What is a good PowerPoint presentation?
Based on presentation slides used for a group presentation, I will discuss on what can be improved. The slides were very simple; mostly words and two pictures were used. One of the tips for a successful presentation (n.d.) is combining photos, charts and graphs and even embedding digitized videos with text, will add variety and keep your audience interested in the presentation. Therefore, to improve the presentation, more visual examples should have been used.
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| Example of the slide with pictures. |
According to Putnis and Petelin (1996), It is important to align all the elements on each page (or slide) orderly. Below is an example of a presentation slide that is not properly aligned and therefore more difficult to read.
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| Slide with messy text placement. |
The slide also seems too cluttered. This is also a bad example as Reep (2006) describes that white space is actually the most important format element because, without it, most readers would quickly give up trying to get information from a document.
In terms of content, some of the points can be difficult to understand if you are not familiar with the topic. A piece of advice given by Sandman (2008) is ‘Don’t use jargon to impress. If you can live without the word, cut it. If you absolutely need to use it, define it.’
Lastly, there shouldn’t be too many slides in a presentation, so it is important to make slides as efficiently as possible (Marquez n.d.). There were 20 slides in the total presentation. Fewer would have been better.
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| The entire presentation had 20 slides. |
When giving a presentation, the purpose would be to present information to your audience. Therefore, it is important that that information is presented clearly and efficiently through an easily understandable presentation. If that is achieved, then it should be counted as a success.
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References
Russell, W n.d., 10 Tips for Creating Successful Business Presentations, About.com Guide, viewed 28 August 2010, <http://presentationsoft.about.com/od/powerpointinbusiness/tp/bus_pres_tips.htm>.
Putnis, P & Petelin, R, 1996, Writing to communicate, Professional communication : principles and applications , Ch. 7, pp. 223-263.
Reep, DC 2006, Document Design, Technical writing, 6th ed., Ch. 6, pp. 133-172.
Marquez, ZL n.d., How to Make a Good PowerPoint Presentation, Ezine articles, viewed 28 August 2010, < http://ezinearticles.com/?How-to-Make-a-Good-PowerPoint-Presentation&id=4313178>.
Sandman, PM, 2008, Simplification Made Simple, The Peter M. Sandman Risk Communication Website, viewed 28 August 2010, <http://www.psandman.com/col/simplify.htm>.
