“People who know what they are talking about don’t need PowerPoint.”
— Steve Jobs quoted in Walter Isaacson’s memoir Steve Jobs.
This quote has become fairly popular after it was featured in a post by PresentationZen. If you think there is reason enough to ban slide decks altogether, I’d say no.
I too, like most white-collared workers, have been subjected to one too many sleep-inducing presentations with wordy slide decks that never seemed to end. But are we right in blaming PowerPoint? Isn’t it just a tool that is harmful when it falls into the wrong hands? Shouldn’t we be blaming poor presenters instead?
The hypocrisy of Steve’s statement is evident when you realize that he loved using slides:
“We had one rule that really bothered him: We never allowed slides, which were his main presentation tool.
One year, about an hour before his appearance, I was informed that he was backstage preparing dozens of slides, even though I had reminded him a week earlier of the no-slides policy. I asked two of his top aides to tell him he couldn’t use the slides, but they each said they couldn’t do it, that I had to. So, I went backstage and told him the slides were out. Famously prickly, he could have stormed out, refused to go on. And he did try to argue with me.”
— Walt Mossberg in The Steve Jobs I Knew
Yes, the very same person who appears to be blaming slide decks was irritated when he was not allowed to use them.
Of course, there is a difference between Steve’s slide deck and the common office meeting slide deck. Steve’s were always beautiful and often narrated a story. A successful presentation is nothing but a story well told. And slides can help you in the storytelling process if you use it right.
By blaming “PowerPoint”, Steve is just poking fun at a product developed by Apple’s competitor, Microsoft. He could just as well have mentioned Keynote (or simply ‘slides’) but he didn’t. He phrased his words in a way that people would identify with and, at the same time, show Apple’s competitors in a poor light.
That was the genius of Steve Jobs. And everyone fell for it.
Even Steve Jobs Used Slide Decks
This quote has become fairly popular after it was featured in a post by PresentationZen. If you think there is reason enough to ban slide decks altogether, I’d say no.
I too, like most white-collared workers, have been subjected to one too many sleep-inducing presentations with wordy slide decks that never seemed to end. But are we right in blaming PowerPoint? Isn’t it just a tool that is harmful when it falls into the wrong hands? Shouldn’t we be blaming poor presenters instead?
The hypocrisy of Steve’s statement is evident when you realize that he loved using slides:
Yes, the very same person who appears to be blaming slide decks was irritated when he was not allowed to use them.
Of course, there is a difference between Steve’s slide deck and the common office meeting slide deck. Steve’s were always beautiful and often narrated a story. A successful presentation is nothing but a story well told. And slides can help you in the storytelling process if you use it right.
By blaming “PowerPoint”, Steve is just poking fun at a product developed by Apple’s competitor, Microsoft. He could just as well have mentioned Keynote (or simply ‘slides’) but he didn’t. He phrased his words in a way that people would identify with and, at the same time, show Apple’s competitors in a poor light.
That was the genius of Steve Jobs. And everyone fell for it.
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Posted in Commentary
Tagged Apple, Steve Jobs