Plan the reading order
Supply the audience, decision, source material and required coverage. Review the outline before generating. For a QBR, keep results, variance, risks and next decisions distinct instead of mixing them into a status collage.
Agenda Slide
An agenda slide sits after the title slide and tells the audience what the session will cover, in what order, and what it is for. The version that works states outcomes, not topics — "Agree the Q4 budget" rather than "Budget". Three to five items, and a timing column only when the session runs longer than 30 minutes.
Last reviewed: August 2026
Lumen · real output
Read the deck before you choose the workflow.
Open an actual exported deck, then compare its outline, source constraints and slide choices with the job you need to finish.
Investor Brief: Why Grid Battery Storage Is Growing
A 12-slide investor brief on grid battery storage, built only from two public EIA articles: how much capacity the U.S. has and how fast it grew, what is planned for 2026 to 2028, and how storage earns revenue. It has no product, traction or ask slides, because the articles supply none and Lumen did not invent them.
Inspect the source brief or data
An investor narrative for a company that is raising money; no company is named and nothing is known about it. Build the market context and the case for why now from the supplied pages only: how large and how fast utility-scale battery storage has grown, what is planned next, what the largest facilities are, and how storage earns revenue, as the pages describe it. The company's product, traction, financials, team and the amount it is raising are not supplied, so leave those slides out: do not invent them, and use no placeholders and no illustrative numbers. Every figure must come from the supplied pages. Workflow: Startup fundraising. 12 slides requested. Documents supplied as text (EIA, "U.S. battery capacity increased 66% in 2024 (Today in Energy, 12 March 2025)", https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=64705; EIA, "Battery storage capacity averaged 70% growth over the last three years (Today in Energy)", https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=67925).
Read the sample review notes
A separate reviewer agent read the deck’s 86 claims, slides and speaker notes, against the two EIA articles: 69 are supported, 11 loosen or go a little beyond their wording, 6 are in neither article and none contradicts one. Three of the six are the deck’s opinions or advice about the opportunity; the other three say how big storage is on the grid or how fast it is growing in comparison, which the articles do not say. It is not a person’s review.
Refine at the right scope
Edit structured slide fields, preview field alternatives or review a whole-slide rewrite. Ask Lumen can propose wider changes; inspect and select the changes before applying them to the saved deck.
Inspect the actual handoff
Check charts, speaker notes, images and contrast in presentation view and the downloaded file. A new-period deck is a separate draft with changed values and sources to review.
Outline planning and field alternatives
Choose a creation mode and workflow profile, supply source material and review the planned coverage. Slide fields have layout-specific budgets. Field assistance offers alternatives with rationale and word counts; whole-slide refinement shows field-level changes. Ask Lumen can propose wider structural edits, which require a reviewed preview before application.
Data, themes and the next reporting period
Paste spreadsheet rows, choose header handling and preview replacement chart data. Where offered, select Business metrics explicitly and inspect their source receipt. Review changes in values and sources before accepting a next-period draft. Theme controls cover brand colors, type, logo placement, background and contrast choices; a custom theme still needs visual review.
Presenting and the exported deck
Inspect full-screen and audience views, speaker notes, next-slide preview, navigation and timer. Check PDF and PowerPoint separately. Supported elements can become native editable shapes or charts; complex visuals can use a flattened fallback. Speaker notes and per-slide handoff choices should be inspected in the actual file.
PowerPoint export is hybrid: supported content may remain editable while complex visuals can be flattened. Conversion between a responsive story and slides requires a preview; it is not lossless.
Outcome-led beats topic-led
Most agenda slides list nouns. Nouns tell the audience what you will talk about; verbs tell them what will be different by the end. The second is what makes people stay attentive.
| Topic-led (weak) | Outcome-led (strong) | Why it works |
|---|---|---|
| Budget | Agree the Q4 budget envelope | Names the decision, so the room knows a call is coming |
| Q3 results | What changed in Q3 and what it means for Q4 | Implies analysis rather than a data dump |
| Roadmap | Confirm the two features we are cutting | Sets up the hard conversation instead of burying it |
| Next steps | Assign owners and dates for the migration | Makes the close concrete and accountable |
| Questions | Open questions we need answered today | Signals that questions have a purpose, not just time to fill |
Agenda slide examples by deck type
Board meeting
- Performance against plan — 15 min
- Decision: approve the Q4 hiring plan — 20 min
- Risk register review — 10 min
- AOB and close — 5 min
Sales or client meeting
- What we heard from your team
- Where the current process is costing you
- How we would approach it
- Commercials and next step
Workshop
- Frame the problem — 10 min
- Generate options in pairs — 25 min
- Score against the criteria — 20 min
- Agree the top three and owners — 15 min
Webinar
- The problem we keep seeing
- Live walkthrough
- Results from three teams
- Q&A — last 15 minutes
Conference talk
- Why the standard advice fails
- What we tried instead
- What the data showed
- What you can apply on Monday
When to skip the agenda slide
An agenda slide is a cost as well as a service: it spends your first 30 seconds on administration at the moment attention is highest. Cut it when:
- The talk is under 10 minutes. Just start. A four-item agenda for a seven-minute talk is a fifth of the runtime.
- It is a pitch. Investors want the hook, not a table of contents. Open on the problem or the traction.
- The audience set the agenda. If they wrote the brief, reciting it back reads as filler.
- You are the fourth speaker. The audience has seen three agenda slides already.
- The deck is a leave-behind, not a talk. A contents page with slide numbers serves better than a session agenda.
The one case where it always earns its place: any session where a decision is required.
Naming the decision on the agenda slide means nobody can claim at minute 45 that they did not know a call
was being made today.
How to write an agenda slide
1
Write the outcome of the session first
One sentence: what is true at the end that was not true at the start. Every agenda item should serve it.
2
Cut to three to five items
More than five stops being an agenda and becomes a contents page. Group the small items.
3
Start each item with a verb
Agree, confirm, review, decide, assign. This converts topics into outcomes.
4
Add timings only past 30 minutes
Short sessions do not need them, and published timings you then overrun cost you credibility.
5
Mark the decision point
If a call is being made, flag which item it is so attendees know when to be present.
Frequently asked questions
What is an agenda slide?
A slide near the start of a presentation that lists what the session covers, in order. The strongest version states outcomes rather than topics, so the audience knows what will be decided or resolved.
Where does the agenda slide go?
Immediately after the title slide, before any content. In longer sessions people also repeat a dimmed version as a divider between sections to show progress.
How many items should an agenda slide have?
Three to five. Beyond five it becomes a contents page and stops being scannable in the few seconds it is on screen.
Should an agenda slide include timings?
Only for sessions longer than about 30 minutes, or any working session where you need to protect time for a specific item. For a short talk, timings add clutter and create a promise you may break.
What is the difference between an agenda slide and a table of contents slide?
An agenda describes a live session and is time-bound. A table of contents describes a document and usually carries slide numbers for navigation. Leave-behind decks want the latter.
Do pitch decks need an agenda slide?
Generally no. Investors want the problem or the traction in the first 30 seconds, and an agenda slide delays it. Use the time for the hook instead.
What should an agenda slide look like?
A numbered list in the deck's own theme, text large enough to read from the back, and no decorative icons competing with the words. If you use timings, right-align them in their own column.
Should I repeat the agenda between sections?
In sessions over about 45 minutes it helps, with completed items dimmed and the current one highlighted. In short talks it wastes slides.
Related slide and deck guides
Updated
More from Gixo