Hippos, Harpos, and Harlots

The first rule of public speaking is to tailor your presentation to the audience.  In presenting the results of a modeling analysis, you wouldn’t use the same presentation for a project team as you would if you were presenting the analysis at ACoP. 

One of the more difficult tasks for a modeler is to get acceptance of a model by non-modelers on a project team, who often do not understand the modeling process.  Model development, model validation, what makes a good model or a bad model, these are things that are alien to them.  To make matters worse, the background of members on a project team may be different; they may be toxicologists, statisticians, regulatory affairs, medical, and operations.

So how then do you tailor your presentation to all these different people?  You don’t.  One trick for model acceptance is to tailor your presentation to the HIPPO in the room.  Jim Sterne, a web metrics expert, coined the term HIPPO in 2010 and it stands for Highest Paid Person’s Opinion. The HIPPO is the one person in the room who after everyone else has said ‘yes’ to something, if they say ‘no’ then it doesn’t happen.  If you make the HIPPO happy, then everyone else is  happy.  This is often the Project Team Leader, but it may be someone from medical or regulatory.

The HIPPO term is useful, but it may not be applicable to today’s matrix team environment. 

Enter the HARPO and the HARLOT.  The HARPO stands for the Highest Ranked Person’s Opinion.  Hence, you may have a VP MD who is ranked higher than a Director level Project Team Leader.

The former may have more influence  than the latter with regards to team decisions.  The HARLOT is the Highest Acting Leader’s Opinion (a word of advice, Don’t use Google’s search engine at work when looking for photos of Harlots - LOL).  In this instance, there may be a person on the team, who may not be on paper the leader of a team but may act as such in person; they are the de facto leader of the team.

HIPPOs, HARPOs, and HARLOTs come in many different types.  Some may want to see just a high level overview of an analysis, others may want to see everything.  Some may embrace new methods, others may reject new methods.  It’s important to know beforehand what you are dealing with and how best to present your data.  Presenting your data in the wrong manner can lead to outright rejection of your work and can lead to credibility issues later on.

A useful book on presenting to particular individuals is Gary A. Williams and Robert B. Miller’s book The 5 Paths to Persuasion (Time Warner Book Group, New York, 2004. Williams and Miller interviewed hundreds of leaders and categorized them into 5 groups. For each type they show you how to tailor your presentation. For instance, Steve Jobs and Richard Branson are categorized as Charismatics. These leaders are big picture types that want to see the bottom line. They are easily bored but are enthralled by new ideas. In contrast, leaders like Bill Gates are characterized as Thinkers. These leaders want to see everything, they are persuaded by data, and are the toughest to persuade because they need as much information as possible to make a decision. They need time to make a decision and don’t make impetuous decisions like charismatics.

As you prepare your presentation think about “what do they need to know?” By tailoring your presentation you can maximize your chance for success whether that is trying to get an audience to accept the results of an analysis or to get approval for something you want.