Q1 2026 Earnings Season: 3 Resources Worth Your Time
With Q1 earnings season underway, we pulled together three resources that may be useful as you prepare, review, or refine your earnings materials.
I. How to Make Your Earnings Story Clearer and Repeatable Using this Four-Part Framework
If your earnings presentation has the right content but still feels a bit loose, this framework is a simple place to start. This is also helpful if you feel like you’re reinventing the wheel each quarter.
Our four-part framework recommends a structure for your earnings deck. Essentially, your deck flow should look like: 1) Earnings Highlights, 2) Business Updates, 3) Financials, and 4) Guidance. The goal is to make the quarter easier to follow, and to give your team a structure it can come back to quarter after quarter.
The full article walks through what each section should do, how they work together, and where teams often make the story harder to follow than it needs to be.
📌 Read the full framework and examples here.
II. How to Cover a Routine Acquisition During Earnings
A routine (or smaller, relatively speaking) acquisition can be tricky to cover during earnings calls.
Spend too much time on it and it can feel overplayed. Mention it too quickly and investors are left filling in the gaps.
This article looks at a simple way to cover a smaller, routine deal without letting it crowd out the broader earnings story. We focus on what investors usually need to understand: why the deal makes sense, what it adds to the business, and how it fits the larger strategy.
We also share a “strawman slide” you can use as a starting point, plus real examples from earnings materials.
III. How to Make Your Earnings Deck Carry the Narrative (FICO Case Study)
If your earnings deck mostly serves as a backdrop for prepared remarks, it could be doing a lot more.
When we worked with FICO, the goal was to build an earnings presentation that carried the story on its own, one that complemented prepared remarks during the call and traveled well after it. The result was a deck investors could follow clearly with or without the commentary.
The case study breaks down how we structured it, and how you can apply the same approach to your own earnings materials.
📌 Read the full case study here.
Along similar lines, see how Linamar shortened prepared remarks by 30% by making the earnings story simpler, and more focused.
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