Communicating with Executives: Point First, Explanation Later

10/03/22 • 14 min

At one point in my career, I started giving presentations to senior management - GMs, SVPs, and occasionally our Chief Product Officer.
When I first started giving those presentations, I would present my data, decision-making process, and the whole story before getting to the potential options for how we could move forward. These were usually strategy presentations and I thought the leaders needed to know basically everything I knew before they could help make an informed decision.
WRONG.
After a few months of this - and a few frustrated executives, some meetings that ended poorly, and complete confusion on my part - my boss took me aside and explained that executives think a little differently than someone on the ground.
You see, they do a lot of homework - usually. They’re caught up on the high points of the strategy. They know or don’t need to know all the details. They can ask if they want to know the details, so let’s just get to the point first.

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How to Lead a Hybrid or Remote Team: Running Effective and Inclusive Meetings

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Someone recently asked me about being a leader or peer leader for a team that’s half in the office and half working from home. To be clear, he’s not their boss but is a kind of peer leader at work, and he wanted to get better at helping everyone feel included and part of the team.
You see, the people working from home didn't feel included. They didn't have a voice and didn't feel like part of the team.
That's a problem. That's a BIG problem.
This guy wants to be a leader people want to follow. In order to be that person, he's trying to help other people feel included, listened to, heard, and like they're part of the team, even when they work from home.

This sounds exactly like the dynamic I had as a Product Manager - a sort of peer leader - when half my team was in the office and the other half worked from home from all over the United States and, at one point, around the world. We had people from all different time zones.
After some tinkering, we had one of the most sought-after teams in the company. People asked to work on our team. So how did we create a thriving team dynamic that included everyone, in person and remote?

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Management Material - Communicating with Executives: Point First, Explanation Later

Transcript

[Applause] [Music] don't be a waste of an executive's time they know more than you think that they know they read they prepare they're usually dreading coming to these meetings because people like to talk and have air time in front of the executives don't be that person set the stage and then get to the point first welcome to management material my name is Catherine vanderlaan I started my career at the bottom as an assistant and worked my way up to become the boss's boss in eight years and oh