PowerPoint and Presenting Stuff

Steve Jobs and PowerPoint

OK, this is one of those strange things in life that encounters you in a foreign country. Back in May, I was on vacation in Bangkok and ended up in a book store full of Thai computer books. My curiosity led me to find books on PowerPoint and the most prominently displayed book in this section had Steve Jobs on the cover!

At that time, Steve Jobs had already been dead for 7 months, and that wasn’t even the whole irony! That Steve Jobs will teach you how to use Microsoft PowerPoint is more than ironical, it is downright funny! Most people know that Apple’s own Keynote was created especially for Steve Jobs since he did not like PowerPoint a whole lot!

I could not help buying a copy of the book, although I cannot read a word of Thai — this proves that a book can indeed be sold because of its cover! Also found the page listing this book on the publisher’s site, just in case you want to order a copy of the book.

Filed Under: Books
Tagged as: Books, Keynote, PowerPoint

Learn PowerPoint 2010 for Windows: Using Custom Textures as Fill for Text

When you consider using texture fills for your text, you need not limit yourself to only the default textures that PowerPoint offers. You can always explore some third party custom textures including our own Scribble Custom Textures that provide your text with an organic look, as if someone scribbled lines with a pencil to fill them! You can also try some more custom textures from our Ppted Background Texture Collection. In this tutorial you will learn how to use custom textures as fills for your text.

Learn how to use a custom texture as a fill for text in PowerPoint 2010 for Windows.

Filed Under: PowerPoint 2010
Tagged as: Fills, PowerPoint 2010, Text, Tutorials

HBR Guide to Persuasive Presentations: Conversation with Nancy Duarte

  Nancy Duarte has been Principal at Duarte Design since 1990. Her firm is in the heart of the Silicon Valley, and the client list is loaded with Fortune 500 companies. Her passion for business communications that are clear, meaningful and attractive has opened doors for her in a business world full of cluttered and complex visual communications. After authoring two best-selling books, Slide:ology and Resonate, Nancy announced the release of her new book, HBR Guide to Persuasive Presentations.

In this conversation, Nancy discusses her new book.

Geetesh: Your new book, HBR Guide to Persuasive Presentations has been just released – tell us more about what motivated you to write this book?

Nancy: When HBR called me to write this guide book, the premise was “if your boss broke their leg and you had to present in their place, write the one book you’d want to have on your bookshelf”. Well, it’s impossible to be an accomplished presenter in those circumstances, but I wanted to give it a shot to create a reference book that covers everything from creating great content to dealing with stage fright.

Geetesh: Does HBR Guide to Persuasive Presentations build upon your other books, Slide:ology and Resonate – and how can readers of those books benefit from this new one?

Nancy: This book has some concepts from Resonate and Slide:ology, but has much more than just message and slides. This book has some visuals but is mostly a book written in prose that covers:

1. Know your audience and build empathy
2. Develop persuasive content
3. Use storytelling principles and structure to engage your audience
4. Identify the best modes for communicating your message
5. Conceptualize and simplify the display of information
6. Deliver your presentation authentically
7. Measure and increase your presentation’s impact on your audience.

You May Also Like: Excerpts from HBR Guide to Persuasive Presentations

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

Filed Under: Interviews
Tagged as: Books, Interviews, Nancy Duarte, PowerPoint, Presentation Skills

Learn PowerPoint 2011 for Mac: Changing Bullet Styles

In spite of the repeated cries about how bullets can cause “death by PowerPoint”, bulleted paragraphs are still being used in PowerPoint. We won’t go into whether or not you should use bulleted paragraphs in your slides — suffice to say that too much of anything cannot be good! However most PowerPoint slide layouts are already set up with placeholders for bulleted lists (or paragraphs), so that when you start typing into a text placeholder, your text is automatically bulleted. Sometimes making some changes to the appearance of your bullets can make a difference. We show how you can change the bullet styles for your text placeholders (or text boxes) in PowerPoint 2011.

Learn how to change the bullet styles of selected text in PowerPoint 2011 for Mac.

Filed Under: PowerPoint 2011
Tagged as: Office for Mac, PowerPoint 2011, Text, Tutorials

Using Stock Photos and Diagrams in Business Presentations

By M. S. Ramgopal

Business presentations are increasingly becoming visual. Slide decks are being used more as visual aids for audiences than as memory joggers for presenters. In this article, we explore the specific roles played by two common visual tools -viz. stock photos and diagrams in business presentations.

The Difference Between Stock Photos and Diagrams

Even though the terms photos and diagrams are quite common, the difference between the two tools is not clearly defined. So, let us take a minute to spell out the difference as we see it:

Read the rest of this entry »

Filed Under: Guest Posts
Tagged as: Graphics, Guest Post, PowerPoint