Optimize Hybrid Working with PowerPoint
The pandemic has altered the business world’s appetite for remote working. Research shows that the COVID-induced shift to virtual work did not lead to a productivity meltdown as some anticipated. And its relative success is leading to another transformation post-pandemic – to hybrid working options.
Business PowerPoint presentations will continue to play a key role in corporate communications – empowering dispersed colleagues to problem-solve and innovate as they face the challenges of the future.
eSlide brings its more than 10 years’ experience working as a remote team and its more than 20 years’ expertise with PowerPoint to inform our advice. Here’s why we think PowerPoint will continue to enhance the quality of meetings in the post-pandemic work environment, helping organizations stay connected and energized.
Elevate Your Meetings with PowerPoint
Humans are visually dominant beings. But because of the reliance on virtual meetings during the pandemic, we’ve reached a visual saturation point. Research shows that constant screen time can contribute to stress, fatigue, and cognitive load. But this doesn’t have to be bad news for your business PowerPoint presentation – if you use visuals and presentation techniques that elevate your meetings above all the rest.
Use Visual Themes
Start by creating a visual theme that can be threaded throughout your presentation, repeated in different variations. This will help your audience make connections for themselves, enabling them to see the big picture without a lot of explanation from the presenter. It also helps increase comprehension, so that the audience can focus their energy on making meaningful contributions, problem solving, and innovation. This technique will separate your meeting from all the others your colleagues will attend in their work week, making it the one they will remember.
Let Agendas Flow
An agenda is a good way to open a meeting and keep it on track. Including your agenda in your business PowerPoint presentation gives your meeting an anchor – but that doesn’t mean the visual representation of your agenda must be a static bulleted list. Using a flowchart for your agenda can help the audience see how topics build on each other to reach an end goal. It also keeps them aware of the ultimate purpose of the meeting, and how each individual topic contributes to it. Think of your agenda flow chart as another opportunity to help your meeting stand out from all the others.
Anticipate Adaptability
All the virtual meetings during the pandemic have taught us to be ready for anything when presenting. So, we recommend that you make adaptability and flexibility a permanent part of your presentation toolkit. One way to do this is by creating space for impromptu discussions. Thankfully, PowerPoint comes equipped with several options for whiteboard-like functionality, making it easy to include a brainstorm at any point during your presentation. We recommend always including a white board slide at the end of your business PowerPoint presentation deck so that you can find it easily if you should need it.
Define Meeting Parameters
The number of meetings (and work hours) have increased during the pandemic. This will likely continue for the foreseeable future as companies settle into new ways of working. Therefore, keeping teams energized is going to be an ongoing challenge.
To help keep teams engaged and motivated, we recommend that you prioritize transparency around your meetings. This means making sure attendees know what to expect and what – if anything – they’ll need to prepare. Your agenda flow slide will help with this. Sending it ahead of time will enable colleagues to prioritize appropriately and attend your meeting ready to give you their best.
As the future of working and meetings continues to evolve, we want to help you and your organization excel. eSlide has been working with top executives from Fortune 500 companies around the globe for more than 20 years. Business PowerPoint presentations are all we do. Let us focus on your presentation design, so you can concentrate on your content, meeting preparation, and keeping hybrid teams energized.
Contact eSlide today to learn how we can save you time and help you deliver better results!
