Assessing your Presentation Skills

It is good that you have prepared an awesome presentation and ready to meet your audience. As a student or a novice at work, it may be the first time that you are going to speak in front of people. It could be for just a handful of people such as in a meeting to present your project idea or to give a progress update. It could be in a classroom for an assignment presentation or it could be for a larger audience attending a seminar or conference. You could otherwise be a professional speaker with yet another presentation.

Whatever it is, delivering an effective presentation requires two primary things - a well-prepared content and your readiness to meet the audience with your poise and acumen.

It will do you loads of good to assess your presentation skills, check if you have everything covered and make necessary improvements if needed.

Factors to consider for Assessing your Presentation skills

You need to give special attention to few factors to ensure that you are well -prepared for the presentation. These include:

• Preparing content that is relevant and focused
• Taking care of audio-visual aids
• Getting ready the PowerPoint
• Preparing relevant handouts and other materials for distributing to participants
• Anticipating possible questions and preparing the answers
• Using the right story, examples, activities
• Incorporating pictures, charts, tables in PowerPoint
• Getting ready with yourself – adequate practice, attire, building confidence
• Meeting the needs of the audience
• Presenting with style

Do you want to make a self-assessment of your presentation skills? Well then, use the Presentation Skills questionnaire to understand how effective you are and to identify scope for improvement.

The questionnaire has 27 statements covering the above-mentioned factors and responses are got on a five-point scale.

Click here to download the questionnaire on Assessing your Presentation Skills. Presentation Skills Questionnaire

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