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Whenever you’re facing a new, complex problem to solve, step back and reflect on your general approach from a philosophical point of view: are you aiming at solving it completely straight from the beginning or are you integrating a learning curve? Perhaps the most complicated problem ever solved was to put a man on the Moon, and maybe we can learn something from NASA’s approach. Related Posts:No matter what problem you are solving, if it’s in an organization chances are that, at some point, you’ll have to present your recommendations to an audience and build a consensus. When you do, make sure that you pick the right types of charts to support your point. Use the right type of chartA common characteristic to all effective presentations is that that they have a clear storyline: they take the audience from point A to point B in a logical, efficient manner. A good way to do this is to organize your message in a pyramid structure. Related Posts:Chances are that sooner or later you will be leading a problem-solving team. When you do, make sure that you use the right leadership style. Just as there isn’t a single golf club that’s optimal for all shots, there isn’t one leadership style that is most effective in all situations. Instead, you must adapt your style depending on the skills and confidence of your team to do the task in hand. This is called situational leadership; it was first developed by Ken Blanchard and Paul Hersey in Management of Organizational Behavior (now in its 9th edition). Here is a variation of it. Related Posts:Let the primary use of your presentation dictate your slide design philosophy. Slide decks are usually the end deliverable of consulting engagements, so consultants must prepare excellent documents to justify their huge fees and looking for inspiration in how strategy consultancies prepare effective presentations can be useful. But consultants are not the best at integrating images and generating emotions in their presentations so you can also find good inspirational material in design-centric approaches. Related Posts:When presenting your recommendations, the tagline of each of your slide spells out its main idea and the body of the slide supports that idea with details. You have several options to display these details including text, quantitative charts, concept visuals, tables, photos, or a combination of these. Each creates a different impression. Let’s talk about quantitative charts. Quantitative charts can be an excellent way to present data but you must choose the right chart for your data. Related Posts:Chances are that you’ll have to present material. A slide deck can be two things: a visual support for your message during the presentation and a stand-alone record for it that can be distributed. During the presentation, slides are a visual support helping you to communicate your message and facilitating its memorization. As such, they shouldn’t compete with you, the presenter, who remain the primary conveyor of information. Most people have difficulties reading and listening at the same time, so keep your slides simple. Also, simplicity gives the image of clarity, so you’re definitely better off having simple slides. Related Posts:Solving problems in general, and building issue trees in particular, requires both an understanding of the general picture and an almost-obsessive attention to details. Usually we are good at one or the other but hardly ever at both. If you suck, you will probably need someone to tell you, so get a Devil’s advocate. Progress through critiqueThe hard part about solving problems on your own is that it requires to shift your paradigm, which isn’t the easiest thing to do, let alone by yourself. Related Posts:Most of us use PowerPoint as a business communication tool. Here are a few ideas to prepare high-impact slides. Present one idea per slide. Your slide is your unit of reasoning and argumentation; have just one idea per slide. If it’s a complex idea, you can break it down over two or three slides, whatever makes it simpler for your audience to follow you.
 Following a few simple rules can make your slides more effective. Related Posts:Richard Feynman, the physics Nobel Prize laureate, gave a commencement speech at CalTech in 1974. There he talked about cargo cult science: Related Posts:Simplify as much as you can, but not more. Simplify as much as you canWhen I first moved to the US in the mid-nighties, I became much smarter. At least, I felt much smarter. If I were sick, I would go to the doctor and she would explain me in English what I had, why I had it, what I could do about it, and how I could prevent having it again. Related Posts: |
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