You CAN Survive, Even Succeed, Without PowerPoint

"His knowledge on that topic is only PowerPoint deep."
~Anonymous Army major quoted on a web site devoted to military strategy

Greetings once again. Isn't it funny how patience pays off with one of those serendipitous moments? Just a few days ago, I was thinking of devoting this issue of my newsletter to PowerPoint. I've taken on this technological monster seven or eight times over the past three years, but I needed a fresh angle. Well, off I went to a Rotary breakfast meeting, and the speaker dropped a beauty right in my lap.

Let me set the scene. Our weekly breakfast happens at six tables plus a buffet table loaded with scrambled eggs, fried eggs, pancakes, quiches, casseroles, bacon, sausage, fried potato patties and all manner of fresh fruit and pastries. This time, an enormous screen had been dropped from its overhead housing over one of the tables, effectively canceling it out as a place to break bread together, and there in front of the room was all the electronic paraphernalia that go with a PowerPoint presentation. I was not excited, and began thinking about slipping out after polishing off a perfectly textured vegetable quiche.

But to my relief, our speaker, a bright young lady who was there to talk about her job as head of the local Red Cross, opened by telling us that she'd run into a techno-glitch and would have to talk from her PowerPoint slides on a laptop. Now, as someone who teaches presentation and briefing skills, I was receptive, and here's how she did:

• She was facing us the whole time, allowing her personality and energy and devotion to the Red Cross to animate her presentation.
• Her gestures and frequent smiles appeared to be quite natural, as she conversed with us in a relaxed and friendly manner.
• Holding our attention, she told stories, which is how adults learn most effectively. The great advantage of stories over bullet points on a PowerPoint slide is that we, the audience, are engaged because we want to hear how each story ends.
• From my vantage point, she never had to pause and read off her laptop. She knew her topic so well -- and was so enthusiastic about it -- that it was conveniently stored in her brain and came out effortlessly. I call that a sure sign of expertise and confidence, and we listened actively, not just politely, which led to a useful Q&A.

I drove home thinking about another PowerPoint moment three years ago when I spent three days running a writing seminar for seven Navy SEALs who, between overseas assignments, were doing staff work at the Naval Special Weapons Development Group in Virginia Beach, Va. To a man, they slammed Power Point for expecting too much of the audience. "You see a Power Point, and you're supposed to be proficient," one SEAL said of the classroom training they often have to sit through. "But it's not enough."

So we worked on presentation training without Power Point. Each one practiced traditional communication, looking from listener to listener as the rest of us played the roles of the generals and admirals and ambassadors and foreign dignitaries who SEALs brief around the world. They went to the whiteboard to highlight key points with a magic marker, maintaining that vital audience contact throughout. They learned to be concise and leave enough room for the questions that any effective presentation is sure to inspire. In other words, they communicated.

Anyone who teaches communications skills for a living would appreciate brief, punchy sentences, particularly this one from Marine Corps Gen. James N. Mattis, commander of the U.S. Central Command: “PowerPoint makes us stupid.”

Enjoy the rest of your summer.

Dave