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Background: A job become available within my current industry. I know all four of the people in the department I would become a part of pretty intimately. This is a company I have expressed interest working for about 2ish years ago. The job was posted Dec 30th (the person in charge of this department forwarded me the listing), they waited two weeks, and thereafter their boss called me to schedule a phone interview (they're on the East Coast). The phone interview included the CEO (relatively small group of about 35 employees total), the Director of Business Development, the manager within this small group and the current person in charge of sales/marketing also within this group (my potential boss).
Summary: The interview went as well as I had expected and they have since arranged flight, car, hotel to go through an in-person interview**. They have not hired a person in this department in 3 years and prior to that 19 years, and while I have the impression that we're mainly just going through the process for sake of going through the process I'm still taking it quite seriously. I plan to make a career out of this move.
Situation: Ah, the reason for this post. They have requested I give them a 20 minute presentation (powerpoint). How am I going to help them with their goals? (which I have a list of), and How can I add unique value to the team? (which I thought I did in the phone interview). Regardless, if not, it should be apparent in the presentation (ie: answered indirectly).
Now my problem is not that I have issues with presenting to groups (that's part of my job). The problem is that I have never given a presentation to a potential employer. I am usually presenting scientific stuff with pretty pictures, graphs and data (where did the fishy go and how did it get there stuff). Those presentations are easy to chop down to fit the allotted time.
My problem here is that I have not figured out how to cram a 30 minute presentation on how I can effectively address their annual goals in a 20 minute time slot. And in reality the list of things that I am suggesting in relationship to their goals is a lot, hell...they are likely going to forget two-thirds of it. That's okay if they offer me a job though.
I am wondering how it would appear if I show up for a 20 minute presentation and run it 30 minutes? I mean, first impression right...can't follow instructions...that probably doesn't bode well.
Do I ask them, now, if they would be okay with extending the presentation to 30 minutes? Or do I figure out how to slice up my current presentation by a third?
I don't see it though.
I do spend 2-3 minutes reviewing what they want to get out of my presentation (ie: What they expect from me). I think I need to keep that for the people who are too preoccupied in what one of the four of them sent me. I then spend 2-3 minutes reviewing their 2016 goals which I also think I need to reiterate what their goals are although they should know them. After all, I use their goals throughout my presentation to show them we're on the same page and that I am addressing their specific goals. Then I breakdown a subset of their goals with specific action items that I would take if they hired me for the position. And I do that for the next 20-25 minutes. I might be able to omit some of these "specific action items" that might be less important? Hmmmmmmmm maybe I just solved my own problem by writing all this out...
Ahhhhhhhhh good night...thoughts and suggestions are welcomed.
Simple: leave things out to get it down to 20 minutes. There is no other choice. And whatever you do, do not just read your slides. You can put the content up there for them to read while you are speaking, but no need to speak to it directly. That'll help reduce your time. And then when you are done, they may ask you to go back and review a slide, which you can then speak to at your leisure.
They are looking at how well you present, and how your thought process works. No need to go in depth on each goal. Like the PP said, a do a high level review of solutions and then how you add unique value.
I had to give a powerpoint presentation for the interview I had for the job I have now. No one cared what my personal philosophy was on the topic (though I was asked to present about it), nor did they care about what I thought the issues were that currently face our industry (there is quite a bit of subjectivity in my industry on this topic). They just wanted to know, if I was asked to give a presentation to stakeholders, could they be confident in my ability to present.
... They just wanted to know, if I was asked to give a presentation to stakeholders, could they be confident in my ability to present.
I appreciate this perspective, thank you
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