5 Tips for Presenting to Executives

We, as CFOs, regularly think about our priority of assisting the CEO to do her job better.  CEO’s have very full plates.  They are always looking for people they can trust to get things done.  With trying to do so many things at once, the last thing she needs is a finance person telling her all of the problems her company has.  The CEO needs to know about the problems, but just as importantly needs someone to offer her solutions.  The following 5 tips on how to present to Executives really ring true.

1. Get to the point. Executives don’t have time for the long version.
2. Talk about problems and solutions winning in the marketplace. CEOs are thinking 3 years in the future.
3. Sell the vision before sharing data.  They simply won’t listen to the data otherwise.
4. Lead with stories, not data.  Data bores them.
5. Don’t be afraid of executives, be afraid for them.  Your job is to alleviate their fears and make their jobs easier.

The 5 points really will help you with your presentations and just your overall communications with CEOs and executives you deal with on a daily basis.