Mastering the skills of presentation

The need to prepare and give presentations has increased in almost every field, be it in college or professional life. Facing a group of people and delivering your presentation can be nerve-wracking and often stressful. To make things a lot simpler, British Library recently held a workshop on presentation skills. The workshop was conducted by Huma Riaz, a freelance corporate trainer and a content developer for the British Council.

The two-day workshop dealt with various aspects of delivering power-point presentations. And what was really interesting was the fact she kept the workshop very interactive by teaching the group through language games, activities, practice tasks and many more things. Says Huma, “One must keep so many things in mind while giving a presentation and I wanted the participants to understand the various technique and also teach them how one can really make an impact by starting with a bang, through non-verbal gestures and understanding the audience during the presentation.”

It was interesting to see a whole lot of people from different backgrounds attending the workshop. There were few from the corporate sectors, students, teachers, lawyers, entrepreneurs and even yoga instructors. Each one of them had their own reason for joining. Rashmi, a teacher at MS Ramaiah of Hotel Management, was one of them. Since she faces students everyday, Rashmi thought the workshop would help her not only to make the class better but also help her teach her students on how to fine tune their presentation skills. “The workshop really helped me gain better confidence to face a large audience,” she adds.

While Girish, an entrepreneur, attended the workshop, as giving presentations plays a crucial role in his job profile. “Initially, I used to stress a lot over power point presentations but after this workshop, I have learnt a better way of dealing with it and not worry too much over getting a presentation ready in time,” he adds.

By the end of the workshop, participants were able to assess their own presentation skills, analyse the audience and even learnt to handle questions well.