“The foundation of communicating effectively with executives is to get a clear understanding of why you’re communicating with them in the first place.”
This is essential. I sit in these meetings with senior execs all the time in my role (mostly as neither the presenter nor one of key audience members) and I can’t tell you how often people presenting to execs make their lives hard!
E.g. status updates on key initiative/project is delivered as a summary of all the work that’s been done to date, challenges encountered and overcome, detailed technical commentary, and piles of next steps and detailed charts, when all the leadership team wants to know is 1. Is the project on track? 2. What are the key milestones/ next steps 3. Where and what are future risk /decision points, 4. Economics/budget considerations
This is essential. I sit in these meetings with senior execs all the time in my role (mostly as neither the presenter nor one of key audience members) and I can’t tell you how often people presenting to execs make their lives hard!
E.g. status updates on key initiative/project is delivered as a summary of all the work that’s been done to date, challenges encountered and overcome, detailed technical commentary, and piles of next steps and detailed charts, when all the leadership team wants to know is 1. Is the project on track? 2. What are the key milestones/ next steps 3. Where and what are future risk /decision points, 4. Economics/budget considerations