- Block employees now bring working prototypes instead of slide decks to internal meetings.
- CEO Jack Dorsey says prototypes built on real data have more depth and can be modified in real time.
- The shift follows Block’s layoff of 4,000 employees in February, with Dorsey citing AI-driven efficiency.
- Dorsey joins Jeff Bezos and Steve Jobs in a long line of tech leaders who rejected PowerPoint culture.
Prototypes Over Presentations
Jack Dorsey says meetings at Block look fundamentally different now. Speaking on Sequoia’s “Long Strange Trip” podcast, the Block CEO said employees have stopped bringing slide decks to meetings entirely. “Now everyone is bringing a prototype that they built, which is pretty amazing,” Dorsey said.
The prototypes — built on simulated or real data — replace the static presentations that dominated the company’s internal culture just two months ago. Dorsey says they offer more “depth and realism” than slides ever could, with the added advantage of real-time modification during discussions. The cost of iterating and being wrong, he added, “is getting closer and closer to zero.” The shift comes after Block laid off over 4,000 employees — roughly 40% of its workforce — in February, with Dorsey pointing to AI-driven efficiency as a key driver.
The Anti-PowerPoint Movement Keeps Growing
Dorsey is not the first tech CEO to declare war on slide decks. Perplexity CEO Aravind Srinivas said in October that he hasn’t built a pitch deck since the company’s Series A, preferring written memos and live Q&A sessions instead. Jeff Bezos banned PowerPoint at Amazon back in 2004, requiring four-page written memos. And Steve Jobs famously dismissed slides altogether: “People who know what they’re talking about don’t need PowerPoint.”
What makes Dorsey’s version different is the emphasis on building over writing. Where Bezos replaced decks with documents and Srinivas replaced them with conversation, Block is replacing them with working software. In an era where AI tools are collapsing the cost of prototyping — and Block is explicitly restructuring around that reality — the slide deck may be the first casualty of the shift from describing products to demonstrating them.
