Overview – PowerPoint presentations
PowerPoint is a proprietary presentation application developed by Microsoft. It is an easy-to-use and effective way of conveying visual and audio elements to support a verbal presentation. PowerPoint presentations may comprise text, graphics, animation, sound, video and other elements for the purpose of persuasively communicating with employees.
Presentations can be printed on paper or displayed live on a computer, large screen or via a webcast. Multimedia features enable the presenter to display information in concert with their speaking.The overall design of a presentation can be configured using the master slide. Some organisations require all presenters to use a standard-format master slide as the template for their presentations to ensure conformity with corporate identity guidelines.
This tactic is useful for:
✓ Presenting information to persuade your audience.
✓ Enhancing your message and its delivery through a range of features.
✓ Providing a visual aid to your presentations for greater audience understanding.
Things to consider:
⇒ Determine desired outcome: what is the purpose of your presentation and how do you want employees to respond to your communication?
⇒ Determine the three main points you want to communicate. Build your content around those points.
⇒ Tailor your content to meet your audience’s communication needs.
⇒ Remember the beginning and end of your presentation are critical. Employees decide the value of a presentation in the first two minutes. And the concluding messages of a presentation are what an audience walks away with.
⇒ For non-print presentations, keep text to a minimum. Use no more than six bullet points and 24 words per slide. Make text large enough to read easily (minimum 20-point font).
⇒ Ensure the text colour contrasts highly with the background colour.
⇒ Use graphics to illustrate a point wherever possible.
⇒ Rehearse and rehearse. Be well practised because audiences are becoming increasingly more sophisticated and unforgiving.
Create a library of standardised PowerPoint templates for all presenters to use. This ensures a consistent look and feel that aligns with corporate identity guidelines. Include introductory slides with the organisation’s profile and vision, values etc. for use as required. Store these templates on the intranet, together with hints and tips for delivering effective PowerPoint presentations. Also, include in the style guide.
Category: Face to Face