|
|
Deleted ScenesDeleted Scene #2Chapter Two: The Rise of the 'Lesser Includeds' Section: The Manthorpe Curve Commentary: This second "deleted scene" constituted my first attempt at explaining what Mark Warren later called "the cult of the PowerPoint briefing" inside the Pentagon. As originally written, this was the intro to "The Manthorpe Curve" section in Chapter 2. Mark cut these paragraphs and started right with the one that followed: "In the early 1990s, William Manthorpe was Deputy Director …" [p. 63]. I include this deleted scene simply because I like it. Deleted Scene: First Attempt To Explain Cult Of PowerPoint [TEXT BEGINS] A lot of people deride the influence of PowerPoint in the presentation of ideas to groups. They say that all the flash, in combination with the program making everything look so darn neat, fools people into believing the ideas presented are really better than they are. They say, in effect, that the conversation is dumbed down. I have never believed this to be the case, if you really know what you're doing with PowerPoint, which -- unfortunately -- is not true the vast majority of the time. Nowhere is this more evident in the Pentagon, where you see two types of PowerPoint briefs: either the words-only bullet medley or the smoke-and-mirrors image montage. Both forms stink to high heaven and -- with my allergies -- will have me fighting back the snores within minutes. The bullet-only medley is frankly an insult to both audience and presenter. It says the presenter cannot deliver an interesting talk without having to read it from his cue cards -- eight-feet tall on the wall behind him! It also suggests the audience is too stupid to track the logic unless they can follow the bouncing laser beam word-by -word. In contrast, the one-damn-image-after-another approach is far more honest with the audience: it is simply the presenter's way of saying, "I don't have any ideas worth presenting, so why I drone on, have a gander at my beautiful shots of jets and nuclear submarines." A really good PowerPoint presentation allows the speaker to walk an audience through very complex and challenging ideas while simultaneously reinforcing their understanding with graphics that tell the story -- beat by beat. This is why I animate my briefs thoroughly, meaning my average slide contains 20 to 30 separate animations timed to the delivery of my words. This is storytelling at its highest, with the LCD projector serving as high-tech campfire. Laurie Anderson meets Donald Rumsfeld. But truth be told, the most powerful slide I've ever seen was an old fashioned vugraph put together by one of the most old-fashioned intelligence analysts I've ever known -- a retired Navy officer named William Manthorpe. [TEXT ENDS] |
Putnam, 2004 |
