English Presentation Skill 2

English Presentation Skill 2

Did you still remember what we learnt yesterday?

How to Make a Strong Start

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I’m sure that in your life, you’ve heard good speakers and bad speakers.

Good and Bad speaker

• Good speakers grab your attention and don’t let go. You want to hear what they have to say. You feel interested and energised by listening to them.

  
  

• Bad speakers are the opposite. Even if you try to make yourself listen, you find that your attention drifts away. Your eyelids feel heavy, and you have to struggle to stay awake.

  
  

Here’s the questions

• What’s the difference between good speakers and bad speakers? 

• How can you make sure you speak effectively when you make your presentation in English?

  
  

This is it

• Bad speakers don’t think they have to earn your attention. 

• Good speakers understand that no one has to listen to them, so they work hard to make you want to pay attention.

What does this mean for you, and your presentation?

• Getting people’s attention starts from the beginning. 

• You need to make it clear what people should expect from your presentation

• Why they should care about what you have to say.

  
  

Here are three techniques you can use.

• First: establish a problem which many people in your audience have. Then, establish that you have a solution to their problem.

• For example:

  
  

  "Have you ever felt unfairly treated at work, or felt that the work you do isn’t appreciated? We’ve been working to design new HR policies that will make sure all staff get fair recognition for their contribution to the company.

  In this way, you take a boring-sounding topic like HR policies, and you make it more relevant to your audience. How? By connecting it with their experiences and feelings."

The second technique 

• Mention an interesting fact, or a surprising statistic to get people’s attention.

• For example:

  
  

  "Did you know that the average office worker spends eight hours a day at work, but only does four hours of productive, useful work? I’m here to tell you about ‘quality control’, and how you can use this idea to make better use of your time."

The third technique

• You can engage people by telling a short story and connecting it to your topic. Stories are powerful, and they can add an emotional dimension to your topic if you do it well.

• For example: "I once met a young salesman—I won’t mention his name. He spent several weeks building a relationship with a potential client. He worked overtime, and he was working so hard that he was under severe stress, which started to affect his personal life. In the end, he didn’t close the deal—the clients signed with another firm. Today, I’m going to talk about confidence as a sales tool, and how you can avoid the traps that this young man fell into."

Use one of these three techniques in your introduction to connect with your audience and show them why they should be interested in what you have to say.

Here’s a question for you: which technique would you prefer to use, and why?