What are Presentation Skills?

Delivering compelling presentations is a valuable workplace skill

When thinking about levelling up your presentation skills, there are a few things to consider. To deliver a successful presentation, the presenter needs to be able to engage, inform and capture their audience.

The content needs to be engaging, but for a presentation to really resonate, the presenter must also work on tone of voice, body language and reading the audience. Truly understanding who you’re speaking to can make all the difference.

The Four Speaker Personas

Know your style and keep sharpening your presentation skills

While it might not seem achievable for the introverted among us, effective presenting can be learned. A great place to start, or for leaders to upskill, is to know your preferred ‘speaker persona’ and how you can flex between different personas for different audiences.

Learn more about Thinka’s four speaker personas in this quick 3-minute video or read on for more details.

Confident Leader

Focussing on solutions and results, the confident leader offers definite statements to get buy-in from the audience and communicates with utter clarity.

Key Traits: Energy and certainty
Best Suits: Innovators and trailblazers
Works Well: When setting the pace on projects, influencing an audience or communicating your vision

Storyteller

This persona is a warm, conversational style that inspires the audience and engages them in discovery. The storyteller paints a picture and focusses on an exchange of ideas.

Key Traits: Inspiration and curiosity
Best Suits: Creatives and collaborators
Works Well: When working together on ideas and communicating in out-of-the-box ways

Trusted Advisor

When presenting as a trusted advisor, information is credible and delivered as ‘sound advice’. These presenters can synthesise information and present it in ways that the audience can easily grasp.

Key Traits: Credibility and trust
Best Suits: Deep thinkers and detail-oriented individuals
Works Well: When complex information needs to be delivered or there are a lot of moving pieces

Good Friend

The good friend presents with authenticity. The aim of presenting with this persona is to build a connection and a deep relationship with the audience.

Key Traits: Sincerity and connection
Best Suits: A “people person” or someone who doesn’t want to be ‘centre of attention’
Works Well: For presentations that benefit from interaction

How Do You Continually Improve Presentation Skills?

Presentation skills should be continually applied in different contexts, to help you improve this human skill. Why not read the blog to learn more?