Presentation Skills

Today we had a presentation skills work shop. It was very useful cos we did it in small groups of about 10 and each person got the chance to do two presentations. The first one was a prepared presentation about some aspect of the work we did before the MBA and it was videoed and played back. Then the lecturer and the peers would comment on the presentation. I've always hated seeing myself on screen. It feels so weird!

One really good thing I gained from this session was confidence cos according to the lecturer my presentation skills are pretty good and I'm someone with a naturally 'authoritative voice'! I never thought of my self that way...

One thing that the lecturer emphasised a lot was what is the audience getting out of the presentation??? Even though this seems pretty obvious it's unbelievable how many of us get so wrapped up in our own world, and do a presentation really interesting to us but forget the audience. I've sat through many of these when I'm thinking I could be doing so much better things with my time. His main point was if you can't answer 'what is the audience getting from this presentation', you shouldn't be doing it!