Here’s a great TED Talk in which John Bohannon offers a simple alternative to terrible PowerPoint (in the style of Jonathan Swift).

This was a really fascinating TED talk, but the part that really got me was when John introduces his modest proposal.

“I think that bad PowerPoint presentations are a serious threat to the global economy,” he says. To which the crowd chuckles, then erupts into applause and cheering. That statement got the biggest audience reaction of the whole talk.

The world already knows that PowerPoint is boring. They’ve accepted, unhappily, that this is just the way things are. But that doesn’t mean they like it.

But it doesn’t have to be that way. Authors like Garr Reynolds and Nancy Duarte have shown us how to be better. WAY better. But it’s still not something that many people are aware of.

We need to spread the word that there’s a better way! So that people who are still PowerPointing in the dark ages will see the light. The first step to getting things to change is helping people realize that there’re alternatives to terrible presentations.

And the best way to get them to see that is to make your presentations remarkable. We’ll change the world’s thinking, one audience at a time. We can! And we must!

Because I am really NOT much of a dancer.

Have you ever done this? Start with a blank slide. Add bullet after bullet until the slide’s full. Add a tiny image to fill in the white space. Move on to the next slide. I have.

Why do we use Microsoft PowerPoint like it’s Microsoft Word?

A printed document costs money, so extra pages cost more. By filling the page, we’re being cost effective. But slides are free. Using ten costs the same as using one. And it’s much easier for the audience if the slide matches exactly what the speaker’s saying at the moment without reminding them of what was just said or tipping them off as to what’s coming next. Which is why I always offer this advice: one idea per slide.

When you believe in things you don’t understand,
Then you suffer,
Supersition ain’t the way.
– Stevie Wonder

The late, great Mark Twain is quoted as having once said, “It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.” This is almost certainly the case with PowerPoint.

Many of the commonly understood and accepted ways to use PowerPoint are wrong. They’re superstitions that we all believe in (or believed in at one time) for no other reason than everyone else believes in them, too. Five years ago, we all believed our smartphones were really smart. It wasn’t until Apple unveiled the iPhone that we had our first glimpse of what could be. After that, we weren’t satisfied with the status quo we had contented ourselves with just hours before.

Some prevalent PowerPoint Superstitions include:

• Add bullet points until the text box is full.
• Use images to fill up whatever whitespace is left after adding your text.
• It’s good to use lots of different fonts on every slide. People like variety.
• If you decide to make a portion of text bold, it’s good to underline and italicize, too. Extra points for changing its color.
• Random transitions give your presentation the extra-special edginess of uncertainty.

The problem here isn’t that people don’t know what rules to follow. It isn’t that we don’t require everyone to study design in school (although this isn’t a bad idea). It isn’t that there’s no one speaking up about how to do slides a better way.

The problem is that people aren’t aware of the problem. They think they know what they’re doing. They think this is how PowerPoint is supposed to be done. And since they don’t see a problem, they’re not searching for a solution.

I’d like to take just a few minutes to introduce you to a really useful little set of commands in PowerPoint that you may have overlooked in the past: the alignment commands. These are located on the Home tab, in the Drawing section, under the Arrange button.

Ordering Objects

The image to the left displays the list of commands you’ll see when you click the Arrange button. The first four commands, under the Order Objects heading, control the stack order of the elements on the slide. My guess is that if you’ve spent any time at all with PowerPoint, you’re already familiar with these four commands. Bring Forward and Send Backward increase or decrease respectively an element’s position in the stack by one, while Bring to Front or Send to Back move the object all the way to the top or bottom of the stack. But you knew that already.

Sidebar: Did you further know you can use the Selection Pane… command to open a pane that will let you edit the stack order manually? Give it a try sometime.

Grouping Objects

The next three commands, under the Group Objects heading, I assume you know as well. Group, Ungroup, and Regroup allow you to create collections of objects that will behave as one object until released.

Aligning Objects

It’s the next command I’d like to tell you about today. Under the Position Objects heading is a command called Align which has a fly out menu with several options in it, which you can see to the right.

These commands allow you to fine tune the positioning of anything on the slide. The first three commands control horizontal (left and right) alignment, and the following three control the vertical (up and down). This positioning is dynamic, meaning that it changes based on how many objects are selected. If only one object is selected, the object will be aligned to the slide. If two or more objects are selected the objects will be positioned relative to each other.

For example, if only one object is selected when you choose the Align Left command, the left-hand side of the selected object will be moved into alignment with the left-hand side of the slide. If two or more objects are selected when you choose Align Left, then the left-hand side of all the objects will be aligned with the left-hand side of the left-most object. If you want to override this default change in behavior at any time, you can do so by toggling the check box on the menu from Align to Slide to Align Selected Objects, or vice versa.

Align Left, Align Center, and Align Right will only change objects’ horizontal positions. It will not move them up or down at all. Similarly Align Top, Align Middle, and Align Bottom, will only change vertical positons. So if your goal was to have two objects line up right on top of each other, you’d have to choose two commands, Align Center followed by Align Middle or vice-versa.

Distributing Objects

The next two commands, Distribute Horizontally and Distribute Vertically, allow you to space objects evenly between to points. For instance, when you choose Distribute Horizontally, the left-most and right-most objects will not be effected, and the rest of the selected objects will be spaced evenly between the two. These commands only work when three or more objects are selected.

Aligning or Distributing Groups

The alignment commands also work on groups. Suppose you have your objects just the way you want them, but they’re slightly off center. Rather than trying to move them each over a few nudges at a time, you could create a group out of all the objects, align the whole group to the center, then release the group with the Ungroup command.

Alignment is one of the easiest ways to sharpen up the look of your slides. Take some time to experiment with the Align menu and learn how it’s commands behave in various situations. Of course you could always align objects by hand, nudging and positioning things until you have it just right, but learning to use the align tools can be a real time saving trick.

(in no particular order)

The Essence of A Great Presentation
Whitney Johnson – Harvard Business Review

Why Whitespace Matters
Paul Boag – boagworld.com

Fear of Public Speaking
Janice Tomich – janicetomich.com

2010 Annual Top 50: loved.
Bobbi Sheridan & Mike Belschner – bobbiandmike.com/blog

Acceptance Speeches Improved By Strong Openings & More Tips For Better Acceptance Speeches
Lisa Braithwaite - coachlisab.blogspot.com

10 Ways to Prepare for a TED-format Talk
Nancy Duarte – blog.duarte.com

Joseph Campbell on the Hero’s Journey
Jenny Blake – lifeaftercollege.org

Why Do Animated Videos Work?
Lee Lefever – commoncraft.com

6 Ways to Be A PowerPoint Superhero
Jon Thomas – presentationadvisors.com