Best Practices

Question and Answer Sessions

Some entrepreneurs are great at presenting and terrible at Q&A. Someare the opposite. It is important to shine during both portions of apitch. A quality presentation shows that you understand your businessand can explain it well. A quality Q&A session shows how you processand respond to challenges and gives a glimpse of your personality. These tips are primarily for entrepreneurs that are presenting theirbusiness plans to investors, but many of these concepts apply for otherQ&A scenarios – sales presentations, partner presentations, etc.

Answer the Question

. Seems obvious, but too manyentrepreneurs ramble and try to use Q&A as a way to extendtheir presentation and squeeze in more information

Be Concise

. Try to answer the question in 1-2 sentences. Givethem a short, concise answer that stands on its own. If theywant more information, they will ask for it. Make sure youimmediately give them an answer and then you can give themsupporting information if needed. Don’t start with a bunch of background information that leads up to the answer.

Don’t ramble

. If someone asks a question and has a puzzledlook on their face, don't just ramble until they cry "mercy". Askthem "Did that answer your question?”.

Practice.

Sit down with your team and write up 30 questionsthat might be asked. You know your business and the holes andrisks, so you know what questions you will get. Then preparetight answers for these questions and practice delivering them.If you do this, you will be prepared for 90% of the questions youwill receive.

Don’t be defensive

. Too many entrepreneurs make Q&A into anargument because they feel they have to defend their business.Be confident, but flexible. They are going to ask somechallenging questions that poke holes in your business. Addressthem without being stubborn.

Know your audience.

Do your homework on who will be in theaudience. Know their career, their education, the deals theyhave done. This will help you understand why they asked certainquestions as well as how to answer them. It will also help youbuild a relationship with them. And you will impress them at howprepared you are when you toss out something like… “I knowyou recently did a deal with XYZ so you understand that…”

Stroke their ego.

You might have some people in the audiencethat want to ask a tough question just to prove how smart they