Create a professional Microsoft PowerPoint presentation

There are a number of differences between a Microsoft PowerPoint college presentation and a presentation created for your work. Many of these tips may sound like common sense, but it’s the finer points of a presentation that your audience will pick up on, and that will define how much they get out of it and whether they take it seriously.

The following is a checklist containing the most common points to look for when creating a presentation for your work. It’s a good idea to print something like this and go over it before submitting your presentation for any kind of review.

• Use a template – If you can, you should use the standard template that your company, project, etc. Use for PowerPoint presentations when creating your own presentation. This is what your audience will probably be expecting, and if not (for example, in the case of a new customer), this is what you want them to expect from now on.
• Consistent font style – You must use a consistent font style throughout your presentation. The places where exceptions to this rule could occur are:
  • Deck slide – The first slide of your presentation will usually have fonts, etc. that are not found in the rest of your presentation. This is fine as it can be a standard slide for your company presentations or just the standard for your project. It can also attract the attention of the presentation, so you really want it to stand out.
  • Headers / Footers – The header and / or footer of each slide is usually part of the template that you and your company use for PowerPoint presentations, so it will most likely not have the same font as the body of the slides.

  Aside from the two examples above, you should use a consistent font style in all sections of your slides. For example, the body text for each slide must share the same font, as well as any headers or footers that exist outside of your template.

• Chorus for using clipart – While it may seem clever at the time to make a slide out of a large “Idea” light bulb, it won’t score you any points with your audience. Clipart it’s very generic and doesn’t really add anything to the presentation, it just messes it up. On the other hand, if you want to use actual images for your subject, that’s fine.
• Use bulleted thoughts – One of the biggest mistakes you can make when putting together a presentation is putting too much information on the slide. This usually occurs when paragraphs are used instead of concise, bulleted thoughts. The purpose of each slide is not to be a Word document; you are just supposed to have points that you can talk to while making your presentation. Too much information per slide will cause your audience to lose interest quickly and you may lose hope that they will leave after they have learned something. Be concise and lively to show only your main points on each slide.
• Get a peer review – This is probably the most important tip to remember. Before submitting your work, you should always have it peer reviewed, as well as read it yourself. It’s easy to get lost in your project when you’ve been “in the bush” for a long time, so it’s always a good idea to take a step back and have someone else take a look at it. It’s also a good idea to put it aside for a moment and then go over the presentation yourself to get a new perspective.

The tips above are a good start to a checklist you can use before delivering any of your presentations. You must add information specific to your job. This will save everyone the time of proofreading and proofreading and will make your first draft that much better.