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Two articles quoting current governmental and business leaders who eschew PowerPoint-style presentations for more thoughtful approaches.

Extract from 2010 article by Elisabeth Bumiller (New York Times)

“PowerPoint makes us stupid,” Gen. James N. Mattis of the Marine Corps, the Joint Forces commander, said this month at a military conference in North Carolina. (He spoke without PowerPoint.) Brig. Gen. H. R. McMaster, who banned PowerPoint presentations when he led the successful effort to secure the northern Iraqi city of Tal Afar in 2005, followed up at the same conference by likening PowerPoint to an internal threat.

“It’s dangerous because it can create the illusion of understanding and the illusion of control,” General McMaster said in a telephone interview afterward. “Some problems in the world are not bullet-izable.”

Commanders say that behind all the PowerPoint jokes are serious concerns that the program stifles discussion, critical thinking and thoughtful decision-making. Not least, it ties up junior officers — referred to as PowerPoint Rangers — in the daily preparation of slides, be it for a Joint Staff meeting in Washington or for a platoon leader’s pre-mission combat briefing in a remote pocket of Afghanistan.

Read the complete article at We Have Met the Enemy and He Is PowerPoint

Extract from article 2015 by Madeline Stone (Business Insider)

Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos is not a fan of PowerPoint presentations.

Anytime an Amazon worker has an idea to discuss, they’re asked to structure their pitch in the form of a four-to-six-page memo, which the company calls a “narrative.”

They then take their pitches to team meetings, where the first 20 minutes or so are spent reading the memo. After, the presenter fields questions from the rest of the team.

It’s an unconventional process, to be sure, but one that Amazon believes forces careful consideration of ideas.

Read the complete article at Why PowerPoint Presentations Aren’t Allowed at Amazon


A PowerPoint diagram meant to portray the complexity of American strategy in Afghanistan certainly succeeded in that aim. (NY Times)

 

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