8. Presentation

Information which is presented in a disorganised way or in a manner that is hard to understand will be less useful to you and be of little value.

Choosing the best method of presenting your information and perhaps sorting or organising it before you present it can make it much easier to understand and far more useful.

Business data

If you were asked to give a presentation to senior managers about where the businesses' customers were located, which of the following methods would you use to present the data?

presenting data

Whilst the data in the table on the left gives more detail about the customers, the management simply want to know where customers are based. The chart on the left makes it very easy to see that most of the businesses' customers are in South Africa with the second highest amount in Mexico. The lowest number of customers are in Italy. Because the information is well presented in the chart you can very quickly understand what it is telling you.

Presenting the information in a table in this case would have been a poor decision. It would have been difficult for the managers to get an accurate picture of what they needed to know.

Buying a house

Your parents want to buy a new house. Which of the following methods of presenting information might make it easier for them to decide if they like a house?

 

The house has an ooak wooden door.

There are steps leading up to the front door.

The windows are hardwood and painted white. They are in need repainting.

The house is half-timbered.

It is a grade 2 listed building

house

Written description

Photograph

 

The photograph is a much better method of presenting the information initially. Your parents can see instantly if the house would appeal to them and whether they would be interested in finding out more.

Once they have decided they like the look of the house they would then want more detailed written information. However, giving them the written information first with no idea of what the house looks like would make it difficult for them to get an idea as to whether they would like it.

 

challenge see if you can find out one extra fact on this topic that we haven't already told you

Click on this link: Presentation of information