Presentations That Force Change
The key target audience for the results of a Customer Satisfaction Study was the service engineers and their managers within the organization itself.
Management warned us that “anything that sounds like a typical presentation of research results will begin with a very small audience and end very quickly with no audience at all!”
While we all knew the results were extremely relevant to the target audience – the survey had uncovered some real performance issues – our challenge was to engage the engineers and convince them of the relevance of the results.
Rather than setting up a one hour research presentation, we ran a half-day brainstorming session designed to help the staff generate the important issues as they saw them; discuss the major problems they were confronting and so on. Engineers were put into teams and the teams encouraged to be competitive – we had prizes for most animated presentation; most comprehensive list of issues etc.
The research findings were then introduced as additional material against which to calibrate the team issues.
Most importantly, building on the key issues identified in the first part of the session, teams were then charged with finding possible solutions. Lastly, the best solutions were rated in terms of “effectiveness” and “feasibility”.
Unlike the typical Powerpoint presentation, the session generated huge energy and involvement from the target audience. Instead of passively listening to ‘research findings’, the group produced action plans to improve customer satisfaction.
