What are some problems that presenters make when using powerpoint and what are some ways to overcome them?

Question

powerpoint presentations

Answer 1

One of the biggest, and most common, mistakes that I see is confusing PowerPoint for Word. Presenters will fill up the entire slide with text, making it so small and illegible that it's more like PowerPointless. And then they usually go and read the entire slide word for word anyway.

That's the problem I see most often. That and presenters who think they are Spielberg and try to add way too many effects to their presentation. It's just a pie chart, Dudley!

Answer 2

The first issue is the presentation.

Your job is to communicate to the audience, not create a beautiful powerpoint. So many people focus so much on the Powerpoint slides, they forget the audience.

The first rule is get your presentation right. Audience interaction and engagement are very important.

In the PowerPoint itself people make a range of mistakes.

Too much information on one slide.

Music, pictures and video that don't enhance the presentation.

Annoying animations, which slow the presentation down.

Poor selection of colours, which become unreadable during a presentation.

Crazy fonts

Making each slide look different (all slides should be similar, unless you want to emphasize a single point)

Using the standard layouts from Microsoft, which are as boring as batshit, in fact during studies where audiences are given the choice of looking at a Microsoft design presentation or a pile of bat ****, they choose to look at the bat ****.

not following the KISS principle (Keep It Simple Stupid). For example, on a slide it is better to have one good picture than 1 good and 4 bad photos.

Answer 3

Writing long paragraphs on powerpoint is a problem presenters make, which can be overcome by just writing key points and then expanding on the points . Making eye contact with the audience is also a problem presenters make, which can be overcome by not reading so much from the powerpoint.

Answer 4

My biggest beefs are:

Inconsistency - different font sizes and/or types. You should have one basic font size for the title and one basic font size for the text. The styles for the title can be different for the text if you wish but as long as all the titles match and all the text matches. (One of the defaults in PP is

Too much text - just stress the points don't use the slide as the script (use the notes pages for the script and print it out or have a second computer handy).

Too busy backgrounds.

Graphics who's colours clash with the background (ungroup the graphic and change individual colours to match or coordinate with the background colours)

Annoying sound effects on each slide transition (i.e. everytime a slide changes a slide projector sound comes up) - this is okay for small presentations but 79 slides of sound effects can drive the audience nuts.

Links to other documents don't work. (the presenter forgot to save the other documents to the same CD or stick - any easy fix is to use the Pak-N-Go feature or Package for CD option as this links and copies all files needed).

Incompatibility with LCD projector - the presenter shows up 5 minutes before hand with laptop in hand and the two can't communicate. (The presenter should always have a back-up plan - book a laptop at the same time as the projector (from the same supplier) even if you have your own laptop and have a copy of the presentation available on CD or with a memory stick - arrive 30 minutes early to ensure everything works as planned.)

Answer 5

The biggest mistake I've seen (I've only seen High Schoolers make powerpoint) is that they make the text hard to read. This may be because it's too small, too bright, or not enough contrast between the text and background.

Use simple backgrounds and make sure that the text is big enough and the correct color to make it easily visible.