Tips in public speaking

Tuesday, September 30, 2008

Dragon Blogger is a friend of mine from Social Spark and made a spark on some tips in public speaking. Speaking in front of an audience is a bit difficult but that doesn't mean you can't make it a bit easier for yourself. I got my experiences in public speaking way back in college and I've been using the same tricks now that I'm working for the government. I'm no expert but I think these tips might help.

1. NEVER! memorize your speech unless you can do so flawlessly-Memorizing is hard work and the worst part of it is that it would take eat up a lot of your time, and during your presentation if you miss a word you might end up missing the entire paragraph or even get lost at all, just make sure you know your topic.

2. Make an outline of your speech or presentation-It won't hurt bringing an outline of what you have to say, just to give you a guide if your a bit lost at the flow of your presentation. Never write everything in your outline, remember it's just a guide on what comes next so you wont miss anything and know what you will say next.

3. Unless necessary make your presentation brief, simple but complete-This makes your job a bit easier, you should use simple words and tackle only the main points, branching topics will make your presentation longer and might end up being boring and confusing.

4. Make sure you have ample time in preparing for your topic with enough rest before your presentation - never cram a presentation, you'll mostly end up missing a few important details, and have a good night sleep before you present. Not only will you need your energy, it will make you look and feel better as well.

5. Know your audience, anticipate questions and prepare your answers- you need to know who your audiences are, what they might know or concerns are about. This gives you an idea on what they might ask for you to prepare ahead of time and maybe impress them a bit.

6. Dress accordingly-packaging is very important, ask people on what clothes you should wear if your unsure. But regardless of what you wear make sure they are not only appropriate but comfortable as well.

7. Before presenting, remember to relax and breathe- for obvious reasons, you can't expect to deliver a presentation being nervous, you don't want to have a mental block-out in the middle of your presentation. This helps you to be confident.

8. Look at your audience while presenting or just look at their hair-you need to look confident, and if you have trouble looking at the audience...simply look at their hair. Yes, their hair, this gives you the impression that your looking at their faces.

9. Use clear well modulated voice-I think in order to be effective you need to make sure you can clearly say what you need to say, and that everybody understands you.

10. Try to be lively-once in a while you can crack jokes, tell experiences, use visual aides, etc., anything to keep your audience attention to you. Everybody hates a boring presentation.

To know more about Dragon Blogger you can check out his site at http://www.dragonblogger.com/