1. Death by PowerPoint
(and how to fight it)
Alexei Kapterev

2. There are 300 million
PowerPoint users
in the world*
* estimate

3. They do 30 million
presentations
each day*
* estimate

4. About a million
presentations are
going on right now*
* estimate

5. 50% of them are
unbearable*
* conservative estimate

6. LOTS of people
are killing each other
with bad presentations.
NOW.

7. They are all DEAD! Well, almost.

8. A vicious circle
Bad
Bad
presentations
communication
Less
training
Bad
relations
Less
Less
money
sales

9. Let’s make the world
a better place.

10. Why are they doing it?!

11. Research shows:
 Bullets don’t kill people
 People kill people
 Unintentionally
 Yet regularly

12. Mainly due to lack of...
 Significance
 Structure
 Simplicity
 Rehearsal

13. 
Significance

14. Why do you present?
To “pass the information”?
l
Your boss told you to?
l
Or to make meaning?
l

15. What’s the subject and
why it matters to you?

16. How presentations work
 Significance creates passion
 Passion attracts attention
 Attention leads to action

17. Are you passionate?
Check yourself.

18. This is passion.

19. This is passion.

20. This is passion.

21. This is not.

22. Can’t find
the meaning?
Don’t present.

23. 
Structure

24. Structure is how you place the
building blocks of your story.

25. Q: What structure to use?
A: Any – as long as it is:
 Convincing
 Memorable
 Scalable

26. Structure choices
 Problem – Pathway – Solution
 Problem – Solution – Reasoning
 Fancy stuff (if it makes sense)

27. Give 3-4 reasons
supporting your point.
They will not remember
more anyway.

28. }
Memorable opening
1 More details...
1 argument 2 More details...
3 More details...
45
1 More details...
2 argument 2 More details...
minutes
3 More details...
1 More details...
3 argument 2 More details...
3 More details...
Memorable closing

29. You can tell this in...
l 5 minutes
l 15 minutes
l 45 minutes
It is scalable.

30. 
Simplicity

31. Everything should be made as
simple as possible but not simpler.

32. Apparently, being simple
is not that simple.
Will give you some examples.

33. Don’t worry: knowing the
language doesn’t really help.

34. Notice cool background.

35. Hey, we’ve got DATA!

36. This one’s my favorite.

37. Fundamental problem?

38. PowerPoint helps to:
 Visualize ideas
 Create key points
 Impress

39. They use it as:
 Prompter
 Handouts
 Data dumps

40. People read faster than you speak.
This means you are useless.

41. How much is an extra slide?
$0.00. Zero Dollars.
Break it in several. It’s free.

42. What’s the point?
One simple point?
Remove everything else.

43. Well, some are
just hopeless.

44. Ditch stupid “rules”
l Do you remember the rule:
l 7 lines per slide or less
l 7 words per line or less?
l Well, it is just plain stupid
l If you follow this “rule”
l You get a slide like this

45. .
d
Ditch stupid “rules”
e
p.
l Do you remember the rule:
mg
a in
l 7 lines per slide or less
rr
Co
l 7 words per line or less?
l Well, it is just plain stupid
B
l If you follow this “rule”
l You get a slide like this

46. Simple design rules*
 One point per slide
 Few matching colours
 Very few fonts
 Photos, not clipart
* pun intended

47. Less text.
More imagery.
Wild imagery.

48. But what if I need to
send or print the slides?

49. Write a document.

50. The Largest
Leasing Companies
• Hansa Leasing
• РГ Лизинг
• Авангард-Лизинг
• Raiffeisen Leasing
• ММБ-Лизинг
Make 2 sets of slides

51. Print with notes.

52. Inform with little text*
* yes you can

53. 
Rehearsal

54. It will never work completely
for the first time. Trust me.

55. YOU PRESENTATION RECEPIENT
Feedback. Go get some.

56. No audience? Present to the
furniture. But aloud. Try it.

57. Check the room
and equipment.

58. Presentation checklist

59. All this leads to...

60. Wow*
* great presentations

61. Alexei Kapterev
Offshore presentation
design & consulting
ak@realtimestrategy.ru