I had originally titled this post ‘Pointless and distracting Powerpoint graphics’ and while that was overly wordy, it also didn’t cover everything that annoyed me.

For years I’ve been working in organisations where the use of PP has been prevalent, who hasn’t? It did it exactly what is supposed to, show slides. In the initial flurry we used those fancy slide changes, the chequerboard, the ping from the left, the slide coming down from the top, we all used them. We all used the bit where bullet points would slide in from the right, and more often than not, a little bit of clip art to show what we were thinking.

Only we didn’t need the fancy slide changes, or the bullet points flying in, and we certainly didn’t need some cheap clip art show us what we were thinking. Presentations were painful enough without a little stick man or a fake sign post. They look so unprofessional. Just accept it, you’re not in college now, you shouldn’t need whizzy graphics to keep the attention from the room, your content should deliver that. And if it doesn’t, go ahead and do the slides again.

I’ve spent more time than I care to remember inheriting slides that I had to present with some crappy set of questions marks or a stick man scratching his head.

The same goes for stupid fonts. I walked past an electricity sub station the other day, and the sign for ‘Danger – Risk of Death’ is in fucking comic sans. Seriously, the most jovial and primary school of all the fonts to warn people their actual life is in danger if they muck about or break into the substation.

If you’ve got a serious message to make, use a serious font. If you’re trying to sell me a service, be sensible, I don’t want to see your playful or fun side when I’m parting with my hard earned money. I want to know that what you’re offering is good quality, not that like you might borrow the font for an invite you’re sending to your ‘gal pals’ for a weekend of prosecco and hot-tubbing.