Over the last few days it has been difficult to escape news that Malcom Gladwell, author of The Tipping Point and Blink, is in town to promote his new book, Outliers: The Story of Success.  Amongst the sometimes eulogistic coverage, was a three pager in last Sunday’s Observer Review headlined, “Is this the world’s most influential thinker”?

Whether you believe this or not, he certainly provokes thought and this evening will be talking to an audience at the Lyceum Theatre, where for a day he replaces the less demanding Lion King.  It was in an interview in Time Out, discussing his talk, that the areas of agreement were apparent.

A recurring theme here has been the encouragement  to use storytelling more and powerpoint less.  Discussed in the last post ‘ Please tell us a story’  and  in the  Best Practice  Guide, Staging and Content.  This is what the great thinker had to say:

“I won’t be singing” Gladwell confirms, “I will tell a story unadorned. No visual aids.” A firm believer in the axiom  “Power corrupts, PowerPoint corrupts absolutely,”  Gladwell favours old school narrative tecniques where performance is concerned.

“PowerPoint has destroyed storytelling, so I pledge there will be no PowerPoint.  It’s going to be very nineteenth century………..We’ll try and tell a story with a beginning, a middle and an end.”

Great minds..