I was reviewing the Alumnae Information Services presentation for the Reunion Planning Workshop that I created last year with PowerPoint and was not feeling comfortable with it. Then I read an article that pointed out that many PowerPoint prentations are little more than teleprompter displays for the speakers and are not very helpful in the communication process. Then I came across Presentation Zen, a blog that empasis simplicity in designing presentations. There was an article that contrasted the styles of Steve Jobs of Apple and Bill Gates of Microsoft. It was rather eye opening and I decided then and there to completely rework the presentation with the following goals in mind:
- The presentation by itself would be practically meaningless without the speaker
- No bullet points
- No ugly backgrounds
- Minimal if any transitions
- No animations
- Slides would be more visual and enhance what the speaker was saying and not repeat what the speaker was saying
- One image per slide
- Display no more than 5-7 words per slide
- Provide a detailed handout after the presentation
I was able to stick to most of my goals. I did use one slide with bullet points to summarize some possible future projects. I was not going to use any transitions, but I liked the Fall transition in Keynote that is simple and consistent. Hopefully, the audience will find this year's presentation more engaging, informative and entertaining.
The Washington Post published a timeline of hard drives over the past 50 years and shows how far storage technology has come along. For instance: