Is PowerPoint really past its prime?
An international study.
The “Business Presentations – Practice, Efficiency and Success” international study launched by Strategy Compass involved over 500 participants across German and American companies. It represents a cross-section of thinking, predominantly from managers, from companies with 1,000 employees or more.
Securing well over 90% of the vote, PowerPoint is the clear tool of choice, and if the study participants are anything to go by, its use is set to intensify even further over the next few years. These days, every second internal meeting and every 1.5 external meetings involve a PowerPoint presentation. And yet, surprisingly, only some 50% of participants rated their own company as “good” or higher when it comes to presentations.
When asked why they believe most presentations fail, the participants primarily responded with aspects such as poor structure, poor visuals, own objectives not congruent with target-group expectations, and a messy slide layout. This is astonishing since these problems are quite easy to eliminate or at least reduce. Unprofessional presenters, on the other hand, were not considered anywhere near as much of a problem as criticism commonly cited in forums and articles suggests. The interpretation side of things is getting interesting, because the main question is, of course: What is the reason?
In addition, although digitalization continues to be on everyone’s lips, it must still be said that in some cases, everyday work operations are still struggling to keep up with these developments.