Presenting to Senior Executives

with Tatiana Kolovou

Redirecting a Distracted Audience

Sam is presenting his idea for a new platform that executives must bless for the project to move forward. As
he starts to share data that talks about costs, the CFO leans over and starts talking to someone else in the
room who in turn starts looking up something on their laptop.

Sam calmly pauses and says:

“These are the cost numbers we have come up with. Is there something we may have missed? Let me know if I
can dig up some more data from my appendix slides.”

Or

“Let me pause and see what questions or comments are coming up. I don’t want to leave anything unanswered.”

Now imagine a similar scenario happening on your presentation day. List the audience members who would
be likely to attend and imagine what type of distraction would come up. Record yourself interjecting, pausing
for questions, or noting something specific on the screen. Share this audio recording with a colleague. Ask for
feedback.

• Have them listen for tone; is it confident and clear?

• Have them listen for competence; do you sound like you are prepared to share more information?
• Have them listen for warmth; do you sound like you are open to discussing further and you welcome
the interaction?

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