Organizing Your Presentation with Sections

Have you ever gotten lost in a giant presentation?

You know the feeling. The slide titles and numbers start blurring together, and navigating through the presentation becomes impossible. You simply lose track of where you are! There must be a better way to keep slides organized!

In PowerPoint 2010, you can use the new Sections feature to organize your slides, much like you would use folders to organize your files. You can use named sections to keep track of groups of slides, or you can assign sections to colleagues to make ownership clear during collaboration. If you’re starting with a blank slate, sections can even be used to outline the topics in your presentation.

Creating a section is easy. Add a section by clicking “Add Section” in the ribbon or the right-click context menu, and a section label appears for a slide or a group of slides:

Right-click the section label and select “Rename Section.” Simply type a name for the section and it’s done! You can drag-and-drop sections, apply themes to a section, print a section, or go to a section during slide show.

If you have multiple sections and want a high-level overview of your presentation, click “Collapse All.” You’ll see that your presentation immediately looks more manageable. You can expand individual sections to focus your attention and not worry about the other 100+ slides that are in the deck.

The best way to handle a big task is to break it down into smaller parts, and sections will do just that for your presentation.

Happy organizing!

Sandy Yu

Program Manager, PowerPoint

July 21, 2009