It’s time to scrap the one-way, top-down presentation tools of yore. Try these tips to craft more interactive meetings, speeches and gatherings.

Stacy Hintermeister, VP of Marketing and Growth, CBX

Digital communication tools have become the superheroes of today’s remote workplace.

Without Zoom, Microsoft Teams and other digital systems, collaboration among remote workers, employers, agencies and clients today would be nearly impossible. However, if you’re a corporate communicator who’s facing time-sensitive productivity issues (and who isn’t?), there’s one digital tool you should ditch: PowerPoint.

To be fair, PowerPoint and its cousin Keynote allow us to whip up visually stunning decks so we can talk at large audiences. But if your goal is to conduct meetings in a culture of collaboration and make decisions during those meetings, spark team creativity or engage your audience, then you need to think beyond PowerPoint – especially during our remote-working, semi-quarantined way of life.

PowerPoint’s weakness

One-way communication is fading fast for the same reasons that mass communication and advertising are no longer seen as the best ways to reach target audiences. Furthermore, one-way communication doesn’t follow younger generations’ expectations to participate in  dialogue that’s rooted in transparency, authenticity and reality – that’s where PowerPoint fails us.

PowerPoint’s limitations are not just the labor it takes to craft the perfect story, but also in its inability to be inclusive and invite conversation. It’s best used as a tool to “present” rather than a means to incite dialogue about key issues, encourage others to join in or create alignment within large groups of people.

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