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How can a lead developer improve his skills of speaking at meetings and presentations?

 
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Developers and lead developers always have a lot of speaking to do during meetings and presentations (meetings may often be telephonic).  One way I can think off is to always think before speaking and speak direct ,clear and loud. Any other things which one can do to improve the skills of speaking in the correct way during meetings and presentations?
 
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Toastmasters is excellent for this. They are all over the world (toastmasters.org).

I've been a member for many years. I've seen it make me and others better - both more effective and more comfortable.
 
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Moving to our soft skills forum.

Speaking in a meeting and speaking for a presentation are two completely different things. Both need lots of practice; I would find ti difficult to envisage somebody getting into such a senior position without practice in meetings.
As for presentations, there are tutorials about that; I can remember a “how to” in the British Medical Journal about that, about thirty years ago. Another thing is that you should rehearse your presentation with a friend or colleague beforehand; the more critical they are the better. If you get comments like, “Divide that part into shorter sentences,” or similar, that will improve your presentation no end.
 
Satyaprakash Joshii
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Thank You. I will explore toastmasters and also practice speaking to friend as mentioned.  Are there any dos and donts for speaking effectively in meetings?
 
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I'm a member of Toastmasters as well, and I've done a few conference presentations.

There is a lot to learning how to do effective public speaking: from how you use your voice and your body, to how to use clear language and structuring your story with a clear opening, body and conclusion, and handling your nerves. It's really something that you have to practice a lot to get better at, and while you are practicing, you'll notice what your personal strong and weak points are, and which points you need to improve. Toastmasters is great for that - you get a lot of opportunities to practice, and your fellow club members will give you feedback which helps to improve yourself.
 
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Some of the things which I have learnt regarding spoken communication:

1)  Try making shorter sentences instead of long sentences which are sometimes confusing for the recipients.

2) Try to use connectors in sentence.Those help convey more effectively.

3) One may try to reduce pace of speaking ,in order to be in more control and avoid any grammer mistakes and also, to make sure each word comes out loud and clear to the recipients.

4) Try avoid the use of any fillers in communication.

Any other Dos or Donts ?
 
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5) Don't assume everyone knows what all your acronyms mean.
6) Never say "Everyone already knows...", because then if someone does NOT know, they can't ask for clarification without feeling stupid.
 
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fred rosenberger wrote:Don't assume everyone knows what all your acronyms mean.
Never say "Everyone already knows...", because then if someone does NOT know, they can't ask for clarification without feeling stupid.



Can you tell one example.
 
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fred rosenberger wrote:. . . "Everyone already knows...", . . .

. . . that 70% of statistics quoted in lectures are made up on the spot.
 
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Satyaprakash Joshii wrote:

fred rosenberger wrote:Don't assume everyone knows what all your acronyms mean.
Never say "Everyone already knows...", because then if someone does NOT know, they can't ask for clarification without feeling stupid.



Can you tell one example.


Combined two into one.

...check jls and you'll see that I was right. I think no need to tell what jls is, as I'm sure everyone knows already...


And try to be in a position of a poor listener and google it: https://www.google.com/search?q=jls&rlz=1C5GCEM_enGB898GB898&oq=jls&aqs=chrome..69i57j0l3j46j0j46l2.931j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

Wanna guess what I had in mind?
 
Satyaprakash Joshii
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Liutauras Vilda wrote:

Satyaprakash Joshii wrote:

fred rosenberger wrote:Don't assume everyone knows what all your acronyms mean.
Never say "Everyone already knows...", because then if someone does NOT know, they can't ask for clarification without feeling stupid.



Can you tell one example.


Combined two into one.

...check jls and you'll see that I was right. I think no need to tell what jls is, as I'm sure everyone knows already...


And try to be in a position of a poor listener and google it: https://www.google.com/search?q=jls&rlz=1C5GCEM_enGB898GB898&oq=jls&aqs=chrome..69i57j0l3j46j0j46l2.931j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

Wanna guess what I had in mind?



Thank You
 
Satyaprakash Joshii
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Campbell Ritchie wrote:

fred rosenberger wrote:. . . "Everyone already knows...", . . .

. . . that 70% of statistics quoted in lectures are made up on the spot.



What does this mean ?
 
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It's a joke.  Campbell is making up a statistic on the spot about the amount of statistics made up on the spot...
 
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On that note, if you're going to tell a joke, try to avoid the ones that go over the audience's heads.  
 
Satyaprakash Joshii
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fred rosenberger wrote:5) Don't assume everyone knows what all your acronyms mean.
6) Never say "Everyone already knows...", because then if someone does NOT know, they can't ask for clarification without feeling stupid.



Understood.Thats is an important point to not to assume that recipient already knows what you are taking about .

The most crucial part of communication ,I would say.

Thank You
 
Satyaprakash Joshii
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While I have been trying to improve my communications skills , I realised some more points as below :

7) Communication should neither be "aggressive" nor "too soft ".It should instead be "assertive".

8)Communication should have Brevity.

9) For good communication skills one should have good listening skills too.One should never interrupt while the opposite person is speaking but should listen carefully to him and then speak.

These are just my opinion.
 
Satyaprakash Joshii
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I have realized that even if one does all of the above but is not relaxed while communicating, it is not a good style and it will affect how his communication appears to the others. One should try to be at easy when communicating and it will reflect in his communication.
 
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