The Briefing

Most people who speak at work are briefing rather than presenting, and the two are frequently confused with expensive results.

A presentation exists to convey a body of material. A briefing exists to put somebody in a position to decide or act. The second has a much narrower purpose and a much shorter running time, and it fails whenever it is built like the first.

The structure

Four parts, in this order, and the order is the whole thing.

The situation. One or two sentences. Where things stand, stated as fact.

The problem or decision. What has to be resolved, and by when.

Your recommendation. What you think should happen, stated plainly, before any supporting material.

What you need. A decision, a resource, an approval, or simply their awareness. Say which.

Ninety seconds delivers all four. Everything else you have prepared exists to answer questions, and questions are where the useful part of a briefing happens.

Why chronology fails

The instinct is to narrate: here is what happened, then what we found, then what we did, then where we are.

This asks the listener to hold everything in suspension while waiting to learn what any of it is for. A person with authority and a full day will not do that. They will interrupt, usually around the third sentence, with some version of what do you need from me, and the briefer will experience this as being cut off rather than as accurate feedback that they buried the point.

The interruption is not rudeness. It is a listener attempting to reach the structure the briefer failed to supply.

Bring a recommendation

Presenting options without a view is the most common briefing failure among capable people, and it is usually done out of deference.

The reasoning is that the decision belongs to the senior person, so it would be presumptuous to pre-empt it. What actually happens is that the person closest to the situation has withheld the most valuable thing they possess, and the decision now gets made by somebody with less information about it.

Recommending does not take the decision. It supplies the input only you can supply. If you genuinely have no view, say so and say why, since that is itself information: I do not have a recommendation because the two options turn on a legal question I cannot assess.

Separate what you know from what you think

The single most valuable discipline in a briefing, and the one that most affects whether you are trusted over time.

Confirmed: the permit was denied on Tuesday. Assessed: I believe they will reconsider if we address the setback issue, based on what the planner said informally. Unknown: whether the neighbouring owner intends to appeal.

Most briefings deliver all three in the same register, and a decision-maker who cannot tell them apart will either treat assessment as fact or discount everything equally. Marking them costs three words and lets somebody weigh each item correctly.

Naming what you do not know also protects you. A briefer who says a thing is unknown and is later proved wrong on it has been accurate. One who let an assumption pass as fact has not.

The two questions to prepare for

Whatever the subject, two questions arrive with near certainty and should be answerable in one sentence each.

What happens if we do nothing. And: what would change your recommendation.

The second is the more revealing. A briefer who cannot name the condition that would alter their view has either not tested it or is defending a position rather than offering an assessment. Preparing an answer forces the test.

Not knowing

You will be asked something you cannot answer. The response is three words followed by a commitment: I do not know, I will find out and come back by Thursday.

What destroys credibility is not the gap. It is the improvised answer, delivered with the same confidence as the verified material, which will be discovered and will retroactively make every other statement in the briefing suspect.

One briefer who says I do not know three times in a year and is right about everything else is worth more than one who has always had an answer.

Receiving one

Leaders shape the quality of the briefings they get, largely through what they reward in the first thirty seconds.

Ask for the recommendation first, every time, and people will start leading with it. Respond well to a stated uncertainty and you will keep receiving accurate ones. Respond badly to a single I do not know and you will receive confident answers of unknown reliability from then on, which is a considerably worse position and one you will not know you are in.