YOUR success and effectiveness in business and beyond, is powerfully impacted by the quality of your communication and presentation skills," says Barbara Hoadley, renowned corporate trainer and assessor.

Sounds like a platitude? It is not.

In today's business environment, mid-career professionals need the ability to manage change the most. And a presentation is a basic managerial skill and is one of the foremost career enhancers.

A successful presentation requires meticulous preparation and is a combination of 'what' you say and 'how' you say it. No other skill can expand effectiveness more than being able to present ideas convincingly and confidently.

You might have the best product, proposal or idea but none of it will see the light of day, if it is not presented in a persuasive, structured manner.

Dr Gautam Raj Jain, Senior Professor, Mudra Institute of Communications, Ahmedabad, says, "Learning about public speaking is developed through a more natural process. Participants speak from their heart and dwell on meaning that they actually believe in and make all possible efforts to communicate in class through strong arguments."

"We as teachers always tend to assume that mid-career professionals are great in communication or expressive skills. The truth is, these executives take tremendous interest in learning these skills through classroom projects/ assignments," adds Jain.

"I spend over 60 per cent of my teaching time through this approach so that they learn and speak about their learning to peers. This adds great value to their personality," says Dr AK Sengupta, Director, SIES College of Management Studies, Mumbai.

Learning, re-learning and, sometimes, unlearning are the three ways to enhance your communications skills through various classroom projects.

The five Ps
Plan, Prepare, Practise, Perform and Postmortem are the mantras for a successful presentation.

Plan
This addresses the what, why, who, where and when of a presentation. Collect background information -- the topic, objective, profile of the target audience and date, time and venue of the presentation.

Understand the objective. Also, orient the presentation to the needs of the audience to make maximum impact.

Prepare
This includes building content. Start with a central theme. Add new and related ideas through lateral thinking, without pausing, judging or editing.

Say you have the topic: the aftermath of the Iraq War. List all the points you can think of -- causes, personalities involved, consequences for Iraq, America and the rest of the world on the social, economic and political front.

List down whatever comes to mind, without being concerned about relevance, sequence and structure. Check the relevance of each topic and then spice it up with anecdotes, examples and visuals.

Photograph: Vipurva Parikh

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