By Bill Foley, Microsoft MVP and owner of the PPT Inc web site.

If you can not find a built-in printing format for your handouts in PowerPoint, the Send to Word feature is a great alternative. You can use Send to Word to make slide thumbnails, notes, or blank lines that you can modify as necessary to provide a customized handout for your audience.

1. With your presentation open in PowerPoint, on the File menu, point to Send To, and then click Microsoft Word.

    Note   The first, second, and third options in the Send to Microsoft Office Word dialog box are available only when you use the Send to Word feature.

2. Do one of the following:
   • To send notes, click either the Notes next to slides or Notes below slides check box.
   • To send handouts, click either Blank lines next to slides or Blank lines below slides button.
   • To send an outline, click Outline only.

At the bottom of the dialog box you can choose whether to Paste or Paste link. If you use the Paste option, then go back and modify your slides, you will need to recreate your Word handout again. If you use the Paste link option, this file will automatically update.

As with any linked file, don’t move the new Word handout file around, because the link can easily be broken.

The easiest way to eliminate linking problems is to keep all files associated with your PowerPoint presentation in the same folder, then link them. This way the path is relative in case you decide to burn a CD, which means the links will still work!

About the author:   Bill Foley is the Vice President and co-owner of Professional Training Technologies, Inc. He was recently nominated as a PowerPoint MVP and just completed the examination requirements to be certified as a Microsoft Office Specialist Master Instructor. His specialties include creating Computer-Based Training (CBT) using PowerPoint VBA, developing Word templates and user-interfaces for accessing your various templates, providing computer training on Microsoft office products, developing training materials for the Nuclear Power industry, training Operators at nuclear power plants, providing Continuing Instructor Training, and maintaining the PPT Inc web site.