Tip of the Week: How to Use PowerPoint as a Training Tool

Training your employees is important. One tool that you may find useful is Microsoft PowerPoint, as it allows you to create an engaging and informative training program.

Here, we’ll review the benefits that using PowerPoint can bring, as well as what you will want to include in the training materials you create.

Why PowerPoint for Training Purposes?

PowerPoint is an effective training tool for a variety of reasons - not the least of which is that it is effectively a multimedia platform. Allowing you to present information both visibly and via spoken word, PowerPoint gives you a platform to really reinforce the lessons you want to impart.

Now, while there are many tools that PowerPoint includes to assist users in presenting whatever materials they have more effectively, we’re going to focus on one particular web-based feature: Presenter Coach.

Presenter Coach does more or less what it sounds like it would do: it allows a user to practice their presentation, catching them as they fall back on undesirable public-speaking habits. The official video from the Microsoft Office 365 YouTube account explains it best:

So, in a way, PowerPoint can not only help you train your users... it can help you improve your own abilities to train others.

To activate it, open up the presentation in PowerPoint for the web.

On the Slide Show tab, click Rehearse with Coach. (This option is also under the View tab for some users).

What to Include in Your Training

Of course, regardless of how well you present it, your training is only as effective as the content that goes into it. As you are creating your materials, it is important that you do so in an organized fashion. Here are a few tips to help you get started.

• Identify the need that this training should address. In other words, what do you want to teach your team about? What should they know how to do better than before they participated? Keeping this need in mind will help you to keep your training concise and targeted, making it more effective at communicating your specific lesson.
  
  
• Determine what information to include based on the lesson and who you are speaking to. If your training only applies to a given department in your business, use specifics in your presentation to better illustrate your points and drive the message home. However, if the training applies to everyone - as cybersecurity lessons do - make sure you discuss the topic in basic terms that everyone can grasp and put into action.
  
  
• Include visuals, calls for questions, and individual sections to ensure that each topic is understood. Incorporating visual aids and separating your points into their own distinct slides can make the information you are trying to get across clearer to your audience. You should also encourage your team to ask questions throughout the training, and remind them that they can always ask these questions if they are ever unsure.
  
  
• You training doesn’t stop once your presentation is over. You could have designed the best presentation of your life, but if nothing has changed after you deliver it, you need to go back to the drawing board. Be sure that your staff knows that they can give you honest feedback without any backlash from you.

Give these tips a try, and feel free to reach out to Walsh IT Group for more assistance with your productivity tools.