The Result Followed by a Recommendation.
What to think about: Be objective, impartial, base all your statements on facts, logos.
OUTLINE
1. Describe your theme. As requested…, I have been assigned to assess the possibility to find a location for a new sports centre close to the city centre…
2. Introduction. The purpose of this assessment has been to… Despite the efforts I have found this work very satisfying and it reminds me of… (here you can use a quotation…) what Thomas Henry Huxley once said: “Zeal without knowledge is fire without light.” (Huxley had planned to leave Oxford instead of participating in a debate but he changed his mind, stayed, debated and won…)
Thesis. First of all I would like to say that I will recommend … rather than… Here you can use phrases like: It would be ideal to… It would/not be advantageous/practical to…
3. Summary of Reasons. The main reason… But I will return to that later on.
4. General Conditions/Problems/Challenges. The reason for this issue… At the same time…
5. Alternative Actions. In this situation there may be two possible solutions.
6. Comparisons/Advantages – Disadvantages. The advantage of the first alternative is … while on the other hand there are two serious disadvantages connected to… Regarding the second alternative… there is one also a problem but…
7. Additional Alternatives. Furthermore, it would be possible to solve most problems if one took a third alternative into consideration… However… In addition…
8. Recommendation. On the basis on the points mentioned above… Therefore I recommend… The only/obvious conclusion to be drawn from these facts is…
SOME ADVICE
Try to connect the experiences of the listeners to your report. By doing that you make a concrete connection of what they know with your new facts and thereby you increase your ethos.
Devotion is perfectly alright since it will be easier to captivate your listeners that way and they will realize the importance of what you are presenting. This enables you to reach pathos in the end, i.e they are convinced and they will follow your recommendations.
Since you have already sent out a compendium beforehand you just have to mention the most important facts briefly but do not forget any of them since there might be listeners who have not prepared well.
Describe your suggestions as simple as you can to make them understandable for all people present. No one wants to stand out as stupid so they will not ask you for a clarification so it is up to you to make them understand what you want to achieve by the changes you proposed.
Presentation of the consequences of the alternatives can be presented in different paragraphs, one by one, or together. The last one will enable the listener to be more aware of the real differences concerning the consequences.
At last, organize your possible claim/motion as accurately as possible so that it can be used easily and directly by a board or committee.