Making PowerPoint decks more accessible

An essential component to maximizing remote participation by people with disabilities

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Part two of a two-part article. Part one focuses on how to optimize the video conference experience for the event.

One of the lasting impacts of the pandemic is that business people are spending much more time on video conferences. Many of those meetings involve one or more PowerPoint-based presentations.

Do you know how to optimize your decks for the 20 % of your audience with a disability?

Following the steps in this article will help ensure that participants with disabilities will be able to equally consume your content.

Step 1: Run the PowerPoint accessibility checker

PowerPoint has implemented an accessibility checker, which will review the deck for the 30 % of accessibility issues that can be detected automatically. It can be accessed from the Review Menu, or you can type accessibility in the search bar, and the Best Action highlighted in the popup should be the accessibility checker.

This is what you want to see:

This type of result means you have some more work to do:

You can open each of these accordions, select the item, and it will show you precisely what object on what page is causing the problem. Once you solve the issue, it…