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There’s a lot of advice about boardroom presentations.

Don’t tell stories.
Do present with gravitas.
Get to the point.
Make it interactive.
Don’t make it interactive.
Remember, it’s not a TED Talk.

In my experience, the truth is rather less exciting:

It depends.

IT - DEPENDS - ON - THE - BOARD.

I once worked with a senior leader at a bank who, without question, was the best presenter in the organisation. That mattered, because the board were notoriously tough. Many of the C-suite dreaded presenting to them, particularly the Q&A.

Before one big session, he said something that completely reframed it for me:
“I see their questions as an opportunity.”

He broke it down into three possibilities.

First, a tough question often means they haven’t fully understood, so it’s an opportunity to explain more clearly.

I was recently listening to a very old recording of Johnny Cash singing U2’s One. Cash is in his late 60s (possibly sounding closer to 106). His voice only appears to have about three notes left in it. It’s deep, fragile, and you can almost picture him in the studio, holding the lyric sheet, resting between takes, just about finishing the song.

And yet somehow it connects.

In fact (and I say this as a U2 fan) Johnny Cash’s barely alive version is arguably stronger than Bono’s.