Accessibility: Make your presentations 'accessible' in less than 5 clicks
Accessibility is important. Everyone in a room should feel comfortable and empowered to join in with discussions regardless of their ability whether that be physical or mentally. I've previously written about how important it is to add 'Alt Text' to your social media channels to ensure that your digital communities remain inclusive.
In my quest to ensure that my social team continue to keep accessibility in mind, I discovered one of the easiest ways to make your presentations more 'accessible' - using artificial intelligence to add subtitles whilst you present to an audience in Microsoft PowerPoint... and it takes less than 5 clicks. (Seriously - we're talking less than 10 seconds to set this up!)
Click 1/5 - Setting up
Go to the 'Slide Show' tab in the Ribbon Bar
Click 2/5 - Enabling the magic
Ensure that the 'Always Use Subtitles' box is selected - this will ensure that your presentations using Microsoft PowerPoint will always be accessible; you'll never have to repeat this again!
Click 3/5 - Select your Microphone
Select 'Subtitle Settings' under the box we just ticked; double-check that you are using the correct Microphone that will be critical in creating your subtitles. For this example I'm using some standard Apple Earbuds plugged into my Microsoft Surface.
Step 4/5 - The magic begins...
Start presenting! Although I don't have any slides (meaning this isn't the fanciest example!) you can see at the lower-left of my laptop and monitor 'Starting Subtitles' is being displayed. Whatever I say will now be transcribed and displayed similar to that of enabling subtitles on your television.
Step 5/5 - This isn't even a step!
As you speak, your words will be displayed - it works like magic!
PowerPoint presentations tend to be highly visual, and people who are blind or have low vision can understand them more easily if you create your slides with accessibility in mind. For more information and best practices, check out this guide. Please so share your accessibility tips in the comments!