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Creating a Presentation Content Strategy, Part 1
When I create a presentation, there are things I want my audience to know, things I want them to think about, and actions that I want them to take. Do these goals sound familiar?
Most business presentations are crafted with these goals in mind, so why aren't more presentations effective?
When presentations fail, it's usually for one or more of several reasons:
1) The evidence supporting the case for action is not compelling and fails to persuade.
2) The presentation content relies on assumptions that have not been sufficiently tested.
3) The presentation suggests considerations or actions that are not consistent with the mission, values, and belief systems that - taken together - underpin the organization's culture.
4) Presenters don't take adult-learning dynamics into consideration.
5) The presenter's thinking isn't organized transparently so that the audience can follow, then remember the content narrative. The message doesn't stick.
6) There is too much information or too many messages (complexity) obscuring those facts or ideas that matter.
Even a very skilled presenter can fail miserably as a result of one of these issues. A silver tongue won't save you. Neither will a beautifully designed set of slides. These things might help you feel more confident in the moment. They might even add entertainment value to your audience, but they won't take you where you want to go. You need a content strategy for that. So let's explore how to build a content strategy that betters the odds for a successful presentation.
For the purposes of this exploration, I'm going to quantify the dimensions of success in outcome terms. In other words, we're not going to be satisfied with a presentation that just informs, or just inspires, or even one that gets people to think. We're going to set the bar at an action-response. We want a set of behaviors to be adopted that contribute to mission delivery.
Let's start with tar-baby number 4: Presenters don't take adult-learning dynamics into consideration. This is a biggie. Ignore it at your peril.
If you want action, you need conviction. People won't act unless they are persuaded that their actions are both the right thing and the effective thing. Good people won't do the right thing if it's not effective, nor will they do the effective thing if it's not right.
Here's a news flash for you: you're not going to talk your audience into anything about which they are not already persuaded. There's only one person in whom they will readily and consistently invest their trust and confidence: themselves.
If you want an adult to take action, you've got to give them time and space to deliberate. Deliberation is a twenty-five cent word for answering the question, "What does this mean?"
Learning experts call this function "sensemaking." Adults crave the opportunity to make sense of their jobs, their relationships, and their world. And increasingly their jobs, relationships, and world are depriving them of this need. Take the news, for example:
How many times do you hear some pundit disguise their opinion in the vestments of "news?" Once upon a time, newscasters presented the facts. Evidently, that was boring, so they commenced starting with the facts, but then proceeded immediately to tell us what the facts meant. For some time now, the information-distribution function and the sense-making function have completely collapsed into one domain: opinion-as-news.
Most thinking adults seethe with resentment at this treatment, especially in their work environments.
We want the opportunity to make sense of things, ourselves. We want to be able to listen, think, talk, and think some more - before we act. When it comes to television news, we might not have much muscle to flex (aside from changing channels or hitting the off switch), but when it comes to our livelihoods and neighborhoods, most adults are much more responsive to processes that engage them by fostering inquiry and dialogue.
So, if you want action, you'd better hoped that your audience will talk, so that they can hear themselves talk. They can talk themselves into doing something that you want them to do when you can't.
Here's another news flash: they need time to do that. So, if your presentation isn't timed for them to talk, you've asked the tar baby to dance.
Facilitating robust deliberation can produce surprising results, the most surprising of which is a strategy twist that looks like failure, but is actually success. If you're a control freak, this can scare you to death, but it can also be very exciting. What's this scenario look like?
From our standpoint, a successful presentation spurs convergence around our evidence and adoption of those strategies that we've recommended. Get ready to let go of that. Prepare to fail forward with divergence from the presented ideas - divergence that comes from real exploration and openness, not from the linear future that one conjures up in one's noggin.
A divergence scenario leads to the espying of a previously unconsidered reality and a correlated strategy set. In other words, sometimes the best presentations transform failure (the rejection of your recommended strategies and actions) into a better future. Of course, it doesn't feel better because you didn't think of it, but that's a different matter.
Look at it this way, nobody can think of every conceivable response to the present - or even every conceivable interpretation of the present - but circumstances can sometimes create astonishing novelty. When this happens, your particular recommendations might fail, but the movement your work created is quite the success. Effective leaders recognize this phenomenon for what it is: adaptive and intuitive innovation. When this happens, it hints at traits that signify a highly functional and highly creative organization.
Of course, your role feels different from the one you've imagined. It's not unlike wearing a weird new set of clothes. You're no longer the strategic seer; you're just the catalyst. Relax. Celebrate. Declare victory. You have achieved your larger objective. You've spurred a set of behaviors that will contribute to mission delivery. People are not only interested, they are compelled. In this way, developing business strategy is a lot like writing a play. Both are developed with the idea that the audience is a co-creator.
Next: Tar Baby No. 3: The presentation suggests considerations or actions that are not consistent with the mission, values, and belief systems that - taken together - underpin the organization's culture.
Posted on August 15, 2006 11:41 AM | Permalink
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