Finding the Right Medium to Deliver Your Content
Analytical design guru and author Edward Tufte hates PowerPoint. I mean he really hates PowerPoint. In his 30-page essay “The Cognitive Style of PowerPoint: Pitching Out Corrupts Within,”15 he blasts the Microsoft presentation tool in a tone that makes it sound like an evil force sent by demons to derail all communication efforts on Earth. “PowerPoint creates a cognitive style that disrupts and trivializes evidence,”16 he writes, and that's just for starters. He goes on to trash its “obnoxious transitions and partitions,”17 the way its slide format is sequential, and the bullet-point culture it creates. PowerPoint, he warns, provides “a smirky commercialism that turns information into a sales pitch and presenters into marketers.” He even likens the presentation tool to a school play: “very loud, very slow, and very simple.”18
I'm not ready to delete PowerPoint from my personal computer just yet, but Tufte raises some valid points about the nature of this software. He points to reports generated by NASA following the 2003 tragedy involving the space shuttle Columbia as his proof. Columbia burned up on reentry into the Earth's atmosphere following a mission. The space agency launched a thorough investigation and discovered that the accident was caused by damage to the wing's thermal protection. A series of reports were generated by NASA to explain the problem and were ultimately presented to the Columbia Accident Investigation Board in the form of PowerPoint slides.
The board wasn't pleased with NASA's format choice for a report of such significance. Because of the program's inherently disjointed, bullet-point style, key information was left out. Consequently, senior managers weren't able to fully comprehend the magnitude of the shuttle's problems. Tufte notes that formal engineering documents, like reports and white papers, would have been wiser, more effective formats to communicate NASA's findings.
PowerPoint has been in existence since 1990—in just over twenty years it's had a tremendous impact on the way we communicate. We've disrupted the tradition of narrative and replaced it with awkward bullet points that offer our audiences fragmented ideas. But it's popular. PowerPoint is the default presentation format for most companies. On any given day, one report discovered, there are 30 million PowerPoint presentations taking place around the world.19 We'll examine visuals for presentations later in the book, but let's note that most people who use this software are not using it wisely. There may be a role for PowerPoint, but clearly it was the wrong choice to communicate a complicated subject like the investigation of an exploding spacecraft.
A quarter-century after its introduction, PowerPoint is by no means a cutting-edge program. But this example shows how easy it is to flock to a new format even if it's not the best solution. There are many new tools available on the market, with more coming, that promise to help us communicate more effectively. Some of them will enable us to bring greater clarity and meaning to our audiences, but that doesn't mean we should abandon what's worked for us in the past and jump to new solutions without consideration.
“Narratives” Instead of PowerPoint If You Work at Amazon
If you work for e-tail giant Amazon, don't even think about using PowerPoint. Chief executive officer Jeff Bezos believes it encourages lazy thinking and has banned the popular software program. After reading Tufte's report he allegedly insisted that Amazon employees write “narratives” instead of creating PowerPoint presentations. Amazon narratives are papers that cannot exceed six pages in length.20
THE BEST FIT FOR YOUR AUDIENCE
Don't be lured by the bright lights of multimedia just because they're eye-popping. Evaluate the options at hand, and only choose multimedia options if they serve your needs. Select the format that best fits your content and will resonate with your audience. Finding the right medium to deliver content is important, and with more options now available it is becoming increasingly more challenging.
But remaining stagnant and sticking with old-school communication techniques can be just as dangerous, if not more so. As Peter Reid, the vice president for strategic communications at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, told me rather candidly: “You're simply not going to be able to survive meaningfully in this communications era if you don't learn how to get it [content] into a format that they [your audience] want it in.”
The digital revolution is creating finicky information consumers. If your intended audience is somehow put off by the look or feel of your communications effort, chances are they'll move onto something else. With so much plentiful content available today, people decide very quickly where to spend their precious time. If it looks dense, boring, and offers no immediate benefit, your readers are likely to skip over it. Deciding what format to use depends on whom you're trying to reach. Conducting audience awareness, the next part of this book, is crucial as you consider your options.
Effective communicators need to understand the transformation that's underway in order to remain effective communicators. Information is being repackaged into new forms the data-weary find easier to consume. You're probably already responding to the digital revolution and are in small ways adapting your own communication style to match new trends. Maybe you're writing shorter, more active sentences or learning how to embed video onto your website. Little by little, you're probably picking up on clues from bosses, clients, or colleagues on how to make your content more appealing to twenty-first-century ears and eyes.
The move from the print mindset to the digital outlook is not one that will take place overnight. The transformation has been in the works for years and will continue to evolve over time. Smart communicators, including those of us too old to be digital natives, must pay attention to the changes occurring around us. We may not choose to learn how to employ all the new technologies or we may opt to keep a certain amount of “old school” style in some of our writings, but regardless, we must stay aware of what's happening in our new environment.
No one expects you to learn how to do it all. Communication today requires more skills than any one person can master. For big projects you'll need to work with teams of people who specialize in writing, graphic design, coding, film production, and so on. If you are leading the charge on a communications effort, however, it is your job to understand what tools are available to you so you can direct others to implement them. Additionally, as communicator, it's up to you to architect the vision for what your final product should look and feel like.