one of the more irritating types of people to present something to are the kinds that sit down quietly and listen to your entire spiel and just ask one stupid question that renders your presentation completely irrelevant.

you might know the one. they're the ones who ask: “Why is this important to me?”, and after every explanation you give, just ask, “So what?”

the ones that barrage you with technical questions are less irritating in comparison, because they've actually bought in to the main idea of your presentation or proposal, and once you field their technical objections, you're okay. sometimes they're doing it for personal reasons, to look good, for example, to show off their command of the subject. that's annoying, but honestly with the right technical know-how they're comparatively easy.

the ones that ask that simple question — “Why should I care?” are the ones you gotta watch out for. They're the ones you structure your entire presentation to.

because no one will make you feel dumber than the dude who says, “your thesis doesn't do anything for me, because you're not giving me what I want.”

maybe you are, but you're not making it clear. they're not the stupid ones here — you're the lousy communicator.

and if you're presenting to a capitalist entity it's actually very easy to get them to care. you have two variables that you can change for them that'll get their attention: revenue and cost. it's embarrassingly easy how everything devolves to that. convince someone that you can reduce their cost and/or up their revenue above what they're paying you, and if they STILL don't want it, run the fuck away. don't stay, don't walk, RUN.

outside of dealing with people who run corporations, who aren't beholden to the balance sheet and the bottom line... it's harder. politicians want votes. governments have KPIs. some people want to be safe. some people want to get laid. others don't know what they want, and you have to figure out what they want.

i had one guy who worked with an NGO, during the Q&A session, respond to my query about why we should care about this thing this way, and his response was, “because it's an international standard”.

he was lucky i was only allowed one question, because... so what?

it's human rights... so what?

it's freedom of expression... so what?

it's an international UN standard... so what?

it's to not break interoperability... so what?

it's freedom zero... so what?

it's best practice... so what?

like, i might actually know why, I'm asking you because i might hope that YOU know why.