Soft Skills for a Digital Workplace: Verbal Communication Unit E: Making Formal Presentations

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Soft Skills for a Digital Workplace Verbal
CommunicationUnit EMaking Formal Presentations
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Objectives

• Plan effective presentations
• Develop presentation content
• Rehearse a presentation
• Deliver a presentation

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Objectives

• Build rapport
• Manage anxiety
• Use appropriate visuals
• Manage questions and answers

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Planning Effective Presentations

• Its important to carefully plan and prepare for
  an oral presentation.
• Guidelines for public speaking
• Refine your message
• Anticipate your audience
• Ask what your manager wants
• Budget enough planning time
• Anticipate the extras

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Improving Informal Communication

• Use informal communication opportunities to
• Develop and strengthen personal relationships
• Promote yourself
• Further your ideas and goals
• When communicating informally
• Be professional
• Emphasize the positive
• Overcome obstacles

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Developing Presentation Content

• The three parts of a presentation are
• Introduction
• Body
• Conclusion

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Developing Presentation Content

• Guidelines for developing presentation content
• Include the three major parts of a speech
• Show your organization to the audience
• Create a storyboard of your presentation
• Write for the ear
• Include attention-getters

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Developing Presentation Content

• Attention-getting devices
• Show pictures or photos
• Play a video or video clip
• Tell a story
• Lead an activity

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Rehearsing a Presentation

• Remember that it takes a lot of preparation to
  sound spontaneous.
• Effective speakers know that the more they
  practice a speech, the more naturally they will
  deliver it.
• When you master the content of the speech, you
  will feel more comfortable adjusting your rate of
  speech, adding pauses, and including suitable
  gestures and movements.

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Rehearsing a Presentation

• Dos and Donts for rehearsing a presentation
• Practice as though you are delivering your speech
• Record yourself (audio)
• Record yourself (video)
• Ask someone to critique you
• Use visualization
• Rehearse a dry run

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Rehearsing a Presentation

• Steps in a successful rehearsal

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Delivering a Presentation

• Remember that a speech is partly a performance.
• The way you speak, move, and interact with the
  audience influences how people react to what you
  say.

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Delivering a Presentation

• Dos and Donts for delivering a presentation
• Gesture appropriately
• Use the power of pauses
• Speak naturally dont read your speech
• Use a sound system or public address system
• Walk as you talk
• Have a backup plan

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Delivering a Presentation

• Using pauses effectively

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Building Rapport

• Rapport is mutual trust, emotional similarity,
  and natural personal attraction.
• When you establish rapport with the audience,
  they become your allies, are more cooperative,
  and will be interested in what you have to say.

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Building Rapport

• Guidelines for building rapport
• Interact before the meeting starts
• Follow the three-second rule
• Minimize the distance
• Illuminate your face
• Make your examples personal

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Building Rapport
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Managing Anxiety

• Performance anxiety, or stage fright, is a
  psychological reaction to a persons fear of
  public embarrassment.
• Glossophobia is the fear of public speaking and
  is the most common of all human phobias.
• Most stage fright arises while you are
  anticipating the performance.
• Once you start to speak, much of the fear quickly
  goes away.

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Managing Anxiety

• Strategies for managing anxiety
• Be well prepared
• Loosen up before you speak
• Remember to breathe
• Keep some water handy
• Dont apologize
• Remember the audience wants you to succeed

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Using Appropriate Visuals

• Prepare visual aids that reinforce your major
  ideas, stimulate the audience, and work well in
  the physical setting of your presentation.
• People learn more readily and retain more
  information when learning is reinforced by
  visualization.
• Popular visual aids include
• Flip charts
• Overhead transparencies
• Slides
• Video clips

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Using Appropriate Visuals

• Visual aids that are poorly done distract from a
  presentation.
• Well-designed visuals can significantly enhance
  your presentation.

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Using Appropriate Visuals

• Dos and Donts for using visuals
• Include one message per visual
• Let your audience read or listen (not both)
• Keep the effects simple
• Manage your colors
• Use minimalist backgrounds
• Proofread carefully

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Using Appropriate Visuals

• Examples of effective visuals

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Managing Questions and Answers

• After the presentation, you are expected to
  respond to audience questions.
• You can request questions during the presentation
  or in a period at the end of the presentation.
• Handling questions with authority is part of
  making a successful presentation and one you
  should prepare for and rehearse.

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Managing Questions and Answers

• Guidelines for managing questions and answers
• Establish the ground rules
• Kick start the questions
• Listen to the entire questions
• Repeat each question
• Answer to the entire audience
• Dont answer if you dont know

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Technology_at_Work Presentation Software

• You use presentation software to create and
  deliver electronic slide shows.
• Presentation software has become the standard way
  to make and give business presentations.
• Although Microsoft PowerPoint is the most
  well-established presentation software, there are
  others available.

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Technology_at_Work Presentation Software

• The top five programs designed for business
  presentations
• Microsoft Office PowerPoint
• Adobe Flash
• Google Docs
• Apple Keynote
• OpenOffice Impress

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Technology_at_Work Presentation Software

• Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2007

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Summary

• Time spent preparing and planning a presentation
  is critical to its success.
• Speeches include three major parts introduction,
  body, and conclusion.
• Remember to rehearse the presentation.
• Follow the guidelines for delivering a
  presentation.

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Summary

• Build rapport with the audience.
• Use strategies for managing anxiety before a
  presentation.
• Use appropriate visuals.
• Confidently managing questions and answers is key
  to a successful presentation.