How to give a presentation so great you get promoted on the spot!

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Mrs. Type A, are you saying it’s possible to give a great presentation and get promoted immediately?

Yes, this happened to me, about 10 years ago. I was an individual contributor at my company, and still quite inexperienced quite honestly. At the time, I was facing a big presentation to our CEO in which I had to make a recommendation on how to evolve our current services based on recent market changes.

I was out of my league!

A recommendation that would affect our whole company? YES

To our CEO? YES

All by myself? YES

ME? YES

Really? Are you sure? YES, already!

There are probably dozens of reasons why I felt that way, some of which may require help from a medical professional :). But, that’s for a different day. Once I came to terms with my need to give a great presentation, I set upon doing the only thing I knew how (and the only thing that was acceptable) as a Type A…work my hardest to have a successful outcome.

Sure, it wasn’t my first rodeo; I had given dozens of leadership presentations before. Some were great presentations, some were just ok.  I had done enough to know I hated them, and that every minute spent leading up to them was miserable as thoughts ran through my head:

What if I forget what I am supposed to say?

Will the CEO ask a question I don’t understand?

Is it crazy to be worried that I will accidentally say a 4-letter word because I’m so nervous I’m not pronouncing things right? (which did happen to me once, by the way…a story for another time)

What if I trip as I walk up and I fall flat on my face? (yes, this also happened. See below)

Fast forward a few weeks, and I complete the presentation. Well, most of it. I wasn’t quite done with the requisite “Next Steps” slide at the end, at which point the CEO asked me to leave. He said, “Thanks, I think we have seen enough. You can wait outside.”

I waited for a bit and then just felt like I may cry, quite honestly. I went back to my office, unsure what had happened.   Just me, alone in my office, with my thoughts:

What are they talking about?

Why did I have to leave?

Are they in there discussing whether I should be fired?

Was I so incoherent, they had to just have me leave and they’d read the slides themselves?

It wasn’t long before my manager, Mr. Erratic, stopped by. He had been in the room for the presentation and the secret discussion after. He sat down and asked:

How would you like to be promoted to manager and lead the team to execute on your recommendation?

WHAT? Did I hear that right?

That great presentation sparked a trajectory for me that I would have never thought possible. I reflect on that moment a lot as I mentor employees now (mostly women) who struggle to be comfortable and confident being front-and-center. It’s one of my favorite things to do at work…to help guide younger professionals through the trials and tribulations of the corporate environment. AND, it’s what has driven me to start this blog.

If you’ve been in business for a short while, you probably have had a lot of formal presentation training. Trainers will tell you that a great presentation needs to have a headline, your key points supported by evidence, and a close. YES, you need these things. What I always struggled with is HOW. How do I develop and deliver those things? What makes it a good opening or close?

So, what did I do that day 10 years ago?

Without further adieu, here are…

Mrs. Type A’s thoughts on giving a great presentation and getting promoted on the spot!

1. Craft an opening “from the heart”

So, this is probably the hardest part for me to master. Some people call this a headline. Honestly most headlines/openers are boring and you’re going to lose people. Trust me, as a current leader of a division in my company, I now sit through many presentations where people are asking for resources, or some other form of a “green light” approval. I tune out when someone says, “My goal today is to seek approval of $XM for a new program to grow market share.” Ugh, this is going to be boring.  All I think to myself is that this won’t be a great presentation.

What I encourage people to start with is the answer to this question: what is in your heart? Why are you excited about this new program? What would it’s impact be? Why do you care about it? Why should I care about it?

Instead of that boring opening, this is what I told our CEO 10 years ago (something like this):

“I’ve have spent a lot of time the past few weeks reflecting on our recent loss of market share. It pains me because I feel our product can offer the customer much more than we have been able to communicate to them effectively. And, so, I’m excited to discuss how we can change today’s business challenges into an opportunity to leapfrog the competition tomorrow.

NOW that will get attention! CEOs want to talk about pushing through challenges. They want to leapfrog! They really, really, really, don’t want to talk about another project idea. That is not the start to a great presentation! So, how you open makes the difference in engaging a leader (especially one that sits through many presentations).

When your passion, excitement, fear (whatever is in your heart) is in your opening, you will get attention, and get people on your side.

I saw this reinforced when I sat through a presentation of a colleague of mine to that same CEO a few years later. She was presenting about the launch of a new division in our company and I was a key functional partner, so I attended to answer any relevant questions. The goal of her presentation was…drum roll please…wait for it….wait for it….quality metrics.

Zzz zzz

How her new division would ensure we could effective measure and communicate product quality

Zzz zzz

Did you fall asleep already?  I know, so so boring, right? Honestly I didn’t even want to go to it. It was not going to be a great presentation.  I kept asking her, “are you sure you need me there?” I honestly thought I’d end up tuning her out and then someone would ask a question and I’d get caught.

Anyway, because I always support my peers (another lesson for another day), I ended up attending. It was probably the best presentation I’ve ever sat through.  She starts by sharing a personal experience where the lack of effective quality metrics in a hospital resulted in the death of her mother when she was really young. And how her passion in life has become to define quality and ensure that decisions are made appropriately with that information.

BAM.

No one even blinked. You could hear a pin drop. I’ll tell you, she had the attention of the entire room for the entire session. We listened to every single technical aspect of this presentation (including the math on how quality metrics would be calculated). No one fell asleep. No one tuned out.

She connected with the audience, shared her passion from the heart, and people want to hear what she had to say.

I do caution that you don’t want to manufacture an opening. And certainly do not over-share. If you have been in a company long enough, you will likely get a feel for what is appropriate. If not, then ask a colleague!

2.  Be transparent about your data and evidence

I’ve wasted a lot of time gathering all the perfect data for a presentation. I have driven my team and functional partners crazy trying to compile a complete picture. I could exhaust them with a million questions:

How far back did this trend go?

How does it compare to this other data trend?

Is it the same in LA vs NYC? What about this part of LA vs. another?

Are we sure this data is accurate?

I’m not sure this is true in every industry, but I suspect that — to some degree –- there is not a need to be perfect and complete.   You can get into analysis paralysis. If you find yourself asking for more and more data, I suggest you just pick one piece of data that illustrates your perspective and just talk about what you don’t know or didn’t consider.

I repeat: to have a great presentation, your data does not have to be complete or entirely accurate AND, if it isn’t, be sure to tell the audience.

The secret is: it is more important to be transparent than to be complete or accurate. It comes down to trust. As a leader, I’ll never know if you actually took all the right steps with that data, or whether you made it up the night before while watching TV. But, if I sense you did your best and are putting forth the best work you could do, then I’m more apt to side with your argument.

So, how does one do this?

If you moved quickly and couldn’t get a complete data set, consider saying something like “In order to simplify, we looked at national data and assumed no regional variance. If regional variance is important to making a decision on how to proceed, I will confirm that data by the end of the week.”

For my own great presentation in which I refer to above, I had to pull something together quickly. I struggled to get a precise forecast. Instead of killing myself and others to get to false sense of precision, I presented a forecast by saying “I know that this number is not accurate, but I’m confident we are not orders of magnitude off so this estimates helps calibrate the impact. I will refine the forecast should we proceed and update you at the interim check-in.”

Let me share another example. I had someone on my team who was in complete analysis paralysis. He was just compiling a lot of data and trying to triangulate it to every other data element he could find. He wasn’t making progress on his deliverable and I was concerned. When he walked me through his journey, I realized that – no matter what other data he found – the decision wouldn’t change. Whether the ROI was 1% or 3%, it didn’t matter; we should kill this marketing program because it wasn’t giving a great return.

I coached him to share whatever data he had, and say, “While I think there is opportunity to put a finer point on this data, I am confident that the actual number is not more than double this estimate, which wouldn’t change the decision to stop this program.”  Ah, that’s a line from a great presentation.

It’s important to note that I am not advocating that you should project a lack of confidence. I argue that being transparent about the gaps in your work is actually a sign of confidence; you are comfortable with your work product. I also advocate that it is also a sign of great leadership. You can look at your work objectively and use good judgment about how you spend your time. As a result, you work efficiently. You seem like someone who should get promoted!

3.  Address questions with ease

OK, so this is the one that I still fret about. In fact, I’m sitting here worrying in the back of my mind about a (hopefully soon to be great) presentation I have to give next week. I’m wondering:

What questions will the audience ask?

Will I know the answer?

Will I look stupid because I can’t answer the questions?

Or worse, will I answer wrong?!

I’ve had some tough experiences with this one. I can share one tip that has helped me, which is to ask questions back. If nothing else, it buys you time…it might even move the questioner to a new topic.

For example, in my great presentation 10 years ago someone asked, “how did this year’s sales trend compare to last year’s?”

Well, shoot, I didn’t look into that! Why didn’t I look into that?  Of course I should know that!

OK, calm down. Don’t overreact. In this situation, think I replied something back like: “My sense is that the data trend is not different than last year’s. If so, would it change your decision?”

In the vast majority of the presentations I sit though…no, it probably would not. Most questions asked in leadership presentations are because people are just simply curious or — depending on your culture — trying to look good / be noticed. Neither really matter to the decision at hand and the presentation.

There is a lot of advise on answering presentation questions out there which advocates being honest and saying you don’t know the answer and will follow up. For the most part, I do agree with this advice. My only amendment to that advice — and how to have a even more great presentation — is to try to get the questioned dismissed first by asking:

Would it change your decision?

What’s driving your question? What are you concerned about?

What would the answer to that question need to be in order to persuade you in a different direction?

You may need to consider the culture of your organization on this, and what tone is appropriate. There are times when I may soften the language a bit to say, “Yes, that is an important data point. We will have to dig more there to make sure there isn’t something we missed as we move forward.”

In my opinion, it’s cleaner not to say you will follow up with the answer later. Especially because the question likely doesn’t matter. And, if it does, you can work through the scenarios real time (i.e., if the trend was different, then what would we do?)

4.  Be funny!

In many cases, this is just a flavor of #1 above to speak from your heart. But, I call humor out separately because it is such a powerful force. Laughter can change your entire outlook on a day (or a business issue). I took a parenting class once and the whole concept was to bond with your child by playing / laughing before you institute something the child will likely not like (i.e., going to bed, taking a shower, etc). The idea being that, when you laugh with someone, they are less inclined to disagree. I’m probably paraphrasing / bastardizing the concept here, but that was my takeaway and I’ve found it helpful with my kids (the two times I had the energy to implement it).

I mentioned above that I tripped and fell once as I was walking up to give a presentation. This is not a lie, people! I was about to give a presentation to over 150 people. I’m walking up the stairs and I don’t know what happened. But I fell. Some people in the front got up to come help me up, which only made it worse.  It didn’t seem like the start to a great presentation.

So what did I do?

When I finally stood back up and put my shoe back on (yes, my shoe even fell off!!!), I went up to the mic and said, “now that the Cirque du Soleil part of this presentation is over, let me share with the new marketing program we are launching today!”

Everyone laughed. Years later, people said they remembered that presentation. I’m always shocked. The actual product I marketed doesn’t even exist anymore. But, they remembered how it made them feel to laugh in that moment, and, so, that presentation stayed with them.

I caution against telling jokes. Or being too overt about it about inserting humor. It has to be natural, and likely, unplanned. In the end, it’s about connecting with the people you are presenting to so use your best judgment on what will make you standout.

4.  Wear a killer outfit

This is a rich topic, so stay tuned for the next post!

I covered a lot of ground about great presentations here.   You may still be wondering, “seriously how did you get promoted that day?” I honestly don’t know.  I never asked.  All I can tell you is how I now – about a decade later – see that situation based on my own experience making decisions as a leader at my company.

When I am looking at approving someone’s proposal in a presentation, I am not really looking at the data. I’m asking myself”

Do I trust this person?

Do they care about the business or is this just a win for his/her resume?

If this project doesn’t go as planned, will he/she be honest with me about it or will he/she hide it from me?

Will he/she take my feedback and let me help them if needed?”

In summary, I believe our CEO felt that he got a good sense of who I am, specifically that I am trustworthy enough to take on a key additional responsibility.  My final advice is – whatever you present – convey that you are a real, trustworthy person who values the business over yourself. If you don’t get your proposal approved or a promotion on the spot, I strongly believe you will have new opportunities coming your way that will lead to those achievements.

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See additional tips on preparing for an interview for a management position here.

Thanks for your attention on what makes a great presentation! I’m new to this blogging thing. I’d love your feedback! What did you think? How does this help? How could it be better?

Also, I do freelance support for presentations, resumes, job cover letters, and MBA applications. Please reach out if you’d like more information on these services at MrsTypeA@MrsTypeA.com.