Table of contents
Introduction
Consultants are known for spending hours aligning shapes and perfecting slides. And that's not far from the truth.
If you spend just 3h a day on PowerPoint (probably a low guesstimate for consultants), that's around 12 entire years of your life spent doing slides for a career consultant. And about half - or 6 entire years of one's life - just spent formatting PowerPoint slides.
Having master the art of PowerPoint to the perfection, consultants are admired for producing presentations of the highest quality, with the ability to bring clarity on big issues many companies struggle to tackle.
What's their secret?
One of the hidden assets large consulting firms have is that they have developed in-house tools to help their consultants prepare and format presentations matching their corporate standards and brand identity.
Wether it's Bain, McKinsey, or EY, each has its own add-in, designed specifically to improve team efficiency with PowerPoint. The result? Always impeccable slides, aligned to the pixel, in record time.
But here's the rub: once consultants leave their firms for new adventures, they have to say goodbye to these super-powered tools.
And that's when frustration sets in. Gone are the automated tools, back to the manual trials and tribulations. It's often at this point that they realize just how much of a difference those productivity tools made.
But there are solutions!
PowerPoint toolbars developed by major consulting firms: the secret weapon
Whether you work at Accenture, Bain, McKinsey or EY, every firm has its own little gems when it comes to productivity tools. If you’ve worked at one of these firms, you’re probably already familiar with their own tool.
Here is a list of the most popular PowerPoint consulting toolbars:
Bain Toolbox for PowerPoint
Accenture QPT Tools
McKinsey's Marvin Tools for PowerPoint
EY SlideFox
Deloitte Ribbon
PwC Smart add-in
Strategy& Toolbar
Bain Toolbox for PowerPoint
If you’ve worked at Bain & Company, you’ll know that the Bain Toolbox for PowerPoint is a must-have for anyone who juggles slides (anyone at Bain basically!). It allows consultants to easily insert or apply the corporate style on a presentation. For instance:
Apply the Bain style for bullets, callouts or headers instantly
Insert elements like chevrons, quotes, numbers etc.
Access company assets directly from PowerPoint
Quickly align objects thanks with all key alignment buttons in one place (very much like the Power-user shapes alignment toolbar)
Scan your presentation
Etc.
Accenture QPT Tools
The Accenture QPT Tools offers similar capabilities, although not as advanced and comprehensive as the Bain Toolbox. It's still a big time-saver for Accenture employees working on PowerPoint a lot:
Access company branded templates directly from PowerPoint, as well as a collection of key slides and visuals
Easily align objects with all key buttons available in one place
Insert objects like Harvey balls or chevrons
Quicky apply company colors
Create a table of content / agenda
McKinsey's Marvin Tools for PowerPoint
Regarding McKinsey’s Marvin Tools for PowerPoint, well, a shot of Marvin and your slides are aligned to the pixel!
EY SlideFox
At EY, they use EY SlideFox, a time-saving presentation tool.
Deloitte Ribbon
Deloitte Ribbon is the ideal tool for those who like to structure their content quickly and precisely.
PwC Smart add-in
Simple, fast and efficient is what can describe PwC Smart add-in. If you’ve had a chance to use it, you’ll know that this add-in is a real time-saver.
Strategy& Toolbar
When every second count, Strategy& Toolbar helps you structure and finalize your presentations.
All these tools are developed in-house for a simple reason: they save precious time, improve quality and make processes much smoother. And that’s the whole point of developing them. The limit is, you lose access to them as you pack your bags.
Leaving your consulting firm? Bounce back with the Power-user add-in for PowerPoint
If you've devided to leave your consulting firm and meet "the real world", it must have not taken long before you realize you were missing that “something”. It’s a common problem among consultants: after having benefited from a great tool in-house, you have to start from scratch in a new company without the tool you've used for years.
But we have a solution for you with Power-user. This productivity add-in for Microsoft 365 is independant from consulting firms and offers most of the key features you need to succeed in your new life.
The Library of content: access tons of qualitative and quantitative content
Our Library allows you to browse and select 800 PowerPoint templates, 7000 icons, 10m+ pictures, 350 editable maps, flags, logos, charts and more. Create consulting-level slides in just a few minutes!
Advanced charts to give life to your data
Power-user offers more than 100 charts you can use and built to stand out.
Creating a Mekko, Sankey, Gantt or a Panel chart is no longer a problem (or difficult).
The Excel-PowerPoint link: create automatic reports
Charts are great, but it would be better if you could automate them, right?
Well, with the Excel-PowerPoint link, you can automate entire reports and update them with just 1 click:
Link anything: charts, tables, and even values in the middle of sentences in texboxes
As easy as it gets: just copy and paste an object from Excel to PowerPoint, and the tool will suggest you create a link in 1 click
As robust as it gets: you can still move, rename or email your files, the links will not break!
Centrally managed: control and update links one by one or all at once from a Link Manager
The Cleaner: instantly find and fix tricky mistakes
Our Cleaner automatically cleans your presentation from errors such as misaligned titles, inconsistent fonts, missing page numbers, etc. You can ensure your slides reflect the high level of quality and consistency one could expect from a former consultant!
The Agenda: create tables of content automatically
The Power-user Agenda structures your presentation with update tables of contents automatically. And yes, it can match your corporate style, and you can use either dividers or a full table of content.
The alignment toolbar: everything, 1-click away
Our Powerful toolbar allows you to align shapes and objects at the speed of light.
You can move and organize objects faster than ever, with an arsenal of well-thought buttons:
Set to same height/width/size
Swap shapes position
Position symmetrically
Move shapes further apart or bring them closer
Straighten lines
Merge or split shapes
Select similar shapes
Organize shapes as a matrix with X rows and Y columns
... and of course all the basics of PowerPoint
... and a lot more!
Wether it's for fixing titles formatting, harmonizing colors, translating slides, taking notes or sharing content, Power-user has what you need.
The toolbar was created by former consultants. It comes with dozens of different features and tricks to help you save time and take your presentations to the next level.
Conclusion
Moving away from consulting is a big step in one's career. Very often, your slides are your signature and reflect heavily on how the organizing will pereceive you.
Having the proper tool to make this transition a brillant success can be a determining factor for propulsing one's career.
With a tool like Power-user, you can keep the efficiency high, communicate more clearly with your new organization and deliver results quickly.
Want to learn more? Book a demo!