PowerPoint supporting a standup comedian

I stumbled on this recent (June 2008) video of Tim Lee, a comedian who uses PowerPoint extensively.
This was the first time that I saw a “PowerPoint-based comedian”. It looks like he is actually only starting to use all possible creative opportunities. At the moment, there are just (poorly formated) bars with made up statistics. There must be more possibilities here for someone with the combined PowerPoint  (animations, images, colors, etc. etc.) and comedy talents. Unfortunately, I lack the latter... An archive of other PowerPoint comedy videos at Presentation Zen.
at Thursday, October 16, 2008

Correct use of apostrophes and quotation marks

Inspired by a Tweet by Garr Reynolds, I dug up the typography rules for apostrophes and quotation marks. The ' and " that everybody is using because they are conveniently located on a computer keyboard are in fact the characters for feet and inches.
  • ‘ and ’ - the single quotation marks (the right one is the apostrophe), ASCII codes 145 and 146
  • “ and ” - the double quoation marks, ASCII codes 147 and 148
Their use is different in some countries. In the UK, people use single quotation marks, in The Netherlands for example, people use low opening quotation marks. How do you enter them? There are a number of options:
  • ALT+code (Windows only). Swith on your numeric keypad with NUMLOCK (laptop owners read your manual). Hold down the ALT key, now press "0" plus the ASCII code you need on the numeric keypad, the number keys on top of the regular keyboard will not work. For example, an apostrophe would be [ALT] [0146] [release ALT]
  • HTML option 1, for example to display the apostrophe enter ’ (for more ASCII codes see above)
  • HTML option 2, enter & followed by a specific character code, a full list can be found here. Single open: ‘ Single close: ’ (apostrophe) Double open: “ Double close: ”
  • Microsoft Office (including PowerPoint), I use the insert symbol menu option, switch to ASCII decimal code and find the right symbols at position 145-148
Because of the complicated entry, I double check use of quotation marks only in final versions of presentation documents. In email, Twitter, (and even in this blog...),  I will continue to violate the rules and use my feet and inches characters... Sorry. Some other relevant links
  • More info about quotation mark typography, plus the full set of codes for the Apple can be found here. 
  • I am not getting into the subject of grammar, but if you are interested check Wikipedia
  • An amusing set of pictures (including the embedded one) can be found in this blog that is devoted to the subject in its entirety
at Wednesday, October 15, 2008

Merging PowerPoint presentations without mixing up formats

Merging different PowerPoint presentations usually creates format chaos. The slides that are inserted are automatically re-formated in the style of the mother presentation. Especially if you want to make a collage of different presentations with a completely different look and feel, this is a disaster. Simply "ctrl-c / ctrl-v" slides across does not work. One solution is to PDF both presentations, then merge them in Adobe Acrobat. But there is a solution inside PowerPoint as well.
Apple:
  1. In the insert menu, select "slides from"
  2. Select "other presentation"
  3. Here is the trick: click "select slides to insert" rather than "select all slides"
  4. Click insert, wait a few seconds
  5. A window will open from which you can select slides, at the bottom you should click the box "keep design of original slides"
PC (PowerPoint 2007)
  1. In the home ribbon, click "new slide"
  2. Click "reuse slides"
  3. Browse for the file to be inserted
  4. Click the "keep source formating" box
UPDATE: PowerPoint Join seems to be an automated tool developed by Sobolsoft that links PowerPoint presentations together. I have not tried it though.
at Tuesday, October 14, 2008

PowerPoint slides - the only way is up!

When designing a flow, always make sure that the direction of the eye is moving upwards to create a more positive feel of the slide. The horizontal orientation (left-right or right-left) is less important and depends in which part of the world you are living. I use flow charts often when I help startups pitch to a venture capital firm for funding. One of the final slides in the deck talks about milestones and future plans. Without revealing too much detail (in a 25 minute presentation the actual/precise/detailed content of the milestones is strangely enough less relevant, they can be discussed later), the chart should show upward momentum.
at Monday, October 13, 2008

After "beyond bullet points", now "beyond stock images"?

I found this presentation today. Playing around with simple text and fonts on an almost empty screen can sometimes be incredibly powerful, to the extent that you can do without that "stunning" stock image. Watch those fancy fonts though that are not installed on everyone's computer. (I disagree with Seth Godin on this one).
Presenting with text
View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: presentation design)
at Sunday, October 12, 2008

Zuiprezi - non-linear presentation tool

New "in the cloud" presentation development tools seem to be popping up all the time now. Today, I came across Zuiprezi which allows you create a "non-linear" presentation on a large virtual canvas in which you can navigate and zoom your way around. Read a review on CNET, and/or watch the video below. While I see the advantages of a dynamic presentation flow, I still think that in most presentation situations a tightly controlled story line works best, especially when time is scarce, for example in VC startup pitch presentations (25 minutes, that's it). When there is more time, non-linear presentations could work. Especially when a group of people needs to discuss, brainstorm and analyze a complex subject (for example a spaghetti-style workplan for a big engineering project). UPDATE: Another interesting application for this technology might be to visualize complex system dynamics analysis in business. At McKinsey I used to use it (it was called "Business Dynamics" there) to map complex interactions between multiple drivers. This analysis can be very insightful to spot recurring loops (and hence how to accelerate or stop them), but delivers very messy diagrams. See one here. Related postings on my blog: PPTplex, a Microsoft tool for zooming inside PowerPoint
at Saturday, October 11, 2008

Images that stick - this week's Economist cover

Update, a slight show with many Economist covers of the past years warning about the upcoming crisis:
The Economist Covers - The Financial Crisis Evolution
View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: inflation evolution)
at Saturday, October 11, 2008

Book review - Made to Stick by Dan/Chip Heath

Made to stick by Chip Heath and Dan Heath (find it here, affiliate link) is recommended reading for everyone who delivers presentations: it analyzes why certain stories "stick" in people's mind, and why others disappear, almost independent of the content: it's they way that they are told that matters.
  • Keep them simple without creating silly sound bites
  • Add unexpected twists to keep people interested
  • Be specific and avoid fluffy hollow statements (Dilbert mission generator style)
  • Be credible to get people to believe your idea
  • Add emotion to make people care
  • Tell stories
The book is written as a set of stories that are analyzed following the above framework. Sometimes this categorization can feel a bit forced (since most stories combine multiple elements), but generally it works well. Framework or not, the stories inside the book are the real treasure. They are interesting and fun to read (many of them still stick in my head). Besides the big idea of the book there are countless interesting bits of knowledge hidden in the stories. Some examples:
  • The brain stores stories in a "virtual 3D" space. Slightly absurd experiment: people read a sentence about a guy and a shirt slower when the shirt has just been taken off a few seconds ago. Your presentation structure and the structure used to absorb information is not the same
  • Being analytical, logical, thinking of numbers switches off your emotional mood: the mood in which you are most receptive to store information. Think about that when ordering slides
  • The curse of knowledge (actually this is a big idea in the book) prevents people from putting themselves in the shoes of an audience for which a concept that took you 3 years to understand might not sound as obvious as it seems to you
  • Another example of the curse of knowledge: when someone taps a song with his fingers on a table, he/she hears the entire performance including vocals, instruments, etc. A bystander just hears an irregular beat of taps...
  • 70% of learning can happen by just imagining, anticipating, thinking about the task ahead of you (scientifically proven): rehearse, rehearse, rehearse your presentation.
  • Negative "don't", "avoid this", "don't fall in this trap"-type recommendations stick better than positive ones: people learn from mistakes. This goes a bit against my marketing theory in business school though.
This book shows again how important it is to decouple structures you use to solve/analyze a problem from the story you use to tell the solution. Scrap all your analysis, nuances, balanced insights you built up (sometimes over a long period of time) and start with a blank piece of paper to think about the best possible way to tell your message to your audience.
at Saturday, October 11, 2008

Sequoia's 56 page PowerPoint deck of doom

Posted on TechCrunch today. A presentation of VC firm Sequoia to portfolio companies. You can click through it in a few minutes. From a presentation design perspective, not great (i.e., not all slides are perfectly designed with many bullet points, but what do you do if you have to put something together quickly), but not completely bad either. The content is slightly depressing though for startups trying to raise money (many of my clients). CEO_ALL_HANDS_10-7-08_FINAL - Free Legal Forms UPDATE: someone making fun of this presentation here.
at Friday, October 10, 2008

Making dense financial accounting data readable in PowerPoint

With a few tricks you incorporate even the most dense financial accounting data in your PowerPoint presentation. Obviously, these are not the slides for your big idea. Still, you sometimes cannot omit them. For example, VC s would like to see some financials even in a 25 minute pitch deck.
  • Round numbers
  • Sligthly different tints/shades of your color scheme to highlight columns
  • No $ signs inside the data
  • Right-align row labels and numbers
  • Avoid abbreviations as much as you can
Click image for a large picture.
at Thursday, October 09, 2008

Financial crisis - at least there are opportunities for data visualization...

The current financial crisis is a "gold mine" for data visualization. Below is a heatmap taken from a recent IMF report on the world's financial (in)stability. The chart shows how the troubles have spread from subprime mortgages to other asset classes over the course of 2007 and 2008. Many more data visualization examples related to the financial crisis can be found on Paul Kedrosky's "Infectious Greed" blog. I discussed a financial crisis primer in PowerPoint earlier here. More on heatmaps here and here.
at Wednesday, October 08, 2008

UPDATED - VC pitch advice/templates available on the web

I updated an earlier post with VC pitch templates available on the web:
at Tuesday, October 07, 2008
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