It's essential that you provide benchmarks in presentations
when you are talking about the size, age, value or other
attributes of a subject.
I have a friend who owns a temporary placement agency. In
conversation, she told me she had x-number of temps placed
with clients that day, and I had to ask her whether this
number was good, bad or indifferent. That's because I know
nothing about her business, so I have no benchmark.
A client told me recently that she had had a 70% response
to a companywide survey she had conducted. Having spoken
with other clients who were getting 30-40% response to
similar surveys, I was able to congratulate her on her
success. Until that point, she had been disappointed with
her own response because she didn't how how poorly other
companies had fared --- in other words, she had no
benchmark.
So, how do you provide benchmarks in presentations? There
are a number of techniques, of course, but the best way
I've found is to compare the unknown to something already
familiar to the audience. Here are some examples:
• The company's net profit for this quarter was $1.2
million --- that's twice as much as we made for the whole
of last year. (Now the audience knows this is good!)
• The president's office is 1500 square feet --- my whole
apartment would fit inside it! (Even though the listener
may not be familiar with your apartment, any office that
could accommodate a whole apartment is one b-i-g office, so
this works as a benchmark.)
• The new product was on the market in three months, from
concept to launch. Previous product launches have always
taken a year. (Without the second statement, there's no
benchmark so the first statement has little meaning.)
Do you see how this works? Let the audience form a mental
picture of what they do know, so that they can understand
the new information.
Of course, you must make sure you use a benchmark the
audience will understand. For example, a common way of
expressing size or length in North America is to say a
thing is the size of three football fields. This would not
work as well in a country not familiar with football fields.
Remember, statistics are meaningless if people don't
understand them. Providing benchmarks in presentations will
help ensure your audience knows whether your facts are
good, bad or indifferent.
----------------------------------------------------
Helen Wilkie is a professional speaker, workshop leader and
author specializing in communication. Call 416-966-5023 for
information on her presentation skills workshops. Subscribe
to Helen's no-cost monthly e-zine, "Communi-keys", at
http://www.mhwcom.com and get your free 40-page e-book, "23
ideas you can use RIGHT NOW to communicate and succeed in
your business career!"
No comments:
Post a Comment