We all know that presenting in front of a crowd is nerve-wrecking. During presentations, even when you’re ready, you may still fill your sentences with the “umms” and the “ahhs”. PowerPoint will be able to help you with that.

In 2019, Microsoft added artificial intelligence-powered assistant to PowerPoint named Presenter Coach. Presenter Coach will be able to hear you as you practice presenting and provide feedback along the way. The coach will pop up with tips about the way and rate you talk, the amount of fillers you had, and the time you allotted for each slide.

Practice with Presenter Coach

To access Presenter Coach, you need to use the online or web version of PowerPoint. Unfortunately, the feature is not yet available to the desktop version of PowerPoint.

You need to sign in with your Microsoft Account (personal, Office 365, or school account) to access Powerpoint Online.

Open a PowerPoint file you’ve created. If you’re using the Simplified Ribbon, navigate to the Slide Show tab. Next, click on the last item called Research with Coach.

If you’re using the Classic Ribbon, navigate to the View tab and select Research with Coach on the Coach group.

Your PowerPoint slide will open in a full screen view and Presenter Coach will pop up on the bottom-right corner of the screen.

Click on the Start Rehearsing button to start the coaching session.

Once you started your coaching session, Presenter Coach will be detecting your speaking rate, fillers, sensitive phrases, and originality.

I started practicing my speech and when I had fillers in my sentence, such as “uhhs” and “I mean”, Presenter Coach popped up and displayed that I should avoid using fillers.

After presenting, Presenter Coach will give you a summary of your practice presentation. You will see how you performed and what could be improved on your presentation.

Final Words

Presenter Coach is only available for English speakers. It works best when you are in a silent place where you are the only one talking.

Since PC is artificial intelligence-powered, the more people use this feature, the more the machine would learn.

Even though you use Presenter Coach, you should practice presenting with a sample audience or in front of a mirror for you to know what you need to improve. Build up your confidence and prepare ahead of time for you to present properly.

Remember, the final presentation will depend on you, how you present yourself and on how you use your words to create a meaningful output.