A Shotgun approach

There are a number of different construction processes that can be followed in developing a presentation. Sometimes you as a presenter will have the opportunity to develop a presentation which specifically targets your audience on a given occasion, with a clear message and intent like a tactical missile.  There are however times where a presentation will be more general in nature, constructed to be all things to all people, much like the spread of lead from a shotgun.

 A shotgun approach delivers certain benefits in that it allows a standard presentation to be recycled, delivered with only minor tailoring, to many audiences, reducing your preparation time. There are many examples of these shotgun standards, In politics these presentations are referred to as “Stump speeches” and are a staple part of the political process, likewise they are used in sales as a product spiel – designed to share the value of a product with an audience where the sales person knows almost nothing about the people.

Shotgun presentations are often useful where the author of the presentation will not be the person delivering the information and the author wants to limit the variation in content between audiences, something that can be significant in seminars involving legal issues.

In developing generic presentations, different skills are required of the author and the speaker, and it is important if you are performing both roles to consider the requirements of both separately.

As an author of a generic or shotgun presentation you are still seeking to engage with the audience, even though you do not know who they are. A strategy for doing so is the use of the “Generic Themes” that is things that will appeal to pretty well everyone:

·         “Do you want to save money/time/effort”

·         “Do you want to enjoy better health/holidays/relationships”

are examples of generic themes in that everyone is likely to respond yes, although how important those things are will vary between audience members.  By building your presentation around those values you are able to clearly articulate what is in it for the audience without actually having any knowledge or the audience.

The risk involved in the “Shotgun Standards” are that they by their very nature are generic and can result in even the most passionate and eloquent of deliveries reaching audience members that respond with “That’s all very nice but what’s in it for me?” or potentially even worse, communicate a message that is inconsistent with the audiences beliefs, such as a presentation of the value of a vegetarian lifestyle with a group of Cattle ranchers.

Another cautionary note for authors of generic presentations is that because generic presentations are so common, some of the terminology has become value loaded such as Family-values, society expectations. These phrases on their own don’t have negative connotations however they have become linked with previous presentations, previous presenters with the result that your presentation maybe tarred with the same brush (or in extreme cases Tarred and feathered).

For the speaker, handed a generic presentation, your challenge is to incorporate those messages into something meaningful. The very first recommendation is to determine how much scope you have to adapt the presentation.

A presenter delivering a presentation on a word for word basis (essentially reading or reciting a presentation) faces the challenge of making the presentation interesting and establishing a degree of comfort with the content. Even if you didn’t prepare the presentation, it needs to sound like you at least understand and support the content, without this the presenter may as well be a tape recording, the audience will quickly disengage from a presentation where the speaker is seen as simply being a mouthpiece of another.

Equally important however is not varying the content too far from the prepared information; doing so can create a situation where an important caveat or essential message is missed in the adaptation.

The speaker is the only person who is able to judge the response of the audience and as such, if you are delivering the message you need to be continually assessing your audience, asking yourself is the language appropriate? Does the presentation assume they have knowledge they don’t? Are the members of the audience looking confused? Are the audience angry with the message?

Unlike a presentation prepared by the speaker, in the case of a generic presentation the responsibility is shared to make the presentation a success and as such both parties need to be committed to the presentation and the audience.

For many presentations of generic information I have observed in the past, the presentation ends up being a fight between the presenter and the author with comments of “We will just skip this part” leading the audience to question the presentation, preparation and professionalism of the entire product.

At the end of the day, a presenter needs to put the people in front of them and the front of their thinking – this will build a quality foundation.

Tips for taking telling to a true transfer of ideas

·         Seek to appeal to your audiences shared interests

·         As a presenter, understand the core parts of the message you are delivering

·         Be flexible and prepared to adapt if your message is missing the mark

 

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Article reproduced with permission of
Robert Green from RJGreenConsulting
http://rjgreenconsulting.blogspot.com/

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