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Evidence-based Management: Guest Columnist: Andrew V. Abela

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Eliminate all irrelevant information or images

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The evidence here indicates that the more arguments and support you offer in favor of your recommendations, the more likely your audience will be persuaded. Perhaps surprisingly, you should also include arguments against your recommendations: this increases your credibility and protects you from counter-arguments. Lawyers call it “stealing thunder”: bringing up—and responding to—negative arguments before anyone else does significantly weakens those arguments.

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Concrete details make your communication more interesting, memorable, and persuasive. The evidence here is that even the more conceptually oriented members of your audience, who may choose to ignore your details, will nevertheless perceive you to be more credible because you provided details.

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Explain why your recommendations will work

Experiments show that causal arguments (e.g. “adding this new feature increases customer satisfaction because it provides a sense of control”) are more persuasive than statistical evidence (“adding this feature increases customer satisfaction by 8%”).

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Weave your content into the form of a story

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Use graphics extensively

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breaking complex information down and presenting it in multiple simple pieces is actually less effective than presenting everything at once.

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For a sufficiently complex diagram, provide printed copies rather than projected slides because this allows you to use much finer detail and smaller type fonts, and therefore keep more of your information together on the same page.

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Use color for emphasis—and only for emphasis

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