Albert Einstein once said, “Never regard study as a duty but as an enviable opportunity to learn to know the liberating influence of beauty in the realm of the spirit for your own personal joy and to the profit of the community to which your later works belong”. As I sail on the ES2007S ship, I see new landscapes and learn new skills along the way. I dare to say that I have improved in the way I communicate with people as the course has definitely provided me the knowledge to enhance my communication confidence in specific skills such as team work, oral interaction, oral presentation as well as writing.
Despite having the prior awareness in using voice and language effectively to deliver one’s message, this is inadequate to having a good oral presentation. Through the course and tutor’s feedback, I have learnt the importance of analyzing and engaging my audience. This is something which I have often overlooked in the past with the mistaken belief that presentation is just another form of presenting information verbally. However, this should not be the case when the message is to be delivered across effectively as the audience might be busy people with not much time to spare. Another valuable lesson is the gain of self-confidence in presenting without the need to rely on memorizing scripts word for word which I used to. Thus, this enables me to demonstrate appropriate body language, gestures and eye contact as well as variation of tone naturally so as to display confidence and capture the audience attention.
Having said so, there are still rooms for improvements. One of them is the effective handling of Q&A such that every member has equal opportunity to answer questions. With reference to my team presentation, I think that all of them have applied the principles and skills learnt in delivering their contents except during the team Q&A where Zhang Jiao seems to be left out by the team. Instead, I should have taken the initiative to direct related-questions to him so as to strengthen our team dynamics because team performance plays an important role towards a good presentation. Another is to focus on building up my limited vocabulary as words do matter a great deal. They can either make or break communication when the right/wrong word is used.
As for my learning, one of the greatest learning achievements is to resolve conflict amicably through building interpersonal communication, interpreting non-verbal communication cues and fostering intercultural communication which can also be applied in workplace. In the past, being impulsive, I am fearful to be involved in conflicts as I face difficulty resolving which often leads to poor working relationship and team performance. Another is identifying the importance of the 7Cs of powerful writing and applying to writing tasks. This aids in amplification of a good organization and fine language.
After all, having been through the training, I would like to focus on developing my oral interaction skills which is still lacking in me. For instance, during peer feedback, I give good constructive comments with the aim of improving myself and others. But that is not enough; instead I should offer practical and workable suggestions that I have read from articles or my own experience for the individual or team to improve. This allows me to think critically and communicate effective that are transferrable to my future workplace.
As the course comes to an end, I hope my peers and friends have enjoyed the nice scenery and happy sailing as much as I have. Thank you Ms Happy Goh for making this possible.
(599 words)
To end off, here's a sharing by engineer and producer Trina Shoemaker on why communication skills are a critical part of an engineers or producers toolbox.
(599 words)
To end off, here's a sharing by engineer and producer Trina Shoemaker on why communication skills are a critical part of an engineers or producers toolbox.
 |
| The importance of communication |
Hey Kent,
ReplyDeleteI thought you had done an excellent job with your oral presentation. You were confident and fluent when speaking; your slides were very clear and you had a consistent idea throughout your entire slides presentation. While it may be most ideal to be a brilliant all-rounder in oral presentation, I think building on one’s strengths to create winning delivery is one alternative. With regards to the Q&A, the questions were coming fast and furious from the floor given that the audience had their complete attention on your presentation that day. While Ho Zong may have been the one answering most of the questions, I’m sure he had the greater good of the team in mind. Just as you, I had planned to direct the questions from the audience to the respective group members with the relevant information. However, during the Q&A itself, we had simply relied on quick glances at one another to gauge who would answer the question. I’m certain with more experience we’d be better prepared for such circumstances!
Also, I agree with you that I have learnt the importance of engaging the audience. Most of my presentations in the past were more of an informative nature, so I seldom had the audience’s well-being in mind. I believe crafting and delivering an effective presentation is a necessary skill everyone should hone as ‘collaboration is the stuff of ideas!’ (Sir Ken Robinson). I’m glad to have taken this module despite the apprehensive reviews I had seen on the module-review website. We are fortunate to have had Ms Happy Goh as our tutor too!
While we did not have the opportunity to interact on a more intimate basis through group assignments, we may just meet again in the coming semesters! Good luck with the coming exams, though I doubt luck will have anything to do with your academic success.
Live Long and Prosper, Kent.
Regards,
Eric
Hi Kent
ReplyDeleteAs mentioned in my reply to Ho Zong, I felt that your group could come closer to the audience during the Q and A session to engage us better. Nevertheless, it was still an effective presentation in which your group had certainly sold the concept of the sky garden well.
I have to agree with you that it is difficult to offer constructive feedback without sounding very critical. This is also something that I will need to work on. Perhaps, you can refer to this link on the steps to give constructive feedback: http://www.expressyourselftosuccess.com/five-steps-to-giving-constructive-feedback/. I hope you will find it useful.
Finally, I wish you all the best in the upcoming examinations and thank you for sharing the video.
With regards,
Kar Liang
Hi Kent,
ReplyDeleteIt really is an interesting and creative idea to describe our journey through our module as "physically" sailing a ship, with us being the crew members. I think throughout our work as a team on the proposal and presentations, your maturity of thought, and being constantly brimming with a plethora of interesting ideas, struck me as being strengths you could come to rely on.
From my observations, I think currently the only obstacle to you fully realizing these strengths is the effective articulation of these ideas. Seeing how effective the mind maps were when we were doing our slides for the presentation, may I suggest that you could try circumventing this obstacle by forming simple mind maps with diagrams where words fail, to organize and using it, articulate your ideas? It could prove to be an effective means to facilitate and improve communication with your team members.
On a different note, I thought you did a fantastic job during the presentation on Thursday. Having rehearsed a number of times with you, I've noticed your presentations improved by leaps and bounds. As you had mentioned, the confidence was evident in your presentation, and it was a pleasure listening to you present.
To attain even better confidence in presentations, I suggest we could follow the points listed on the website (link provided below). One interesting method I would like to highlight is to display and concentrate on one's emotions linked to the topic, and by doing so, eliminates the fear of doing a presentation. If one could possess this fiery passion for his topic, then it could be a useful aid in elevating one's confidence, and thus deliver an effective presentation.
Finally, I should add that I did enjoy the sail thus far as much as you did. Hopefully the conclusion of this module is just a port of call on the journey of learning and discovery,and as to the rest of the journey, bon voyage!
Web Link: http://www.presentationmagazine.com/presentation_nerves.htm
Cheers,
Ho Zong
Hi Kent
ReplyDeleteI was really impressed by your presentation as you were really calm and fluent in your presentation. In fact, I found your slides were really engaging as they were well planned and contained pictures which were attention grabbing while not too distracting. All these really caught my attention right from the beginning till the end of your team’s presentation.
However, one thing which can definitely be improved on is your team’s coordination in the Q&A session. Most of the questions directed during the Q&A were answered by Ho Zong, you and Jerina while Zhang Jiao remained quiet most of the time. Perhaps there could have been more emphasis on a mock Q&A session prior to the presentation so as to improve the feedback coordination during Q&A.
Once again, thank you for the impressive presentation and I wish you all the best for your finals.
Regards
Chung
Hi Kent
ReplyDeleteI think it’s a similar misconception among many of us that presentations were just another form of presenting information verbally. We have realized through this module that engagement of the audience is critical. I am glad that you have gained self-confidence through this module without memorization of scripts, as would be our natural wont.
It’s good that your group was aware that perhaps Zhang Jiao could have taken a bigger role during the Question and Answer session to improve team dynamics. Perhaps what could have also been done was a rehearsal of the possible questions for that session itself and the delegation of roles for questions with specific aspects. Thus 4 different group members could specialize in four different aspects of the proposal. Ho Zhong could perhaps have specialized in the architectural science of the rooftop garden while Zhang Jiao could perhaps have specialized in the budgetary concerns of the proposal.
I wholeheartedly agree that constructive comments along with practical solutions are indeed hard to suggest. It is a habit that I am still trying to work on.
You have improved a lot since the last presentation. There was consistency and coherency in the ideas presented by your team, and it is with no doubt due to the feedback from Ms Goh and from your team’s resilience to continually improve on the presentation you already had.
Thank you for sharing the video. It is very pertinent for us engineers who for one reason or the other, tend to lack the ability to communicate well.
It was a pleasure to have been your classmate. Bon voyage!
Regards,
Halim
@Eric: Thanks for the compliments and the quote. I will try to improve on the teamwork on the Q&A for my future presentation. I sincerely look forward to working with you when we meet again.
ReplyDelete@Kar Liang: Thanks for sharing the link on the 5 steps to give constructive feedback, i.e. Timing, Choose my words, Start with positive, Be descriptive and talk about facts & Collaborate to come up with ideas for improvement. It has indeed come handy and I look forward to apply in my next discussion.
@Ho Zong: Thanks for your feedback and suggestion. I agree with you that simple mind maps can be an useful tool to communicate effectively with the members and it has proven successful during our presentation rehearsal when you illustrated it. I dare to say that I have lots to learn from you so that I can further improve myself. Also, thanks for enlightening me with the sharing on attaining better confidence in presentation.
@Wing Tai: Thanks for the praises and feedbacks. I have noticed my team Q&A and felt that it has to be further improved. I suggest that in future, I will get my team to come together and brainstorm all the possible questions so that everyone has a picture in mind to answer.
@Halim: Thanks for the encouragement about my last presentation. I think your suggestion on tackling the Q&A session effectively is a feasible idea that can be practiced in my next presentation. Lastly, I agree with you that we engineers have the knowledge but lack the effective communication skills. Perhaps the government can provide subsidies for company to send their workers for such courses like professional or effective communication.
Hi Kent
ReplyDeleteI thought you did a great job at presenting. It was a good idea to put away your script and be able to focus on your audience and mode of delivery. It had been great to work alongside you for this presentation. I have learnt a lot from your maturity, of how you perceive things logically and execute them with great deliberation. More importantly, thanks for being a great leader and getting the act of the team together!
I had also placed less emphasis on understanding my audience, but rather on the content to be delivered; thinking that so long as the information is covered, that would have been a presentation done. However, I realised that many a times, the audience do not perceive the same piece of information as us. Thus, making the information or data applicable to the members of the audience could help in allowing them to gain an exact idea of the content.
I do think that the team dynamics at the Q&A segment could be improved on. And the following suggestions from our course mates are definitely good ones. I would like to add that it could have been the last speaker to direct the questions from the audience to the best person to answer amongst our group, so I should have taken the initiative to do so. Questions and responses are definitely an opportunity to support our argument and reinforce our message, so responding to the concerns of the audience and persuading them of our stand on the proposal would have been important. As the presentation came to an end and we had taken our final questions, it would also be a good idea to repeat our closing remarks, particularly if we had been responding to questions for a while. That should drive home our call for action and avoid ending on a vague or weak note.
On the last point mentioned, to resolve conflict amicably requires good execution of interpersonal skills. No doubt this requires us to be thoughtful and sensitive to the people involved; I thought that understanding your role and giving an objective response without raising any allegations to the person at fault would help.
This is a quote to share!
Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do than by the ones you did so. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover. – Mark Twain
Always be daring to challenge yourself, and through it all, gain much more! Keep in contact!
Regards,
Jerina
Hi Jerina,
ReplyDeleteThanks for your comments and the meaningful quote that inspires me to dream. I am glad that we have learnt from one another through the projects and discussions. I do agree with you that the Q&A session can be further improved through the suggestions that you and the other peers have given. I dare to admit that there is lots for me to learn and improve on in order to be an effective communicator. Good luck for your exams.
Hi Kent,
ReplyDeleteThanks for the nice video.
I found it easy to follow your presentation as you projected your voice nicely, controlled your presentation pace well and emphasized important words verbally. Putting a slide for section summary also substantially helps the audience (at least for me) to grasp important notes. Listening to your introduction, I do agree it is urgent to open more places in NUS for student activities and it was a successful introduction.
As for handling the Q&A session, it is indeed something we have not explored yet. It requires a lot of effort before the presentation to anticipate audience's questions so that the team knows how to direct questions to respective speakers. Thanks for addressing this thought-provoking topic in your post.
It's been very enjoyable reading your blog. In your posts, I can always find interesting topics that put me into deeper thinking. The cartoons and pictures make posts more interesting as well. It is great work! All the best for your exam and keep in touch.
Regards,
Chaoyi
Hi Chaoyi,
ReplyDeleteThanks for your comments. I am glad that my presentation has captured your attention and indeed this is my first time having such presentation in such a style. It has been an eye-opener for me too.
I must say that there is more for me to improve on handling Q&A session effectively through the peers' suggestions.
Once again, I am happy that you enjoy reading my blog and thank you for following my blog. All the best for your papers.
Cheers
Kent
Hi Kent,
ReplyDeleteIt is a nice experience to work with you. You are very kind and considerate. More importantly, I feel you have very strong abilities that I should learn a lot from you.
As for the presentation, I think you set a very good start for the rest of us. You did very well to engage the audience by varying your tones, which was highly appreciated by our classmates during the feedback session. Of course you have displayed your confidence and enthusiasm during in your part, which you should always keep for your future presentations. Overall, you did a very job in he presentation.
All the best for your exams and see you around in campus.
best regards,
Zhang Jiao
Hi Zhang Jiao,
ReplyDeleteThanks for the compliments. It has been my pleasure working with you too as you have aided in editing the videoclip for our presentation which has further enhanced in capturing the audience. I am glad that you have learnt as the journey goes on. Feel free to seek my help if needed. I wish you good luck in your exams too. Catch up again.
Cheers
Kent