Purposeful PowerPoint® Pointers: Part Two of Three

STOP using PowerPoint as a delivery mechanism! It is a support media for your message.

This is the second of three articles designed to compel you to start putting the point back in PowerPoint. Here you will discover my next four pointers and why you need an Xtreme PowerPoint Makeover.

Before my next four ideas, let’s see if you can fill in the blanks from my first article:

12. Don’t print your _ _ _ _ _ _ as your _ _ _ _ _ _ _.

11. Don’t “_ _ _” read the slides.

10. Narrate a _ _ _ _ _, headlines on slides.

9. _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ and graphic on every slide.

Having trouble? See part one of this article at this link.

Now my next four ideas…

8. Chunk your information.

You’ve been there. The presenter begins by clicking to bring up the first slide and proceeds to bring on a fire hose of fast and furious content. Within seconds, you are drenched with more bullets, words and logos than you can possibly remember. So what happens next? You check out. You can only drink in one sip at a time. What’s a chunk? Let’s see… According to some researchers it is as little as three to four bits of information at a time. There is other research originating with AT&T from the 1930s suggesting it is seven give or take two bits. Therefore, five to nine bits of information at a time can be suspended in short-term memory before something has to be discarded to make room. Reframe from a fire hose to one squirt at a time.

7. Exclude the extraneous.

If it is not organization mandatory, get that corporate logo off the slide template (unless people will forget who pays their salary). Think about it: we go into mental trances. Some psychologists will tell you that on average we go to Hawaii in our mind 30 percent of the time. Remember that time you showed up at home and didn’t recall the last two traffic lights? Bingo! That logo is visual ammunition to skyrocket me away from the content. When the slide has off-topic visuals, you are sending me someplace other than where you want me to go. Stick to visuals, graphics and icons directly related to the content message you are after visually and verbally.

6. It’s not about you; it’s about them.

Last month at Training 2007 in Orlando, an attendee stopped me after my presentation and said, “It’s so refreshing to be able to read and digest all your minimalist slides [one idea/one supporting graphic]. During the last time slot, I left a session because the presenter projected text too small to read while telling us he knew we couldn’t read it. It drove me nuts!” Wasn’t that expert saying: I want to show you what I want to show you whether you get it or not? PowerPoint is a marvelously intuitive media for visual message delivery. Yet, it is still about the learner or participant. Let’s be the guide on the side, not the sage on the stage who is going to project their expertise whether or not I can read it…

5. Involve your audience at least every eight minutes.

What is the average length of time between commercials on commercial TV? An average of eight minutes—shorter breaks at the end of the show once you’re hooked and more time in between commercials at the beginning of the show so you won’t surf. According to The New York Times, there are now more TVs in the average American household than there are people and graduating high school seniors are watching more TV than they are sitting in class. We are training the MTV/Wii/iPod generation. It’s got to move. It’s got to groove. It’s almost got to multi-task to keep my attention. See an upcoming article, “Interactive PowerPoint: 13 Strategies When You Can’t Change Your Slide Show” for ways to shake it up even when your slides can’t change.

For article one of "Purposeful PowerPoint® Pointers," click here!

For article three of "Purposeful PowerPoint® Pointers," click here!

Submit your creative training ideas to us and perhaps see your name in print! We’re looking for creative five-minute openers or energizers. Submit your idea to ezineeditor@bobpikegroup.com and keep reading The Bob Pike Group ezine.

Betsy Allen was senior vice president of The Bob Pike Group.

This article was re-uploaded from our internal archive.