PowerPoint Culture

How many times in your organization does a simple question get answered by a PowerPoint deck? How many times have you seen your sales guys spend an hour talking at a PowerPoint instead of letting the prospect discuss her issues? Has PowerPoint sent your culture to the background?

Not too long ago, I worked on a gig with one of the largest consulting/IT firms in the world and was forced to buy an external hardrive just to house the number of PowerPoint decks I received everytime I asked a relatively easy question. This company really didn't talk much anymore. They certainly didn't answer questions directly. Innovation was a real stretch. What they did all day long, every day, was to have teleconferences to go over powerpoints. You'd think as a consulting firm, they might take a look at themselves and wonder if this was really productive.

I also think PowerPoints really killed EDS. When slides cost $300 each with a rush charge, sales folks used their words and ideas judiciously and carefully--and only for the client or prospect. You would have been shot if you spent that kind of money on an internal audience. So no one did. We were spared the many wasted hours listening to a talking head read PowerPoints that had become teleprompters.

About the time PowerPoint was on everyone's desktop, I noticed a kind of PowerPoint narcisism. Egos began to rule and rather than talking to each other, or, for the love of God, actually having a discussion with a prospect. Countless MBAs, executives, engineers and sales folks all began to show each other how smart they were with their ever-complex and impossible-to-read PowerPoints. Man, did it get boring! And, it really didn't sell, innovate, spark creativity, raise the stock price or build the brand. It just gave everyone a tired head.

I'm not saying to eliminate PowerPoints, but I'd like to see if you can go without it for a week. Take the challenge. And while you're not actually doing PowerPoints you might enjoy looking for some of the worst examples you can find.

This seems to be the Worst PowerPoint Slide Ever Given by a CEO according to Google. Don't know about you, but I've seen and, unfortunately, participated in way worse.