Whether you are addressing the Board of Directors or answering the telephone, your presentation skills determine your success at getting across to your listeners. This could make the difference between closing that big deal or losing a customer, getting that raise or getting the ax, capturing your students' attention or losing control of your class. Whether or not you deserve that raise may be irrelevant. Delivering the message in a way that keeps your audience's attention and compels them to action is what matters.
A crucial part of this program involves raising participants' awareness. Part of developing each student's self-awareness involves grooming each participant to become an evaluator of their class peers. By evaluating others' presentation skills (while reflecting on their own issues) they become adept at monitoring and evolving their own skills. They learn for themselves what works... and what doesn't work. Hence, a great part of this session is devoted to developing each participant's senses. Their best tool for self-development is their own ears. Of course, the ultimate goal of this is to improve each participant's performance. As such, their performance is developed through various practice exercises. Classes are very interactive and participation is highly encouraged.
In addition to many of the topics contained in the Writing Skills session, Presentation Skills seminars are facilitated via a blend of additional approaches, including:
- Information transfer by facilitator. Emphasis on importance visual, vocal, and verbal factors.
- Behavior modeling by facilitator (both good and bad).
- Participant presentations with audio and/or video recording and playback.
- Immediate feedback given by:
- participant who just presented
- program participants
- instructor
- In addition to standard vocal parameters, constant attention is given to grammar, Indianisms and usage. Correction is given for all such errors.
- Participants' communication skills are monitored and corrected constantly throughout the session.
- Emphasis on tailoring messages to audience, speaking in terms they would understand and appreciate, for maximum understanding.
- Issues stemming from cultural and linguistic differences are discussed since these factors can affect word choice, tone, and more.
Soft-Skills Training by Greg Hamra