Found a great article by the folks at Ethos3 (A presentation design agency) on understanding your presentation persona. I simply love these guys for what they do! Just presentations (including training). But that’s probably because I love to deliver presentations.
But I digress, the article gives a glimpse of Badge, the agency’s proprietary presentation persona assessment. It’s kind of like the Meyers-Briggs or DiSC but for presenters. Which means it’ll give you great insights on your strengths (and weaknesses) as a presenter and help you leverage them for maximum impact. If you’ve been on stage you know how important that is for your presentation to be a success.
I think I’ve said this before but I can’t never say it enough, “If knowledge is power, knowledge about self is super-power.” (You can quote me on that!)
Here’s what the Badge’s four quadrant looks like:
Quadrant 1: Exploration — how you plan, prepare and practice your presentations. You’ll know if you’re one of those who remain stuck in the plan and prepare stage or the one who wings it. Let me tell you, there are many who wing it than the ones who truly prepare. And the audience can sense the effort that you’ve put into your presentation almost instantly.
Quadrant 2: Sharing — is all about how confidently you share your message while on stage. If you’re nervous, you’ll know how to channelize that energy into something useful. Let me tell you from experience, nervousness can be good but more often than not it screws you up! And that doesn’t look good.
Quadrant 3: Response — tells you how the audience engages with your message. Of course, sharing valuable content is important but if the audience doesn’t engage you’re sort of wasting your time. Which also means that you didn’t pay attention at Q1: Exploration which is all about planning (read: research) for this presentation.
Quadrant 4: Durability — is about how memorable is your content. Your message’s stickability is an important factor. More is better. And more means your message has stories, metaphors (or visuals, if you’re into visual aids), analogies (and other speech devices) that resonates with the audience.
Do you see how each of the quadrant builds onto each other? That’s the beauty of it. It’s super practical and modular. And the best part is that it focuses on your specific strengths as a speaker/presenter which allows you to take the focus away from yourself and onto the audience.
I highly recommend that you invest (it’s just $89!) in this program. And no, they didn’t ask me to promote it from them.
Power to you!