Effective Presentation Skills

For many speakers, the most terrifying part of a presentation is handling the questions at the end. It is almost impossible to predict what questions will be asked. Many people find it hard to come up with a good answer to a question in these conditions.

Dos

Tell the audience how much time they have to ask questions.

Maintain eye contact with the person while they are asking the question.

Go back to eye contact with the rest of the audience when you answer the question. You are not just speaking to the person who asked the question.

If you are in a large room, repeat the question so that everyone will know what has been asked. Reformulate it if you wish. This will give you time to think about your answer.

If you don’t know the answer to the question, simply say that you don’t know but will find out and let them know.

As you come to the end of the time, tell the audience that you only have time for one more question.

Finish on a high. Wrap up your presentation with a strong conclusion reinforcing your mission.

Don’ts

Interrupt or talk over the question.

Ask if you’ve answered the question. Simply look to someone else for the next question.

Ask anyone else to answer the question without prior warning.

Say sorry if you don’t know the answer.

Tags: answer questions, audience, conclusion, dos, eye contact, good answer, handling questions, people, presentation, Presentations, speakers

This entry was posted on Saturday, July 19th, 2008 at 2:35 pm and is filed under Presentations. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.