Truth 42. Good PowerPoint is more than pretty faces: It starts with writing
The speaker strides to the podium…turns down the lights…presses Advance…and slide by slide, his speech splashes across the screen so everyone can stare at the written words and hear an oral version at the same time. Later you get a handout that’s identical to the slides. A multisensory experience? No, just a boring one.
If this scenario sounds familiar, be warned that it will become even more so. Many business schools are training students to communicate predominantly in PowerPoint. In professional communicators’ circles, however, there’s a growing conviction that PowerPoint is often poorly and inappropriately used.
Yes, PowerPoint can add a visual dimension to what you present. But there are major caveats: It shouldn’t dominate what you want to say. It shouldn’t circumscribe your presentation via its built-in limitations. It shouldn’t draw attention away from you, the speaker, more than momentarily.
Begin PowerPoint as a writing project. Why? Because we think in words, even when the delivery is visual. You need to know what you want to say before you package it. If you start by creating your PowerPoint “deck,” you’ll focus on formatting—instead of content. You’ll inevitably find yourself adapting the material to the template, adding unnecessary copy or visuals to “short” slides, and eliminating important points from over-packed ones.
Also, when you eliminate the structure that writing demands, you won’t have thought through your subject farther than what’s displayed on the screen. You’ll miss chances to deepen your grasp of the subject and limit your ability to field questions. When everything you know is on the screen, your lack of depth shows. You’re stuck with reading your slides.
So, consider developing your presentation through good old Microsoft Word, or scribbled notes, or whatever is comfortable. Then translate this thinking into PowerPoint, and when the format and content don’t jibe well, juggle them till they do. This push-pull process generates good presentations. Have you seen a memorable one lately? Ask the presenter how he or she did it.
Here are ideas for making your presentation effective:
Use the step-by-step strategy to plan your presentation, focusing first on goals and audience—Whom will you address, and what do they want to know? What do they already know? What’s the central message you want to deliver? What’s in it for them? Try to get across three or four main points and marshal your content in support.
Next, map and organize your content, the substance of your “middle section,” and pinpoint any missing information. Aim to build a good lead, like an anecdote—especially appropriate for an oral presentation—and a strong close, perhaps summarizing your conclusions.
Write down your plan, whether in Word or on paper or index cards, and then build your deck.
Think of PowerPoint as a support for your in-person presence, not a substitute—For most of your presentation, the audience’s eyes should focus on you, not the screen. And you, the speaker, should be looking at the audience, not the screen. People come to see and hear a speaker, live and direct. They need frequent eye contact.
Never project everything you’re going to say and then say it—Bored people resist the message.
Sequence the deck logically and build transitions from each slide to the next—Start with a title slide, followed by your agenda—what you’ll talk about.
Anchor each slide with a large-type, one- or two-line heading—Use the screen to stay structured, topic by topic, while you provide fuller information, and to present relevant visuals.
Be creative in structuring the story you tell and how you use the deck—For example, you might define the subject and then head your slides as follows:
What’s the best process for improving…
The best research shows…
Here’s what we learned from looking at our competitors…
Our conclusions…
Next steps…
Questions?
You might actually have only these statements on the screen, and talk to each point. The plus factor is that by shepherding people through your own process, you build buy-in.
Use visuals thoughtfully—A lot of meaningless motion and clip art can be distracting. When you must put a lot of information on a slide—charts, graphs, and other images—keep it visually simple and logical for the eye. Take advantage of the medium’s potential to explain things dynamically. For example, the lines of a graph can move to show change over time, or various elements can be introduced one at a time to make comparisons easier to grasp.
Rehearse!—As many times as you can bear it, practice your presentation aloud, along with the deck. Edit the slides to support your oral delivery and check that they flow right visually. Aim to present without looking at your notes. When you can, use humor, personal anecdotes, and stories to enliven the audience’s experience.
PowerPoint as sole record—For better or worse, the medium is gaining ground as sole record of communication within various industries. Many consulting firms, for example, are using it for all in-house communications, even to communicate with clients, and have simply eliminated use of MS Word or other means of documentation for virtually everything. If you’re working in this kind of environment, how can you avoid PowerPoint pitfalls?
Don’t be a slave to the template. No medium should preempt your thought processes and logic. Work through your message via Word or another traditional writing system. Then translate as necessary to PowerPoint. There’ll be more substance behind the words, concise as they must become. Your ideas will connect better, and your arguments will be more convincing.
Hold on to your goal of thinking and writing well in PowerPoint, as in every medium. You need to know more about your subject than you can show on a set of slides. If you shortcut the writing, you shortchange yourself.