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Microsoft PowerPoint is one of the slickest and best products around. It is intuitive, can be used and interfaced easily with other Office products (Word, Excel, Paint), and is truly a remarkable asset to us "artistically impaired" average people trying to do a good job.

Having said that, and assuming the reader has a basic knowledge of the PowerPoint program, this article will give the average users some pointers on how to improve their PowerPoint presentations. I will use some examples from my own experience and extensive use in both classroom and business presentations I have made.

'The dreaded O-Word'

To state the obvious, even PowerPoint will not make a poorly constructed, badly thought-out presentation look good. Before you even consider booting up the application, you have to do the majority of your research, organization, and make critical decisions as to chronology and emphasis of your presentation. Yes, here is the dreaded "O-word." That word is 'outline."

Wait, though. Before you outline, try brainstorming. The results of your brainstorming then can be organized into that outline. The outline then becomes the bones of your presentation, and you can revisit your presentation continuously to add the "meat."

As a college instructor teaching MS Access, a complex database application with a steep learning curve, I used PowerPoint to present my daily lesson plan. I outlined the plan, keyed the text into PowerPoint using its powerful outlining feature. Then I revisited the outline to make sure all points were covered within the less-than-50 minutes I had allocated for class work.

'Adding the Elegant Touches'

If you're satisfied with your presentation, it is now time to add a bit of elegance. PowerPoint assists the user with an array of work-saving design templates, custom animation features that add interesting special effects to your presentation and hold your audience's interest.

A few years ago, I prepared a four-session writer's workshop using PowerPoint. I chose an attractive template that was easy on the eyes in a bright classroom environment and added special text effects where my bullet points emerged from the bottom and right of the screen. These special effects allowed me to pace my presentation with the click of a mouse to allow my audience to absorb my points individually.

Other "elegant touches" include inserting links to your presentation that allow you to switch immediately to another document or illustration without encumbering or cluttering your

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