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PowerPoint
may have been partially responsible for the disaster of the Space
Shuttle Columbia, according to the Columbia Accident
Investigation Board. In a report, the board argued that NASA
had become too reliant on PowerPoint.
The specific
cause of the disaster was the ship’s foam insulation. But the
New York Times reported recently that when NASA engineers
presented findings of the wing damage during the mission, the
PowerPoint presentation was confusing and may have worsened
the situation. The engineers tried to present too much
data. The slides were crammed with confusing information.
“It’s easy
to understand how a senior manager might read this PowerPoint
slide and not realize that it addresses a life-threatening
situation,” the board noted.
The NASA
engineers made the same mistake that many people make when
using PowerPoint: They try to cram too much data into a
slide. Here are a couple of guidelines to remember next time
you create a PowerPoint presentation.
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Limit the slides: Too many slides
will kill any presentation. In a half-hour presentation,
you should have no more than eight slides.
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Limit your bullets: Keep it to no
more than three or four bullet points per slide. More is
overwhelming.
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Use short sentences: Write your bullet
points in headline form. Remember your slides are intended
to support your presentation, not be an entire text.
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Don’t read your slides:
Nothing is worse that having someone read you their slides.
The audience can read. You need to make eye contact and
persuade.
At
Speechworks we help our clients learn how to give
presentations that connect with the audience. If you’re
interested in becoming a great communicator give us a call at
404-266-0888 or check out our website at
www.speechworks.net |
