Month: April 2021

PowerPoint: Presenter Coach (📢New Feature)

Do you ever wish you could obtain some objective feedback on a presentation before the big day? PowerPoint’s new Presenter Coach feature might not be exactly like rehearsing with a real live human… but, incorporating Microsoft’s increasingly impressive AI features, it is quite possibly the next best thing. Let’s take a look.

Prompt" Try speaking a little faster

Presenter Coach

The Presenter Coach is currently only available for people using Office 365 (both Windows and Mac versions).

To Rehearse with Coach, visit the Slide Show tab, left of center, in a new group called Rehearse.

Slide Show tab, Rehearse with coach

When you select this button, you will be taken to a presentation view, with an option at the lower right to Start Rehearsing. Here you can also toggle on or off real-time feedback.

Start rehearsing button with show real time feedback box checked

Real Time Feedback

In an endeavor to show you a wide variety of real time feedback prompts, I provoked my coach with a plethora of bothersome speaking tendencies.

The coach warned me when:

  • I was speaking too quietly…

Prompt: "too quiet"

  • I was using too many filler words…

Prompt: "Try to not use too many fillers like 'umm'."

  • I was speaking too slowly…

Prompt: "Try speaking a little faster."

  • Or too quickly…

Prompt: "try speaking a bit slower."

Report

You can rehearse as long as you would like: you don’t have to rehearse our entire presentation; maybe you only want to examine a portion of your presentation.

When you escape out of presentation mode, you will be taken to a Rehearsal Report.Rehearsal Report, as described in text below

This report will tell you information like:

    • Total time and number of slides
    • Your use of fillers
    • Your use of sensitive phrases
    • Average words per minute
    • A graph with the average pace of speech
    • “Originality,” or how much you added to the text printed on the slide

You also might be revisited by information that the coach prompted you with during your rehearsal, like my overusing of filler words, below.

Rehearsal report: zoomed in on notice that too many fillers were used.

If you are interested, here is a more all encompassing list from Microsoft on what the Presenter Coach is analyzing:

Suggestions from Presenter Coach

Thoughts?

I can’t wait to hear what you all think of this new feature! Drop me a line, and let me know what you think.

Congratulations, Power Users!

Congratulations to our newest Power Users! For the full gallery, and more information about the WSU Microsoft Office Power User Program, please visit: wichita.edu/poweruser