No thank you

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Please, don’t spoil an empty slide of your talk with a “Thank you”!

I don’t know who started this trend. I confess I have felt into this trap too. But, seriously, what’s the point of spoiling a whole slide at the end of you talk with a mere “Thank you for your attention”?

Do you realise this is the slide that is likely to stay longer on the screen that any another slide of your talk? That this is precisely the moment when people try to digest what you’ve just said and would like some friendly reminders? That they (or at least some of them) think hard about what question they could ask? And that your empty slide not only contains no information, but worse than that, it hides the nice information that was very probably on the previous slide?

So pleeeeaaase don’t do this. Thanking your audience orally is enough! If you really want to leave a written print, insert it at the bottom of your last real slide.

Everybody will thank you for this.