PowerPoint and Presenting Stuff

PowerPoint and Presenting News: March 15, 2016

Slide design depends so much on visual layouts, and Connie Malamed discusses this vital topic in this exclusive conversation this week. She also talks about her new book, Visual Design Solutions. Now that the Morph transition is available in some releases of PowerPoint, why not see what design houses are doing with this exciting new feature? And Damjan Haylor of POPcomms, a UK based design house talks about how they are using Morph so effectively. We then feature Maurizio La Cava, who talks about his MLC add-in for PowerPoint that lets you accomplish your tasks rapidly. Fred Miller is inspired by Apple’s old slogan, “Think Different” — and he finds that it is so valid even today. We also get you a presentation on St. Patrick’s Day and show how you can add your Dubsmash videos to PowerPoint slides on the iPad.

PowerPoint 2016 for Windows users can learn about using custom backgrounds for Slide Masters and Layouts, and also how you can duplicate, rename and edit existing Layouts. You will also explore adding new Slide Layouts. PowerPoint 2013 for Windows users can find out about the under-explored Screen Tips option for hyperlinks. And Sway users can find out about removing and revoking Shares. Finally, do not miss the new discussions and templates of this week!

Read Indezine’s PowerPoint and Presenting News.

Filed Under: Ezine
Tagged as: Ezine, Indezine, News, PowerPoint

Linking to Any File in PowerPoint 2013 for Windows

Although you can link from one presentation to another in PowerPoint, you can essentially use the same concept to link to any other file! You can link to PDFs, Word documents, Excel sheets, video files, and anything else. The link will then open in the associated program. For example, a PDF will typically open in Adobe Acrobat or Adobe Acrobat Reader. Word files will open in Microsoft Word. Of course, this depends on whether you have a suitable program installed on your system!

Learn how you can link to any file from within PowerPoint 2013 for Windows.

Filed Under: PowerPoint 2013
Tagged as: Hyperlinking, Linking, Microsoft Windows, Office 2013, PowerPoint 2013, Tutorials

Eagle PowerPoint Silhouettes

An eagle is one of the symbols frequently used to represent the United States of America. The exact name of this symbol is “The Bald Eagle”, and it gained informal recognition when the Great Seal of the United States which shows this eagle was adopted on June 20, 1782. In this set, we provide you with 4 eagle silhouettes.

Download and use these Eagle silhouettes.

Filed Under: Presentation Bank
Tagged as: Eagle, Graphics, PowerPoint, Shapes, Silhouettes, Visuals

The State of Financial Presentations 2016: Conversation with Dave Paradi

  Dave Paradi has been recognized by the media and his clients as a presentation expert. He has authored eight books and four Kindle e-books on effective PowerPoint presentations. He consults on high-stakes presentations including one used to brief one of President Obama’s cabinet ministers. Dave is one of only fifteen people in North America to be recognized by Microsoft with the PowerPoint Most Valuable Professional Award for his contributions to the PowerPoint presentation community. His ideas have appeared in publications around the world.

In this conversation, Dave discusses his new State of Financial Presentations 2016 survey.

Geetesh: Dave, tell us more about your new survey. Also, how can exploring results from such surveys help us create more effective, financial presentations?

Dave: In 2014 I decided to do a more specific survey than my biennial survey on what annoys people about PowerPoint presentations. I chose financial presentations because my clients struggle with them more than other presentations. I wanted to know what makes those presentations so challenging to understand. By getting the audience perspective, it can help financial professionals make clear, understandable presentations. I am now updating that survey to determine the state of financial presentations in 2016. If you see financial presentations such as budget reviews, monthly financial results, cash flow analysis, capital project rankings, or any other presentations where the goal is to review and discuss financial analysis and decisions, please take the survey (link no longer exists).

Why did I want to update the survey? Because I saw how much the results of the previous survey helped professionals who present financial information. I have seen my clients go from using spreadsheets with hundreds of numbers on a slide to clear graphs that tell the important story senior executives need to know. This leads to quicker decisions and better results. Financial presentations are important to all organizations and are required to be delivered regularly. By adopting the best practices that we learn from the survey, professionals can reduce the time they spend creating these presentations and increase their effectiveness.

Geetesh: You have been regularly creating these surveys which explore reasons for and returns from business presentations. From the findings, what is one thing that has been consistent, and what is it that evolves?

Dave: The unfortunate consistency in the results from all of my surveys is that the major issue in presentations today is information overload. Professionals have difficulty focusing their content down to just what the audience needs to hear. Whether it is a slide full of product features when only two or three are important to this prospect, or a slide full of numbers when only the trend is an important metric illustrates that urgent action is needed, or a slide with a complex process diagram when only a high level of the process is needed, professionals tend to put too much on slides. It leads to audience confusion and delayed decisions. This is probably the key issue I address in my customized workshops.

What I have seen change is organizations starting to see the bottom-line impact of poor presentations. In the past, poor presentations were tolerated. I see that changing. Executives who have to summarize the presentations of their staff to present to senior levels are fed up with the hours they spend at nights and on weekends away from their families trying to figure out what the key messages are from the overwhelm of information they have been provided. They want clear, focused presentations that they don’t have to redo when presenting to the next level up.

Senior decision-makers have also run out of patience with overloaded presentations that they have to try to figure out. They need to make quick decisions in today’s competitive market. They can’t be spending time hoping they figure out slides full of numbers. They pay their staff to figure out the conclusions and they expect a clear conclusion from the analysis that has been done.

Organizations are seeing that delayed decisions and executive overwork have a clear bottom-line impact. They know they need to improve their presentations. Surveys like the one I am conducting now give insight into what audiences think and what they want presenters to do better.

The views and opinions expressed in this blog are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of any other agency, organization, employer, or company.

Filed Under: Interviews
Tagged as: Dave Paradi, Financial Presentations, Interviews, PowerPoint, Survey

Screen Tips for Hyperlinks in PowerPoint 2013 for Windows

We have explored several hyperlinking tutorials in PowerPoint 2013. However, what happens when you hover any of these hyperlinks before you actually click the anchor? Typically PowerPoint just uses something for the Screen Tip (screen tip) when you hover over a hyperlinked slide object. PowerPoint defaults to showing the path to your hyperlink. This can work most of the time, especially if you are presenting and you know what you must click. However, if you need to distribute your slides, it looks more professional if you have a proper screen tip added to your hyperlink.

Explore how you can add screen tips for hyperlinks in PowerPoint 2013 for Windows.

Filed Under: PowerPoint 2013
Tagged as: Hyperlinking, Microsoft Windows, Office 2013, PowerPoint 2013, Screen Tip, Tutorials