issues. If questions are asked, you will be ready and will increase the confidence your audience has in you. If certain facts are not available and you must make an assumption, identify the assumption, say that it is necessary, and continue. If your listeners wish to challenge the assumption, they can do so during the question-and-answer period, at which time you should be able to explain your rationale. Normally, you do not interpret the information in your briefing. Present the facts and let your listeners draw the conclusions. Such phrases as “In my opinion, ” “I think,” and “I take this to mean”   are generally signs that the briefer is going beyond the mere presentation of informa- tion and is interpreting the meaning of the information. Emotional appeals have no place in a brief- ing. Your listeners will be justified in doubting your objectivity if your presentation is charged with emotion. This does not mean that your delivery should be dry and lifeless—rather, quite the contrary. Because you must present pertinent information and nothing more, you should strive for an animated and interesting delivery. Visual aids can help you show quickly and clearly many things that you would have trouble putting into words. One glance at a map would show your listeners more about air bases in Communist China than 15 minutes of words alone. Practice the briefing with your visual aids until you can use them smoothly. They should be an integral part of your presentation. If you do not practice your briefing, such simple acts as uncovering or recovering a chart can cause awkward breaks in a briefing. CONCLUSION. —This part of a briefing should be short but positive. Summarize your main points if you feel it is necessary. Since a question-and-answer period usually follows a briefing, a good concluding sentence might be “Ladies and gentlemen, are there any questions?” If a question period is not to follow, you might simply say, “Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes my briefing. ” Clear, logical organization of your material will help your listeners understand it. In organizing the introduction, body, and conclusion of the briefing, keep the purpose in mind. It can be to give your listeners an understanding of a certain mission, operation, or concept. Or it can be to enable them to perform a specific procedure. In either case, organize your material to inform as you would for a speech. On the other hand, if the purpose is to provide your listeners with information on which to base decisions, a problem-solving plan to organization can be most effective. When you prepare and deliver briefings, remember their basic function is to convey information more rapidly and effectively than would be possible by any other means. It takes practice to become an excellent briefer. Experience in other types of public speaking and in writing also helps. As a member of the Navy, you need to be adept at stating your ideas accurately, briefly, and clearly. Procedures for Presenting a Briefing When you are giving a prepared briefing, your briefing needs to support four basic areas: 1. You should state the point clearly and concisely at the beginning of your briefing so that your audience knows what they are listening to and what they can expect from the rest of your briefing. 2. You must amplify the point you are trying to make or the area you are trying to cover. 3. You should support that point. You must bring the audience enough information to inform them or to help them make a decision, whatever the purpose of your presentation happens to be. 4. You must end your briefing appropriately. The conclusion should bring the briefing together in a concise manner, reviewing the topic but keeping it short. REVIEWING NAVAL MESSAGES AND CORRESPONDENCE An ability to communicate in the written form will serve you well throughout your naval career. As you progress more and more people expect you to be able to communicate clearly and concisely. This section of the chapter will discuss some of the basic procedures to review messages and correspondence prepared by your subordinates. Basically you will be reviewing for content, spelling, and punctuation. If your command is equipped with personal computers, your job will be much easier. Unclassified documents can be written and edited on the computer. You may use programs such as WordPerfect or Wordstar to write, edit, spell check, or substitute words using the thesaurus. Sentence structure can be checked using a program such as Rightwriter. 4-34