To persuade people, trade powerpoint for papier-mâché

ONNECTING

Someone once told me that most PowerPoint presentations have neither power nor a point. Yet in meeting after meeting around the world, PowerPoint is the medium of choice. In fact, according to Microsoft, there are over 30 million PowerPoint presentations given every day.

When someone chooses to present with a slideshow, the choice has consequences. It establishes an old-fashioned power structure with the expert speaking in front of a passive audience. It keeps teams indoors, in closed rooms and in a seated position for prolonged periods. And it places technology at the center of the room with a heavy weight toward text, charts, sound bites and bullet points.

When I helped start a social innovation organization called Civilla, we gave ourselves an operating constraint: There would be no PowerPoint.

We began to think through how we might communicate some very complex information. We had recently analyzed Michigan’s public benefit system, which distributes a substantial amount of aid but required people to complete a 40-page eligibility form, the longest of its kind in America. Michigan’s government had asked us to imagine a more humane, efficient way to deliver benefits. We thought we had found one, but how could we communicate it without everyone’s favorite slide deck program?

With PowerPoint off the table, we turned to a different suite of tools: photographs, rope, twine and papier-mâché. We used these tools to build a large installation that activated multiple senses and delivered our results in an interactive way.

As we brought our presentation to life, we relied on three methods that can benefit any team choosing to say “no” to PowerPoint.

— IMMERSE THE AUDIENCE: We wanted our audience to learn by doing instead of by listening. We knew that experiential learning outperforms passive instruction, so we converted our hallway into a public benefit office that simulated the environment that caseworkers and residents experience every day.

— LEVERAGE THE POWER OF SCALE: Free from the constraints of a screen, we decided to use scale as a key tool in delivering our content — and we went big. We walked leaders past dramatically oversized portraits of residents and maps of the public benefits system. We heard them say things like, “I see the problem in a new way.”

— USE SYMBOLISM: PowerPoint encourages presenters to rely on a slide’s literal content instead of abstraction or symbolism, which are often more memorable and foster empathy. We wanted to communicate the overwhelming client-to-caseworker ratio. We brought the heavy caseloads to life with 750 dangling ropes, each one symbolizing a client. Our visitors had to walk through and spread apart the maze of 10-foot-long ropes to navigate the immersive experience.

The physical act of walking someone through your work is powerful. Interaction versus passive observation. Stories rooted in people versus statistics. These are shifts that move audiences to action, that engage the mind and heart to effect change.