Sections of this topic
You are going to give a presentation on a new application or product. There will be stakeholders, developers, and some managers at the board meeting. Your hands are sweating and you are short of breath. Do not worry – you are ready. Why? Because you have all your notes, and your presentation is ready. You have created a slide show with outlined material, and you have a binder neatly packaged with information to hand out. The packaged notes are very important, especially for those who may not be able to stay for the complete presentation.
Be aware that your audience may be varied, and may not be familiar with the project, so add in some extra background information to ensure everyone is brought up-to-date. And, to ensure that you have all the necessary information and material that you need, make sure you have documented and included the following:
– An introduction to the new product and its purpose, the reason why this project is needed, and how it benefits the organization.
– Material supporting your work on Identifying, assessing, and analyzing all the business requirements, processes, and risks involved, and your ideas on the best way to present the results.
– Notes on continuous meetings with all stakeholders (managers, developers, users, etc.) and how you have collaborated with others to develop some business cases.
– Time, cost, and resources it will take to reach the end result.
– All the technical and functional specifications; guidelines.
– All the technical information detailing the system and data architecture including taxonomies, metadata, definitions, monitoring, recovery solutions, etc.
– Handouts describing specific topics at a high level and then a breakdown for others.
– Images of prototypes.
– Compliance issues.
– All the required test and regression test plans and respective scenarios.
– What user manuals, lessons, and training material will be required, and what user support will be needed via customer service?
– All the needed marketing and sales material.
– And finally, an appendix, glossary, reference sheet, etc., if needed.
Create indexed sections for all of the above for easy reference. Be creative and include some tear-out sheets for a referral. You can even include a link to the existing packet you are handling for easy referral. Create mappings, charts, etc., to depict as much information as you can. Include your slides in the packet so that the audience can jot down notes. For the style of the referenced material, use bullets and outlines, or list items for an easy read; shorten verbiage.
For a break, questions can be included at the end of each section to jolt or remind the audience to consider other additional questions to ask, or to provide recommendations or insights.
Please leave a comment if you have ever had to create a portfolio or a presentation package. What were the drawbacks and benefits?
