I’ve been regularly visiting ted.com (and if you’re not, you’re missing out on one of the greatest things EVER on the web.) Videos of great talks at these conferences they hold for smart people. I read that one of the rules for TED presenters is that they have to tell their story/teach their lesson in 18 minutes or less. Many of them make use of PowerPoint–or some equivalent. I spend a lot of my time making PowerPoint presentations and giving talks. Over time, I’ve realized that I have been using it wrong. Jamming in too much text, doing overly long presentations, using PowerPoint essentially as a teleprompter for me. So, I’ve been in the process in the last year of making my presentations leaner, my slides more graphically oriented. Really trying to look at DESIGN. Anyway, TED.com is helping me really overhaul the way I do this work.
I find it is a big (and very common) mistake to try to use your PowerPoint project as both your presentation and your takeaway notes. It doesn’t do either very well. If you are teaching/training someone, don’t be so frickin’ lazy and create a separate document for people to work from after your show. For the presentation itself, just put up a few key points that you will be talking to, and a couple of cool images (possibly even relevent to your talk) to keep people’s interest.
djm
one of the things I can’t stand in a presentation is when the presenter, needing to have the Power Point as their prompt, talks TO THE SCREEN and not the audience. At least put the darn lap top in front of you so you can talk “at” that and be facing the audience - even if you don’t have eye contact with them.
I also don’t like the cutesy “moving” graphics, fading, etc. If you want to present a video, make a video. Otherwise, be clear and concise and stop with the “wow” factor.
My boss always sticks a slide from this site somewhere in his presentation:
The world would be a better place if we all stuck to the 18 minute rule. Most things really don’t take that long to say.
T
It’s my belief that the main accomplishment of powerpoint is to turn five minutes of material into three minutes’ worth that takes ten minutes to deliver.
I’ve reached the age at which I can’t remember whether I’ve told a story before or not.
I’m told that in some places, bars have “PowerPoint Karaoke” contests. A PowerPoint presentation is downloaded at random from the Internet, and the game is to see how well the contestant can fake his or her way through the presentation.
I recommend Edward Tufte’s essay “The Cognitive Style of PowerPoint.” Brilliant.
My approach these days: Text belongs in a handout, only graphics go into the PowerPoint.
Here is a piece of Tufte’s in Wired, called PowerPoint is Evil.
I’ve got a new book called “Slidology” which is helping me a great deal.
Actually, in a lot of the long-form professional development things I go to, people seem to be ok with text on the screen, as long as it’s not too extensive. But, I think the habit of text-loading PPTs and just furnishing the “handout” version of the PPT is bit lazy. That said, psychologists and educators freak out if you don’t provide copies of the PPT.
A slice of every audience does, IMO.
You won’t understand most of my PPTs (or at least you’re missing something) unless you heard the talk. Hehehe.
By the way, the “Slidology” book is by Nancy Duarte, who I think designed the Inconvenient Truth slideshow.
I agree with most of you.
Why bother sitting through a potentially boring presentation if the presenter is only going to parrot what they have on the PP slides?