Choosing Your Prompts

If we agree that one of the two goals of any presentation is to get some key points across so that they can be remembered, it follows that you need to select an appropriate prompt to ensure that you achieve this. The prompts available can be grouped under four options:

1. A script
2. The slides, document or book that you are using as a visual aid
3. Your brain - i.e. impromptu or ad lib
4. Bullet point notes

All of these options have their place in presentations and meetings, but the one you choose is critical to the success of your presentation.

At Kingstree, when we are asked to review presentations, we obviously examine whether our clients are getting the key points across and whether they are coming across as themselves, competent professionals. To achieve this, we maintain that they have to match three criteria:

Is the presentation being led by the speaker (as opposed to being led by the visual aid with the speaker in a supporting role?

Is the speaker controlling the thinking of the audience? Are they thinking about what the speaker wants them to think about?

Has the speaker got the audience’s undivided attention, on him, on the screen, out of the window (if that’s where he wants it)?

If the audience can choose from a variety of things to consider at the same time, there is a danger of divided attention.
The challenge involved in matching these seemingly obvious criteria is best illustrated by an example. Several years ago, we worked on the demerger of Zeneca from ICI. Their results announcement six months after demerger was important as the first opportunity for the market to able to make a judgement on the track record of Zeneca as a separate company. A fortnight before that announcement, one of my consultants met with the Management Team to plan the presentation.

John Mayo, the Finance Director, began the meeting by challenging those three criteria. He claimed that the analysts needed to be given the figures first so that he could then give his interpretation of them. He suggested that this would be best achieved by putting the basic figures up on the screen, making sure everyone agrees on them and then discussing his opinion of them.

Wrong. By doing that, he would fail on each criteria. First, the slide would be leading the presentation, with him simply adding a commentary. Second, the moment the slide goes up, the analysts would begin making their own interpretations, which may even involve an uphill struggle to win them back later - so he would not be controlling their thinking. Third, he might be making a point about one area while some analysts would be considering some other point on the screen and so he would have divided attention.

My colleague suggested that before putting up any slide, he should give his opinion of the results they were about to see. So, on the day, he started with no slide, i.e. he led, and, with no distractions to divide their attention, he described how Zeneca’s results were on the face of it outstanding but affected by some favourable exchange rate fluctuations. When he said “let me show you what I mean” and put the slide up, attention was then diverted to the screen. Even better, those analysts were now looking at those figures to see if John Mayo was right, so that, as he led them through the argument, he was controlling their thoughts around the points he wanted to get across. He was now matching those three criteria.

Of course this means that the slide is no longer a useful prompt. Speakers who use a slide, a page of a book or an agenda as their own prompt will have difficulty in making an effective presentation. A script, as we have already discussed, is an invaluable prompt for presentations to large audiences, if they get the impression that you are not slavishly regurgitating a set script, but not much use in a smaller presentation, where you are fooling no one if they can see that you are reading.

This leaves the options of talking ad lib or being prompted by bullet point notes, in each case possibly supported by visual aids. Many people feel that if they want to be seen to know their subject well, or want to appear a natural, gifted speaker, they should talk ad lib, “straight from the heart.” We refute this for a number of reasons. First, ad libbing gives you no guarantee that you will get your points across. How often have you come away from a presentation, a meeting or an important conference call and realized that you forgot to mention some key point? But ad libbing does not necessarily give a positive impression to your audience either. You can give the impression that either you have not taken this opportunity seriously and are casual in your attitude to this occasion, or, worse still, that you are delivering a standard presentation that you know so well or have learnt off by heart.

Churchill was known for learning his speeches, but he always used a script or notes not only as a guarantee against missing something out, but also to create a positive impression that he was taking the occasion seriously. If you are seen to be referring to some notes, the audience will see that you have taken the trouble to select, from all of your expertise on the subject, some key points that you specifically want to get across at that meeting.

So often, we see chief executives “topping and tailing” team presentations without a note in sight. Those that produce some notes, however rough, and are seen to be using them give a clear signal that the meeting is important to them and that they are not just wheeling some standard introduction that they always use.

So notes used well, with visual aids in the secondary role of supporting points made by the speaker, make an effective prompt, better than using slides or agendas as a prompt and far more effective than talking ad lib.

Key Points

• Select a prompt appropriate for the occasion.
• Put yourself in the lead role, not as a narrator to slides.
• Control the thinking of your audience.
• Avoid divided attention.
• Use a script or notes as your prompt.