One foot in the muck, the other in utopia
A couple questions for you, dear readers:
That is, should there be agenda slides in presentations?
I know Steve‘s general answer — no — and I follow that thinking. But, people still seem to use agendas frequently. So I ask you, dear readers, what’s your take?
Technorati Tags: presentations
rev="post-640" 9 Comments
Categories: The Analyst Life.
[…] Recently, Cote asked his readers whether he thought agenda slides were appropriate for presentations. The responses that surprised me the most were the ones that stated agendas were good so that the audience participant could know early on whether he wanted to leave or he would at least know how long into the presentation you were along so he could decide whether he needed to stay. The question that comes to mind for those responses is how did that person get invited to the presentation if it didn’t concern them in the first place. It’s safe and easy to invite everyone to your meeting, but in the end, you only wasted their time and yours. If you stay focused on the point, speak and not read, and keep the length to a minimum (preferable 6 – 15 minutes) , then most people won’t have the need to constantly refer to the agenda wondering when they can get the hell out of there. […]
[…] Recently, Cote asked his readers whether he thought agenda slides were appropriate for presentations. The responses that surprised me the most were the ones that stated agendas were good so that the audience participant could know early on whether he wanted to leave or he would at least know how long into the presentation you were along so he could decide whether he needed to stay. The question that comes to mind for those responses is how did that person get invited to the presentation if it didn’t concern them in the first place. It’s safe and easy to invite everyone to your meeting, but in the end, you only wasted their time and yours. If you stay focused on the point, speak and not read, and keep the length to a minimum (preferable 6 – 15 minutes) , then most people won’t have the need to constantly refer to the agenda wondering when they can get the hell out of there. […]
I am not a big fan of agendas during interesting presentations; however, they do prove nice in boring presentations. At least it gives me something to do while someone is reading their 50 bullet points verbatim. It's the equivalent of watching a clock at a boring manufacturing job or constantly thumbing through the program guide during a wedding/graduation to estimate how much time is left before you regain your freedom.
I say keep the presentations interesting and under 10 minutes and there will be no need for an agenda.
The problem we have is that all of the so-called corporate pros tell us to add an agenda right along with our required standard ppt templates. Bah!
-ewH
I try to avoid presentations altogether, but for many folks, they're unavoidable. Just like I provide an overview for papers, I typically provide an overview for presentations. One slide, up front, 4-5 bullets. I like to think if my paper/presentation isn't appropriate for you, you'll find out after reading the very first bit, instead of reading through to the end.
As a reader, I like to have the same ability. But very, very few people do this, it seems.
Put up an agenda as long as you give people the option to leave if they don't think they'll get value from the rest of the presentation. If you are either a) not confident enough in the value of your presentation, or b) don't want to give people an out, then don't put up an agenda.
Following on from Patrick, I think it's different for a paper – always give the reader a synopsis/'executive summary' at the beginning, because a reader will almost always have the option of "leaving" (i.e. not reading any further).
Depends on how long the presentation is. I use them in longer discussions because they help the audience know how far along we are and so set expectations.
"As a presenter, do you put an agenda slide in your presentations?" – Yes. If the group is small enough,
then presumably at this point the audience participants
can determine whether their questions are likely going
to be answered during the presentation based on this
agenda, and can request modifications/additions to the
agenda. For very long presentation timeslots, this also
give an opportunity for voting/priortization of topics.
And I also like signposting throughout the presentation
so that (among other reasons) people can drop in and
out of awareness until the presentation gets to a topic
of interest to them.
Depends almost entirely on the audience's familiarity with the content. If the presentation is "Optimizing Postgres Queries" for a bunch of postgres users, no agenda needed. If the presentation is "My complicated business involving a non-standard finance model and multiple partners in a domain you've never heard of" an agenda would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks for all the input: I think everyone's setup up good guidelines for when to have and not have an agenda. Obviously, the notion of the audience being able to sniff out the presentation and leave if they're not interested is the top concern, which is an excellent point.