The
Project topic which my group and I have been working on was “Miscommunication
within university project group”. We have decided on this topic because we feel
that it is something which many of us can relate to in the future when we are
in the working society. Good communication is essential to maintaining an
efficient workplace, Miscommunication can lead to employee conflict, a drop in
morale, turnover etc and in certain cases, neither side of a miscommunication
issue is aware of the problem until it is pointed out to them. Therefore, it is
important to know what can be done when such situations occurs.
For the presentation, I would be talking
about the video which we had done regarding about our topic and explained what
is happening, why it had happen and lastly the solution to solving the issues faced
in the video. I started my presentation by connecting back to the statistics
which Kok Zheng had mentioned earlier, to allow the audience to understand how
important and relevant our topic is to them. After explaining the situation in
the video, I then proceed with the solutions to how the situation could have
been properly handled with the used of what we have learnt like the Johari
window, verbal and nonverbal communications etc. In our presentation we
provided a few solutions for miscommunication and one of them which I am
talking about that is related to our video is, of cause communicating more.
Open communication is essential for building team trust. Everyone in the team
needs to talk to one another in an honest and meaningful way. For example, in a
meeting all members in the team have a chance to talk about their progress, and
discuss about the problem which they are facing. This time spent face-to-face
is an important part of getting to know each other. It also creates
opportunities for team members to talk, and to help one another solve problems.
With this, it helps to widen up the open area within the Johari window within
the team because the Open Area is the most important quadrant, as, generally,
the more your people know about each other, the more productive, cooperative,
and effective they'll be when working together. After which I will pass on to
Rati with other solutions methods which can also be applied in real life
situation and lastly the conclusion.
On the actual day of
presentation, I know that I had not done a good job because I was nervous which
lead me to forgetting all the points which I had initially wanted to elaborate
on. In the end, I had to rush through the points without elaborating much on
them, thus, not providing enough supporting details. Another point which I
should take note of is my movement. Because during the presentation, I was
constantly moving in front of the audience which can prove to be distracting to
the audience as they could lose their focus. I have learnt a lot from this
presentation in terms of delivery for example I should avoid reading from notes
or the slides as I tend to focus my thoughts on the notes, thus losing
contact with my audience. Reading can also reduce my voice to a monotone,
removing energy and enthusiasm from my delivery like what some of my peers
mentioned. Instead I should directly address my audience which is much more
engaging. On the
other hand, some of my peers and team mates were very good as they were able to
maintain good eye contact with the audience at all times, not reading from any
script and their pacing was good as well and these are a few factors to being a
good speaker. The other thing which I think I need to learn from them is being able
to have a good pace as I believe with good pace we are able to communicate
clearly and effectively, thus, drawing the attention of the audience as well.
Lastly,
from this experience I am able to understand myself better in terms of my own
strength and weaknesses for presentation and I could work towards them to improve
myself to become a better presenter. Like how others would think of Steve Jobs, who
makes a presentation look effortless but that polish comes after hours and
hours of practice because nobody is born knowing how to deliver a great
PowerPoint presentation. Expert speakers hone that skill with practice. With
all of the being said, I believe I still have a lot to learn and improve in
terms of my presentation skills.
Hi Steven!
ReplyDeleteI feel you. Believe me, I was really nervous on the actual presentation as well. However, one tip i learnt from our peers, Hyirah, Syai and JS during my mock presentation was to feign your confidence. You should take advantage of you non-verbal communication cues by using hand gesture and standing upright to look as if you know what you're talking about. When you appear confident, naturally, your confidence will come through.
I know that frustrating when you forget your points. I believe the only solution is to have more practise. For that, i have to work on that as well.
Not everyone is born being a good speaker, however, as we are still students, we are fortunate to have time to improvise and receive feedback from our peers.
All the best to you!
Thanks.
Regards,
Hany Humaira
Thank you, Steven, for this detailed reflection. You do a very good job of contextualizing the discussion of your presentation within the project itself. You also provide lots of concrete details for your discussion of the experience of giving the presentation itself and for your learning. The highlight is how you explain clearly what you have learned from your peers.
ReplyDeleteOne bit of positive criticism I can offer for this post is that you need to work on being more consistent with your verb tenses. When you describe past events, as you do in most of this post, you really should use simple past tense.
In any case, thank you for all your effort in this assignment, and for the course in general. I appreciate the hard work.