The moment a deck leaves the agency it starts to change. Reps add slides, delete slides, and paste screenshots. In three months the German team has a different story from the Spanish team.
Design for editing
- Use the slide master, not floating text boxes
- Ship a “slide library” of approved extra slides
- Keep speaker notes in all languages
Translate the master, not the deck
When the master is translated once, every new slide inherits the right fonts and labels. We treat the master as a product in its own right.
Update, October 2026: version numbers
Since this post was first published we added one more rule: every deck carries a visible version number on the last slide, in every language. It is the fastest way to spot which team is presenting last quarter’s story.
