PowerPoint clichés and the global economy

There are some 30 million PP presentations created every day according to scientist John Bohannon.  How many of those presentations are actually engaging in any way?  Think about the amount of billable hours wasted in the interminable mire of monotonous slides.  We all agree.  It is rare to come out of a presentation and say to a colleague ‘that was great, but I wish there had been more slides.’

Think about the endless clichés – the overused quote (complete with ‘funny’ photo of Albert Einstein), the multicoloured visual frenzy of various client logos, unimaginative images of light bulbs, icebergs, people shouting down megaphones and slides with more text than Bleak House punctuated by random bold, upper case and different fonts.

Dr Bohannon suggests a radical alternative.  Dance.  Yes, dance.  What does an image of a bull’s-eye do for anyone other than Ted ‘The Count’ Hankey? (I had to look that up).  Nothing.  What does the image of energetic dancers demonstrating the difference between the movement of photons in everyday light as opposed to in a laser do?  Well, it made it pretty clear to me and it is stuck in my head.

Watch the presentation and decide for yourself, but even if you don’t actually call upon the services of the Rambert Dance Company to add some spice to your next client presentation on the future of regulation, do spend a little more time thinking creatively about what image actually supports and enhances what you are saying.  It takes time and you may not find what you are looking for immediately, but with persistence it will appear and will be well worth it for you, your audience and the global economy.