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Instructors may ask that you tailor your oral presentations to a mock (practice) on-the-job audience, with your classmates serving as stand-ins. The types of audiences you will likely address on-the-job include the expert or insider audience, colleagues within the field, the lay audience, and the mixed audience:
| TYPE OF AUDIENCE | CHARACTERISTICS |
|---|---|
| Expert or insider audience | People who have intimate knowledge of the topic, issue, product, or idea being discussed (e.g., an investment analyst presents a financial plan to a group of portfolio managers). |
| Colleagues within the field | People who share the speaker’s knowledge of the general field under question (e.g., psychology or computer science), but who may not be familiar with the specific topic under discussion (e.g., short-term memory or voice recognition systems, respectively). |
| Lay audience | People who have no specialized knowledge of the field related to the speaker’s topic or of the topic itself (e.g., a physical education teacher discusses the proper diet and exercise regimen with a group of teenagers). |
| Mixed audience | An audience composed of a combination of people—some with expert knowledge of the field and topic and others with no specialized knowledge. This is perhaps the most difficult audience to satisfy (e.g., an attending surgeon describes experimental cancer treatment to a hospital board comprising medical professionals, financial supporters, and administrative personnel). |