Presentations are not reading material

The PowerPoint presentation is an endemic part of corporate culture in the Western (and, as far as I know, Eastern) world.

I probably see ten presentations a week, and if you're like me, you'll see about the same. Oddly enough, of those presentations, I probably see the speaker about twice. And of those speakers I do see, I remember nothing of what they said.

So, you say, we've all got problems. What does this have to do with user experience, with interaction design, with information architecture? Because it's a great example of how easy it is to get into a rut of:

• using the same technological solution over and over again
• trying to make one interface fit two (or more) purposes
• not adjusting structure and layout to address your audience
• always using bullet points (I'm kidding here...)

Presentations are often misused as reference material for people who couldn't attend a meeting, or as something to look back on afterwards. This is not what a presentation is for. A presentation is for you to clearly communicate something, in person, to people who are watching you speak.

Reference material for people who couldn't attend a meeting (this is the other eight presentations I see each week) should be proper reference material – a textual summary of the points perhaps, and a paragraph on the general principle or suggestion. The number of presentations I read and think, "This is great reference material" is precisely none.

For people who can attend the meeting, don't give them half-baked reference material. We've all seen these slides a million times – bullet point, bullet point, nested bullet point, bullet point. Do you have a great experience with these presentations? Do you listen to what the speaker actually says, or do you attempt to read the slide?

And why are we using PowerPoint? Not that there's anything wrong with PowerPoint, but has the presenter thought about whether this is the best way to get her message across, or has she just fallen back on a technological solution she knows?

This is why it's relevant to user experience. Most presenters haven't considered their audience: what their audience want to get out of it; what information they want their audience to access. They've provided one PowerPoint interface to fit two completely different needs, and neither of their user groups is going to be happy. They haven't considered all the methods that might be available to help them communicate most effectively, but have instead implemented a technical solution they know they can deliver.

PowerPoint presentations needn't be bad, but because the audience (aka user) is disregarded, and the presenter (aka designer/developer) doesn't have clear vision, they mostly are.

A mini-book PDF on Really Bad PowerPoint, by Seth Godin

An excellent post on Garr Reynolds' Presentation Zen blog, comparing recent presentations by Steve Jobs and Bill Gates

Something we should all do more often