Tips to Developing Killer Presentation Skills

 

Understanding The Why

As a speaker, someone on the stage or behind the podium, it is necessary for you to first understand why are you there? What’s the one reason why you’re standing in front of your audience? Do you stand in front of them as a trainer, to share and transfer valuable knowledge to them? Or do you stand in front of them to convince them, to garner their support for your cause? Many public speaking courses primarily focus on the style of delivery, where you should stand, how you should move your hands or what you should put in your powerpoint slides. However, what many public speaking coaches fail to teach is the “Why” behind all speeches.

  • Why are you standing in front of this audience?
  • Why should your audience listen to you?
  • Why this group of people and not someone else?

Why? In fact, just by answering this one question, you will automatically the answers to your “How” or “What“!

  • How you should deliver your speech?
  • How you should structure your speech to achieve the biggest impact?
  • What essential evidence or proof you should weave into your presentation?
  • What should you say or NOT say in front of your audience?

The truth is, no two speeches in this world are identical. You may have memorized Martin Luther Kings speech, “I’ve a Dream” word for word. However, when deliver the speech, your “Why” isn’t the same “Why” as Martin Luther King deliver his historical speech. It is the “Why” that makes the difference!

Content Is Just One Part of a Great Presentation

Many amateur speakers have the belief that as long as they do their research well and have a beefy content, it is all they need to deliver a killer presentation. Nothing can be further from the truth.     Many amateur speakers when first step onto the stage, what’s

Ernest Chen in Shanghai’s Lighthouse Toastmaster Club!

With President Lighthouse Toastmasters ClubShanghai, a place of delicious food, beautiful sceneries and friendly people. During my trip there, I visited one of the Toastmaster Club in Shanghai – Lighthouse.

At the Lighthouse Toastmasters Club, I gave a 25 minutes impromptu talk on The Power of Rhetoric and the crowd loved it!

Below is the email sent to me by the Vice-President of Education, Julian Yang.

“Dear Ernest,

This is Julia Yang, VPE of  Lighthouse. I am so glad that you came to our club and gave us such an excellent sharing.

Your sharing is both educational and entertaining, truly lightening up our Saturday afternoon.Watch Full Movie Online Streaming Online and Download

We learnt so much from you. We all like it very much and hope that we can listen to your speech in the future.I am sure that our member will use anaphora,  epistrophe and other rhetorical devices in their speech from now on.

Next time, when you are going to pay a visit to Shanghai, be sure to contact us in advance. We like you very much ?

Remember, there is a TMC club in Shanghai that has extremely good meeting atmosphere, there is a TMC club in Shanghai that has friendly members, there is a TMC club in Shanghai that called Lighthouse.

Wish you a pleasant trip!”

If you’re planning to visit Shanghai in the near future, don’t forget to pay a visit to the Lighthouse Toastmasters Club, a club that has “extremely good meeting atmosphere” and “friendly members

Ernest Chen in Lighthouse Toastmasters Club in Shanghai

Pauses Why Are They Important and How to Correctly Use Them

Listening to a speech, it is very common to hear pause fillers like “er”, “um”, “ng”, “ok”, “you know”, uttered by a speaker.

These irritating words usually occur at the end of a sentence or beginning of a sentence or phrases. Why do these unnecessary words have to appear? These are the word whiskers, word clutches or pause fillers – the terms used by language communication specialists.

Worse of all, this unproductive sound usually appeared frequently during important parts of our professional life – media interview and panel discussion.

Still are pauses are important in a speech?

Why Are Pauses Important?

In fact, pause is part and parcel of a speech.  Pause is an important element of a speech. Pauses enable the speaker to breathe, to think ahead, and to enable listeners to think about what has been stated. Pauses also provide opportunities for a change of pitch. Pauses can be long, medium or short in length, depending on the situation.

When To Use Pauses?

  • Pause before you begin to speech.
  • Pause to indicate different ideas.
  • When you pause, pause clearly. Don’t let fillers punctuate your sentence.
  • When you pause, maintain eye contact with the audience. Don’t look over the audience or lift your head up, trying to recall or think of something.
  • Pauses help you to break down your thoughts into units when you speak.

An important aspect of pauses is to slow down the rate of speaking. In written communication, we use, commas, colons or full stops to separate ideas; pauses will help us to break down our thoughts into different units. Here are some of the ways where we can use pauses to highlight our message to listeners.

1. Use pauses after phrases that begin with prepositions and adverbs.

  • By the time I reached London, (pause) the game between Liverpool andChelsea was over.
  • Despite all our efforts, (pause) our team could not reachMount Everest.

2. Use pauses when giving a list of items. This is to help listeners receive the information.

  • The Success Corporation needs to relocate its office, (pause) open five new branches, (pause) recruit five more executives, (pause) and employ fifty more staff.
  • The chairman wishes to review the strategic plan, (pause) develop new processes,  (pause) revise marketing plan, (pause) and rethink the vision.

3. Uses pauses before the connecting words, such as, “and”, “that”, “but”, ‘or”, “because”, “however”, and other conjunctions.

  • Johnny is a good and honest staff, (pause) but he is always late for work.
  • I told them (pause) that there was uncertainty for early profits, (pause) yet they still poured in more money for this stock.

Always keep in mind that speaking texts and reading texts must be crafted differently. When we speak we have to look into the eyes of the audience and create rapport with them. Our eyes have to talk with their eyes; our facial expression has to enhance our verbal message. When we read, we look at the text and read aloud. Therefore, when we speak we need to pause for breath whenever there is a colon or full stop. Sometimes, in a long sentence, more pauses are needed.

Pausing Exercise 

Practise this prose and vary the length of pauses.

The darling princess is dead viagra kautabletten. She looks so radiant and bright even though she is dead. Is she asleep? No. she is dead! No sleep so beautiful and calm, so free from trace of pain, so fair to look upon. Our darling Princess Diana, so serene and so calm, motionlessly lying there peacefully awaiting her Prince Charming to come; yet there is no sign of him. Yes, she is deadFifty Shades Darker 2017 live streaming film online

Try this speech from Winston Churchill.

The whole fury and might – or the enemy – must very soon  be turned on us. Hitler knows – that he will have to break us in this island – or lose the war. If we can stand up to him – all Europe – may be free – and the life of the world may move forward – into broad sunlit uplands. – But  if we fail – then the whole world – including the United States – including all that we have known and cared for – will sink into the abyss – of a new dark age – made more sinister – and perhaps more protracted – by the lights of perverted science. Let us therefore – brace ourselves to our duties – and so bear ourselves that – if the British Empire and its Commonwealth last for a thousand years – men will say – “This – was  their finest hour.”

Speak with pauses (as indicated by a dash -)

Can you feel the effect?

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