PowerPoint Presentation

PowerPoint basics:Planning your content

KerryJOnline Learning SpecialistAustralian Institute of Social Relations

This presentation is about good practice in the use of PowerPoint for presenting information and engaging audiences. It will not cover technical nuts and bolts or the mechanics of the software.

If you have been using it for years, consider this a review and please provide your insights and suggestions.

If you are a first time user, this will help you in planning PowerPoint and other types of presentations.

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YAY it was BORING!

Said no one. EVER.

Audiences want you to succeed. No one wants to be a meeting or presentation hostage. They want engaging, useful information.

What can you do to fulfil their expectations?

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Tell a story

The advice we hear repeatedly is Tell a Story. Its pretty fair advice. Storytelling is an ancient way of imparting knowledge and wisdom in ways that are memorable.

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2DrKmpuKhKE

The tortoise and the hare

Aesop's Fablesor theAesopicais a collection offablescredited toAesop, aslaveand story-teller believed to have lived inancient Greecebetween 620 and 560 BCE.

How many of you have heard the story the Tortoise and the Hare?

The moral of the story was Slow and steady wins the race but what were the other, more subtle messages? Why tell this story of a race between two fictional characters rather than just impart the moral?

If you havent read or seen the story of the tortoise and the hare, click the link to watch an 8-minute, 1944 cartoon version that encapsulates the themes and has a bit of fun with it.

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Who are they?

Image Microsoft

But in telling any story, consider your audience. Who are they? Demographics, culture, education, knowledge of your topic. You might not use Aesops fables for a sophisticated business audience but you could find other stories or case studies to illustrate your points.

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WHERE are they?

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And where are they going to be? Are you presenting to 5 or 10 people around a conference table? In a private home or casual setting? Or to hundreds in a lecture theatre?

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Tell a story

relevant

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So telling stories is great but telling RELEVANT stories is better. Do you use stories or case studies with your audiences/learners/students? Why or why not? How do you use them? Do you change them based on the mood of the audience?

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Here is one way NOT to tell a story and thats by posting pages of your story on your presentation slides!

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I can read!

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People who can read faster than you are going to be bored.

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What was that?

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People who read more slowly than you or have language issues are going to be distracted by your talking.

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Is that text?

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And if you didnt plan for a large venue, people in the back of the room are going to have a hard time making out the 18-point font that looks so big on your computer monitor.

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Text and bullets

On-slide text.

Vendetta Vain 21 by Brian Shannow CC by nc nd http://www.flickr.com/photos/shannow/4302194447/

Its not about YOU.

On-slide text and bullet points are for your audience to have an anchor or reinforcement of sorts for your main points. Its NOT about you.

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Text and bullets

THIS is about you.

PowerPoint makes an area available below your slides to enter the text of your notes. You can then print out your note pages and reference them during your presentation. So keep your notes to yourself.

But how do you do that when you have so much to cover?

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One idea per slide

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Plan your slides so that you only cover ONE idea per slide.

It can be a main topic that supports the overall theme or subject of your presentation or can be a supporting idea of a topic. But dont give your audience or yourself too much to think about at once.

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Complex idea?break it downprepare your audiencedemonstratetalk it out

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Got a complex idea you need to cover?

There are several strategies that dont involve filling your slides with text. Which ones will work for you will depend on the context. Sometimes you have been asked to present information on a specific topic and thats that.

However there are several strategies that can work for you.

You can break down your idea into sub-ideas, prepare your audience in advance of your presentation, demonstrate your idea or talk it out. Lets look at each one in turn.

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Main idea breakdown

Topic 1

Topic 2

Topic 3

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Break down your complex ideas until no more than one idea fits on a slide.

Start by providing an overview of the topic and just list the sub ideas youre going to cover without going into detail, so that your audience can see the relationship between the ideas youll be covering.

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Topic 1

Point 1

Point 2

Point 3

If you can get a sub ideas main points to fit on one slide with no more than three very short bullet points to serve as attention anchors, youve broken it down well.

Introduce the points one at a time.

If your sub idea has more than three bullet points, group your points into sub categories and break them down further.

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Point 1

Sub point a

Sub point b

Sub point c

Some sub-ideas might have supporting ideas that need to be broken down further and thats okay.

Remember not to overwhelm your audience with too much information at once. Introduce the point thats being broken down and relate the sub points to it.

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Sub point a

And if the sub points need lengthy explanation, break things down further until you have the one idea, one point that needs to be wrangled with and understood.

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Point 1

Sub point a

Sub point b

Sub point c

However, remember to go back UP the chain when youve finished and remind the audience of the relationships that exist between the sub points --

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Topic 1

Point 1

Point 2

Point 3

And the relationship between the main points

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Complex ideas

Topic 1

Topic 2

Topic 3

And bring people back to the overall idea so they get a sense of how the categories and sub-ideas relate to each other.

Does the method of drilling down and then moving people back up again make sense to you?Do you think it makes more sense than keeping all the topics and subtopics on one slide? Why or why not?

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Complex idea?break it downprepare youraudiencedemonstratetalk it out

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Weve looked at breaking down complex ideas when presenting.Now lets look at another strategy for presenting complex ideas: preparing your audience.

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Prepare your audience

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Consider asking your audience to prepare in advance of your face to face time.

Consider putting together some key readings and making those available.Pointing them to a video to watch or an audio recording to listen to prior to your presentationOr ask them to collect questions or viewpoints about a specific topic in advance so they are primed to contribute.

If you are presenting as part of formal learning, you may consider putting this information online and requiring learners to take a quiz or submit a short assignment to ensure they read and understood the basics of the material.

Your presentation can then emphasise the important facets of the topic and further support their understanding.

This is called flipping your classroom where you save your face to face time for engaging interaction or in-depth explorations of topics and provide underpinning knowledge resources for people to complete in their own time.

Even in informal presentation environments or one-off workshops, you could ask that people at least watch a YouTube video, read an article online or one you send via email or post or ponder a question.

How could this work for you with your audiences?

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Complex idea?break it downprepare youraudiencedemonstratetalk it out

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Weve looked at breaking down complex ideas and preparing your audience, lets look at the third strategy that of demonstrating.

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Demonstrate

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When you get on a plane, the air hosts do not break out a bullet-laden PowerPoint. They have no idea what language you speak or if you can read. Instead, they demonstrate the use of the safety equipment or show a video that does so.

Think about a simple concept like using a doorknob to open a door. If someone had never seen one before, would you whip out a Powerpoint? Or just show them?

Role plays can also be far more powerful than PowerPoints for demonstrating complex ideas. Use the PowerPoint to introduce the idea, drive it home with a role-play. I know of one instructor who introduces himself as the embodiment of an idea, issue or topic and then gets people to ask him questions. (Prejudice, domestic violence).

What could you do?

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Complex idea?break it downprepare youraudiencedemonstratetalk it out

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The last way of introducing a complex idea is to talk it out.

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Talk it out

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Put a concept on a slide then get people talking.

Abstract ideas like culture, what if scenarios involving more concrete concepts, asking a group to discuss the practical applications of a piece of legislation or policy to their work or to share their experiences.

Obviously this isnt going to work in all situations. Sometimes you are presenting a sales presentation or have been asked to deliver information on a specific topic.

What are some examples you can think of? Do you do this already?If not, would this work for the presentations you give? Why or why not?

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Complex idea?break it downprepare youraudiencedemonstratetalk it out

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Any final thoughts on strategies for presenting on complex ideas?

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Id like to wrap up and present the three key points Id like you to take away. (Puns intended)

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Text and bullets

Notes go HERE.

3.

Number 3: Keep your notes to yourself. Slides are for your audience and they dont need to see full sentences and your entire thought process. And whats more, they dont want to.

YOU are what adds value to your presentation. If people can get the breadth and depth of your information from reading the slides you arent doing your job.

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One idea per slide

2.

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Dont confuse your audience and crowd your slides break down your ideas to one per slide.Allow your audience and yourself concentrate on one idea at a time.

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Its about THEM.

1.

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Number one find out as much as you can about your audience before you plan your presentation.Then ensure everything you do is all about THEM.

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Questions?

Always allow sufficient time for questions after every main topic but ESPECIALLY at the end. Questions not only allow for interaction and participation they provide you with insights as to whether youve covered the topic sufficiently. And presenters often learn a lot from the questions audiences pose.

If you dont get questions ask the audience to answer some to get a discussion going. When people get the idea you care what they think, theyll respond.

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KerryJOnline Learning SpecialistAustralian Institute of Social Relations

e k.johnson@rasa.org.au

PowerPoint basics:Planning your content

Thank you for your attention.

In case you didnt notice, all the images in this presentation - with the exception of my photo taken with my web cam and one free Creative Commons licensed photo I found on Flickr - were free MS clip art illustration and photo images and are copyright Microsoft or the related licensors.

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