RTE's Business programme asked me to talk about PowerPoint's 25th birthday and whether the application is 'over the hill' now.

1. ? What’s the point of PowerPoint What’s the point of PowerPoint ?

2. These drop-in text boxes are intended to provide a narrative voice for this stand-alone presentation.

3. Happy birthday PowerPoint Happy birthday PowerPoint So, PowerPoint has turned 25.

4. And most people think it sucks

5. Because most presentations suck

6. THE SHORT VERSION Why do most presentations suck?

7. Because people are lazy …

8. … selfish …

9. … imitative …

10. … and heedless.

11. Why are so many PowerPoint presentations so BAAAAAAAD? (The real problem?)

12. FAR TOO MANY Because we deliver of the wretched things

13. We use PowerPoint as an AutoCue

14. We use PowerPoint as a brain dump

15. We use PowerPoint when we should be using email

16. And we use it to (badly) summarise hefty reports

17. Most PowerPoint presentations should come with a warning label …

18. It’s difficult to know which slice of the pie your presentation is in

19. You can ask her, but your mother is just not a valid test audience …

20. That’s lovely dear. Very nice!

21. Most audiences aren’t quite this overt in their feedback

22. And your friends and colleagues usually aren’t sufficiently clear with their feedback either …

23. You totally suuuuuuck! Although sometimes they can be quite direct

24. A handful of ideas

25. When is PowerPoint not the tool of choice?

26. IDEAS Presentations are about

27. WORDS And you speak lots of to convey those ideas

28. So this becomes a very important concept … wpm

29. 150 wpm Most people speak at

30. Which means that for a 10 minute talk, you will speak …

31. 1,500 words

32. How many words are in your PowerPoint file? (check its ‘Properties’)

33. 50% If the wordcount in your file is about of the words you are going to say

35. Because if you just read to them, your audience will shut down … No matter how fast you speak, your audience can read a lot faster

37. And if you use PowerPoint as an AutoCue for your benefit …

38. … rather than as a visual aid for their benefit … (Pavement chalk art by Kurt Wenner)

39. … they will switch off

40. PowerPoint has to pass the 60mph challenge

42. If your slides are cluttered and complex, if they don’t get the essence of what you are saying at a glance …

43. … you will lose your audience

44. The 60mph Challenge Look at the following slide for 3 just seconds

46. Any doubts about what they’re selling and what the benefits of the product are? Now, click on to the next slide for 3 just seconds

48. No wonder PowerPoint makes so many people so unhappy

49. Lousy PowerPoint is costing you money!

51. Death by incomprehensible flowchart

52. Death by data dump

53. Death by hideous templates

54. Death by lazy-ass, cluttered, crud

55. You need safety equipment to sit through this kind of material!

58. Imagine if actors behaved that way …

59. Or stand-ups …

61. And you’d be right to get upset; tickets to shows cost a lot of money these days

62. Well guess what? Every lousy presentation you sit through costs you money too …

63. You’re either paying the bozo who is presenting to you

64. Or losing out on an opportunity cost basis

65. “ Up with this I will not put!”

66. Stay the hell away from PowerPoint for as long as you can

67. If you’re starting to put a presentation together …

69. Start here

70. Jot down a few key thoughts

71. Then build your structure

72. Write up your words (1,500 per 10 minutes)

73. Then you can think about how PowerPoint might help you get those ideas across

74. The top 3 differences between the good and the great

75. REHEARSAL

76. REHEARSAL

77. REHEARSAL

78. “ All the world’s a stage and most of us are desperately unrehearsed”

79. Common Objection #1

80. But we never have time to rehearse around here!

81. (translation)

82. I couldn’t give a damn about (a) my audience or (b) the outcome of this presentation

83. Common Objection #2

84. Yeah … rehearsal is great, but I don’t want to end up sounding stale

85. Try telling that to Meryl …

86. … or Dylan …

87. or Leonard …

88. All these professionals do you the courtesy of rehearsing and honing their performances until they are jaw-droppingly good. Operative word: Professional

89. John Lennon’s advice to bands starting out …

90. “ You need to spend 100 hours practising in the garage for every hour you will be playing on stage”

91. Imagine the difference even a tenth of that effort would make to your next presentation (Besides which, you can’t argue with John – he was The Walrus)

92. So, happy birthday PowerPoint So, happy birthday PowerPoint But never lose sight of this …

93. PowerPoint is not the presentation. You are.

95. © Fortify Services 1993 - 2009 presentingissimple.blogspot.com Lots more ranting on this topic at:

96. It usually takes more than three weeks to prepare a good impromptu speech