You’re preparing a PowerPoint presentation, and you have this slide, and you think, “You know what would go nicely right about here? An arrow…”

Hold it right there, buckaroo. Before you go any further, read this post by Joel at Hyde Park Associates. He makes a compelling case for leaving most of those arrows in your quiver:

I looked at over 200 presentations in an attempt to identify the “good, the bad and the ugly” in the use of arrows to illustrate both simple and complex concepts. I regret that I found only one slide that made interesting and effective use of arrows.

The post comes complete with screenshots. (Shudder.)