Presentation skills are a valuable asset for anybody in our modern society. You can be very talented and do marvelous work or have great ideas for products or research topics, however if you don’t manage to sell your work or ideas, nobody will be eager to invest in them, hire you or even take you seriously. Luckily presentation skills can be learned and in the following article we will explain the most important aspects to sharpening your presentation skills.
The most important presentation skill is your ability to create entertainment value. A presentation should always be entertaining. If not, people will lose interest and there is no way you can get your point across when people are not paying attention. Try to never be boring. Even if you have boring stuff to present try to incorporate some humour, interesting facts, (famous)quotes or show a related cartoon. You could also try to engage your public in your presentation by asking them questions or giving them small tasks like “raise your hand if you have ever….?”
How to give a presentation
In a presentation you use effective presentation skills to play a crowd, to keep them entertained and convince them of your views or results. Firstly we can distinguish 2 different forms of communication:
The first and most important part of any presentation is nonverbal communication. If you think verbal communication is more important you are wrong! It has even been suggested that non-verbal communication is as much as 16 times more important than verbal communicationHow To Make a Presentation[1]. With nonverbal communication we mean not only gestures, but also “the presence” of the presenter and the paralanguage used(usage of intonations, pauses and speech volume/speed)[2].
In general the most important is to show enthusiasm to enthuse people and look confident to show authority. Keep in mind that although it helps if you are, you don’t actually have to be confident or enthusiastic, you just have to look like you are. Nobody can look inside your head so if you use the right poses and gestures you can make people believe that you are.
Basic pointers are:
Smile, if you smile you show enthusiasm and enthusiasm is “contagious”.
Make yourself bigger. Use a lot of open gestures, spread your arms and reach out. This will show confidence.
Speak loud and clear. You are the presenter, everybody should be able to hear what you have to say. This will show confidence as well.
Look at your crowd![3] Try to look at individual persons, this will not only make it easier for you to present since it will seem like you are talking to one person, it will also make your audience feel more connected. Be sure however to not look at 1 person too long. Move your eyes to another person every couple of seconds since talking to only 1 person can make this person uncomfortable and make the rest of the people feel unimportant or uninvolved which in turn leads them towards losing attention.
Be aware of your paralanguage[4](the usage of tones, speaking speed/volume, pauses etc.). The use of paralanguage is very important. By pausing after a sentence or word you can emphasize its importance or by playing with your voice you can show you are building into a conclusion or a problem.