Right from the scratch
I had a great opportunity to address a group of 185 students in the space of five hours near BBS, as an aptitude trainer for a few days. The results even though were not phenomenal enough, but the learning was really a great outcome.
Here are a few practical tips that I felt was a quick gauge, a bit different from the regular tips:
- Never, Ever gauge your audience. You can try to understand their expectations right at the start of a few minutes. The first ten minutes of ice-breaking and the last five minutes of closure gets embedded in the mind of audience. If you fail in the ice-breaker, you will have to drag your presentation along, which will turn to boredom.
- Please keep them excited. The fillers can come in many forms to de-stress them, to motivate them, to enchant them, but all of them should be properly planned. Even if you are giving a 5-hour extempore speech, you can at least have the points in mind. Planning does help.
- Mood of the audience. If your audience is drooling, time for a change. If your audience is not nodding, time for a change. Please do not drag a conversation or presentation, just for the fact that you have completed it. Please respect has the mood.
- Sell the content. If you have a good content, do not forget to sell it. Delivering content and selling content are two different processes. Kindly learn to sell.
- Push and Pull strategy. Push your ideas, push your concept, but pull the excitement, pull the seriousness. You can gauge the emotional display to understand which strategy is required.
- Voice Modulation is always appreciated. Intonations, pauses, mini-pauses, repeating of words, referencing from a script of a movie, or a game, comparison of a solution to a life’s real problem, personal queues, anecdotes and references, emphasis excites differently.
- Mobility can be a good innovative idea. Starting your speech by sitting in a chair of the audience, starting from the back of the audience when everybody is expecting you to start at the front- definitely is a good bonus point. Turn to the unexpected. Let the audience rejoice at their unexpected expectations.
- Release of emotions. Sometimes it is natural to get the release of collective emotions of the group. If anyone from the audience is displaying non-positive emotions or body-language, and if you have the advantage to go to the person, please take the risk. Mingling with the audience is a big YES. Sometimes, please cater to persons individually.
- Prepare for a local news and happenings. If you happen to get the opportunity for visiting various places, add the local flavor, especially when you are new to the place. Add a few lines or words in the language at the start. Or sing a song in the language. Audience generally get connected.
- Never fail to appreciate. Last, but not the least, never ever try to fail to pat on the back or a collective appreciation for the person who has answered a question, or asked a good question.
These are a few facts I found out while delivering a few lectures in BBS.