For presenters who rely on PowerPoint to provide visual support for their speeches, it’s no small irony that text builds are called 'bullet points.'  Armed with PowerPoint design templates, an efficient presenter can quickly load and fire off enough rounds of deadly text bullets to send stunned audience victims scurrying for cover. 'Death by PowerPoint' is a ruthlessly cruel way to go. When you think about it, bad PowerPoint has murdered presentations the way bad karaoke has killed live music performance in bars.  
 
Is PowerPoint evil?
In 2003, Yale University's Edward Tufte wrote his now-famous essay for Wired magazine, "PowerPoint is Evil" [September, 2003.]  As Professor Tufte wrote, "Power corrupts. PowerPoint corrupts absolutely. The standard PowerPoint presentation elevates format over content, betraying an attitude of commercialism that turns everything into a sales pitch.  Audiences consequently endure a relentless sequentiality, one damn slide after another." 
Unfortunately, little has changed in the years since the article was written, except that Microsoft has added even more ways to fling, flip and spin bullet points at the audience.
 

Here at Mills James, we have a surprising fondness for PowerPoint -- but not for the reasons you'd think.  Fundamentally, we believe 'PowerPoint doesn’t bore people – people bore people.'  

PowerPoint DOES have its advantages, though.  As a tool to easily sequence and present content, PowerPoint is unexcelled as a slide manager.  And it's everywhere.  In classrooms, fourth-graders are using it for show and tell.  It's as common as a can opener.
 
But as a design and visualization tool, PowerPoint IS evil.  Just because you can spew moving text on the wall in a dozen fonts doesn't mean you're communicating with your crowd.  A hail of flying bullet points can't replace a riveting message and a compelling delivery style.
 
PowerPoint redeemed
But an interesting thing happens when you match a talented presentation designer with a folio of speech content and a current version of PowerPoint -- eye-appealing visuals unite with relevant audio and video content as a powerfully effective communication resource.  Then when it's under the control of a speaker with a polished stage presence, the result is a presentation that actually engages audiences and tells important stories in compelling ways.  People pay attention.  Learn. Understand. And act.
 
The value formula
Some of our corporate executive clients have perfected their recipes for building effective PowerPoint presentations on a budget.  At Mills James, we start with an appealing PowerPoint skin -- not a stock-issue PowerPoint template, but a custom look we've developed just for their brand or especially for their meeting/event.  Then they populate that template with their own presentation content, using their administrative support people to load images and build first-draft text and chart sequences. Once the raw presentations are done, they email or FTP the PowerPoint files back to Mills James where our presentation designers finesse the presentations with improved graphics and imagery, consistent formatting, graceful transitions and optimized audio, video and animations.  This formula provides the best value -- presenters handle the DIY stuff so the pros only need to focus on the technology and the touch-ups. 
 
We believe in PowerPoint -- but only when it's used as support for the presentation, rather than as the presentation itself.  In the end, the presentation isn't done just because the PowerPoint file is complete.  Good presenters rehearse.  Great ones shoot video of their rehearsals to see themselves objectively, the way their audience will.  They use their emotions and converse with the audience rather than 'perform.' They tell stories; talk with their hands; fully use the entire presentation space and don't rely on the screen alone to do ALL their heavy lifting.
 
Great PowerPoint presentations serve both the speaker AND their audience.  For the presenter, they're easy and natural to use -- rather than as prompters or crutches for the ill-prepared. For audience members, the best presentations are created with respect for their backgrounds and frames of reference.  Bullets? They're fine for deer season, not so much for presentations.

PowerPointless -- As written by John Aldrich, Vice President, Creative Meetings and Events, Mills James