Presenting and Slide Show Settings

Presenter View is the professional delivery standard — it separates what the audience sees (the full-screen slide) from what the presenter sees (a control panel with notes, next slide preview, and timer). Setting it up correctly before a presentation takes 2 minutes and prevents the embarrassing situation of your notes being projected on the screen:

• To enable Presenter View: connect a second monitor or projector, go to the Slide Show tab > Monitors group > check 'Use Presenter View.' When you start the slideshow, your laptop shows the Presenter View panel while the projector shows the full-screen slide. The Presenter View panel displays: the current slide (large, centered), the next slide thumbnail (upper right), the full speaker notes for the current slide (scrollable, large text), a slide counter, and a timer showing elapsed time.
• Pressing F5 starts the slideshow from Slide 1. Pressing Shift+F5 starts from the currently selected slide — useful for rehearsing a specific section or resuming a presentation you paused mid-way. Press Escape at any time to exit the slideshow and return to the editing view.
• Keyboard shortcuts during a live presentation keep the presenter's attention on the audience rather than the laptop — arrow keys (right, left, up, down) advance or go back one slide. Pressing B blacks out the screen (shows a black slide), useful during discussion breaks when you want to remove the visual distraction without stopping the presentation. Pressing W whites out the screen (shows a white slide). Press B or W again to return to the current slide. Pressing Ctrl+P activates the Pen tool, turning the cursor into a virtual pen for circling or underlining elements on the slide during discussion.
• The Laser Pointer (hold Ctrl+L or right-click during presentation and choose 'Laser Pointer') turns the cursor into a bright red dot that visually highlights where on the slide you are pointing — far more effective than trying to point with a mouse cursor. The Highlighter (right-click > Pointer Options > Highlighter) lets you draw colored highlights directly on the slide during the presentation.

Professional presenters always have more slides than they present — backup slides, detail slides, appendix data — and need precise control over which slides the audience sees and in what order:

• Custom Slide Show lets you define a named subset of slides to present without the rest — go to Slide Show > Custom Slide Show > Custom Shows > New. Name your show (e.g., 'Orientation – Short Version'), add the slides you want to include in order, and click OK. Run the custom show by going back to Slide Show > Custom Slide Show and selecting your named show. This is useful when you have one deck but need to present different subsets to different audiences (e.g., the full 10-slide orientation for new hires, but only slides 1–5 for a brief 5-minute overview for returning staff).
• Hiding slides keeps them in the file but skips them during the normal slideshow — right-click the slide thumbnail in the Slide Panel and choose 'Hide Slide.' Hidden slides are shown with a strikethrough number in the panel. During the presentation, hidden slides are automatically skipped. You can still jump to a hidden slide manually by pressing the slide number key and Enter. Hide slide 8 for the orientation presentation (which is under revision) so it does not appear in the normal flow but remains in the file for future use.
• Rehearse Timings records how long you spend on each slide — go to Slide Show > Rehearse Timings and PowerPoint starts the slideshow with a timer visible. Click through your presentation as you would in real life, speaking through each slide. When done, PowerPoint saves the per-slide timings and asks if you want to use them for auto-advance. If you accept, the slideshow will automatically advance to the next slide after the recorded time, without requiring clicks — appropriate for kiosk or unattended loop presentations. For live presenter-led presentations, do not use auto-advance timing.

Distributing a presentation before or after a meeting in an appropriate format is as important as delivering it well — the right format makes the content accessible to people who were not present and serves as a reference document after the meeting:

• Printing handouts: press Ctrl+P to open the Print dialog. In the 'Settings' section, click the 'Full Page Slides' dropdown and choose from Handouts options: 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, or 9 slides per page. The 3-slides-per-page handout is the professional standard for presenter-led meetings — it shows 3 slides in a column on the left with horizontal lines for note-taking on the right. For a reference handout to be filed after the meeting, 6 or 9 slides per page saves paper while still showing all content legibly.
• Export as PDF: File > Export > Create PDF/XPS produces a static PDF with one slide per page (or per the handout layout if you set it in the print dialog). PDF is the appropriate format for emailing the presentation to someone who needs to read it but not run the slideshow. Confirm animations and transitions are not preserved in PDF — each slide appears in its final state.
• Export as Video: File > Export > Create a Video converts the entire presentation (including animations and transitions) into an MP4 video file. This is ideal for patient waiting room kiosks, online training content, and recorded webinars. Set the video quality (HD 1080p for screen display, Standard 720p for email distribution) and the seconds per slide for any slides without timed animations.
• Package for CD/USB: File > Export > Package Presentation for CD bundles the presentation file and all linked media files (videos, custom fonts) into one folder that can be copied to a USB drive. This ensures the presentation runs correctly on any computer — even one without the specific fonts or media files installed. Use this when presenting from an unfamiliar conference room computer.