It boloxes me that companies think that the lingua franca of communication is PowerPoint, and that five succinct phrases on a well-laid out page will convince people to change their opinions, rearrange their loyalties, understand the issues and forge new relationships. Yet in the outsourcing and shared services world, almost nothing—from examining a business model to governing a relationship–occurs without the accoutrement of a PowerPoint presentation.
It begs the question–how did we learn to work together before computers and a bunch of smart guys invented the program? Did we pick up the phone? Meet? Gather around a whiteboard with a parking lot agenda? Sit in a room for hours to conduct a discourse which allowed us to understand both the issues and more importantly, their nuances?
Seems to me that a moratorium on PowerPoint presentations would be a good thing relative to communicating outsourcing and shared services change throughout the lifecycle, even though we’d have no props to lean on. No longer would 20 page decks fly through the organization with little explanation of the actual plot. Hours would no longer be spent debating the meaning of every word and the framing of every challenge to each party’s advantage. Critical issues might even get some back up and airtime rather than being relegated to a 20 second glance at an A4 or 8 1/2 by 11 sheet. And perhaps relationships would move to a stronger footing.
Agree with me? take a look at http://www.outsourcemagazine.co.uk/articles/item/3563-death-by-powerpoint, and let me know what you think?