Improving Presentation Skills

The assignment highlights the significance of key skills in employability, emphasizing the need for individuals to possess both hard and soft skills. It proposes a plan to overcome weaknesses by practicing speech and body language, thereby enhancing presentation skills. The document also provides references from various books and journals that support the importance of key skills in employability.

Academic And Employability
Skills

Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................3
Task 1...............................................................................................................................................3
1: Different type of skills requires to achieve employability......................................................3
2. Reflective cycle model: ..........................................................................................................7
Conclusion:......................................................................................................................................8
References........................................................................................................................................9

Introduction
Skills is the key factor which differentiate one company or an individual to other person.
It helps person to excel their work with full efficiency and effectivity. Employability skills is a
combination of skills and abilities in an individual which is required to attain success in the
workplace. Different job has different skills requirement and it's individual duty to learn it so that
they can contribute their part in the success of organization. There are different types of skills
i.e., hard and soft skills which will be explained. All the skills which is required to accomplish
given task will be scrutinized. Model of reflection will be discussed with functional examples.
Task 1
1: Different type of skills requires to achieve employability
Skill is the ability of individual to accomplished any task with full productivity. For
instance, if any individual is working in a software firm then a person should know different type
of coding language. If the employees does not have this skills then they won't be able to perform
better in there work which will leads to termination of employees contract with company. There
are two different types of skills i.e., hard and soft skills which is explained below,
Hard skills: These type of skills can be learned or acquired through teaching or
workshops, online courses etc so to accomplish any specific task. It includes coding for software
programmer, specific knowledge about specific subjects, SEO for marketing work ,accountancy
for finance etc. It can be learned in any age and only helps while doing assigned work (Andrews
and Russell, 2012).
Soft skills: These types of skills are born with a person or it is also spells out as people
skills which can not be measured and it is not specific to any jobs or career of an individual. It
includes leadership , problem solving , communication , listening skills etc. It modify itself
according to the circumstances of individual and could be learn through proper teaching and
coaching. For instance, successful sales person is equipped with good communication skills as
they know how to create demand in the mind of the customers (Collet, Hine and du Plessis,
2015).
Different skills which I have or need to develop to gain credibility for employment
opportunities is explained below with their importance from the perspective of employer:

Communication skills: Communication is a process of exchange in information between
individuals so to convey any message. It includes words, gestures, sounds etc. It is necessary for
me and for every individual to learn this skills as it helps me while talking or conveying any
messages to other. It is helpful for sales and marketing person as their work is to manipulate
customers mind to sell their company's product (Speight, Lackovic and Cooker, 2013) . I have a
decent command over communication but I need to develop it to attain this full skill. There are
few methods which I can use to develop this skills in me which are given below,
 Reading newspaper or magazines to improve my vocabulary which will help me to
communicate with others.
 Doing oral presentation in front of mirror or classes.
 Working on a call centre to improve my fluency over my communication.
This skill is an important factor for employer while selecting candidates as employees have to
communicate with customers to buy their product and this will only attain if a person has good
command over communication skills (de Guzman and Choi, 2013).
Teamwork: This skill helps individual to get along with people they are working to
achieve common purpose or goals of a task. I am a people friendly person due to which I hardly
find any difficulties while interacting with other people. Their is many advantages of team work
skills which I found is given below,
 This skill helps me to increase my productivity while working as cohesiveness between
team member creates positive working environment which is helpful for me to attain my
assigned task and goals.
 Teamwork skills assist me to complete my work on time as I have to switch my work
according to the requirements which increases my knowledge related to specific subjects,
multi tasking etc.
Teamwork could be improve by doing things like,
 Working with NGOs as chances of culture, beliefs, values diversity are high which makes
person to understand their behaviour and behave accordingly.
 Doing assignments in group to make connections between different people with distinct
behaviours.
 Playing team sports can help individual to improve their teamwork skills.

Individual has to work in team while working for any organization and it is important for
employer to hire individual after checking their teamwork skills.
Time management: This is an essential abilities which a person has to succeed in their
career or in job. It refers to organizing and planning of activities which a person is supposed to
do in a day. I find it hard to manage time according to the work assigned to me. I usually waste
my time on planning of activities as I never work according to that due to which my productivity
and efficiency decreases with time (Rosenberg, Heimler and Morote, 2012). There are many
ways through I can develop this skill which are given below,
 Make a schedule of work which you are going to do according to the priority of work.
Time assigned to every task should be challenging as then only it will test individual
abilities.
 Person should concentrate on their work as distractions affects productivity and time
management in a negative way.
While working for big or small organization time management skill is important for individual as
pressure of completing the work is high which deteriorates productivity of employees. That's
why employer prefer to pick those candidates who has time management skill as it won't affect
their efficiency while working under pressure. Reason due to which time management skill is
important for employer is explained below,
 If person is equipped with time management skills then their productivity will increase
due to increase in focus while working. If employees does not loose their momentum
while working than they can attain more goals while giving less effort.
 This skill reduces stress while working as every task has fixed deadline which helps
individual to attain their goals in the given deadline
 Employees in any sector has certain quality and standards of work which they have to
deliver while working. If proper utilisation of time is achieved by person then they know
that how much time and focus should be given to work according to the priority assigned
which helps them to perform accordingly.
Presentation skills: Presentation or public skills is important for any individual to
convey messages to their public (Fallows and Steven, 2013). Proper use of words or vocabulary
plays an important factor in attaining this skill. I should develop this skill as main problem with
me is that I found hard to speak in public due to lack of confidence and fluency while speaking.

This skill can only achieved if a person has confidence, fluency, vocabulary, innovative thinking,
speaking style, body of presentation etc.
I can develop this skill with the help of few techniques which are described below,
 When speaking audience is always sleepy, its orator responsibility to engage them with
your topic so to create interest in their mind.
 Repetition of lines or words is bad as it creates boring environment in the room. That's
why orator should shave proper vocabulary list.
 Body structure which includes standing posture, hands flow etc is important as it helps
orator to express themselves with the help of non verbal actions
 Daily practice before speaking in public is mandatory as it build confidence in the mind
of orator.
Employees in an organization have to communicate with their employees while giving training
or giving presentation to customer while selling products. If employees is not equipped with
presentation skills than person will create boring environment which is negative for any
company. That's why employer check this skills before selecting any candidate for specific job.
Self management: It refers to managing all the work which is assigned to individual so
that other person won't come to check the work status. Self management leads to decrease in
dependencies which increase individual productivity of person. I am good in self management as
I don't need anyone to guide me regularly as it increase my dependencies on other resulting in
decrease in efficiency and effectivity (Jackson, 2012). There are few ways through which I can
improve this skill which is given below,
 Joining volunteer or NGOs can help you to manager yourself as there is no one to guide
you. It increase the sense of responsibility in the mind of individual which automatically
develops self management skills.
 Regularly asking for new and unique work at the workplace so that individual will
become adaptable to critical situation which helps them to manager their work according
to situation (Pârvu, Ipate and Mitran, 2014).
There are thousands of employees who are working at the same time at office and no one has
time to help others that's why employer review their self management skills so that individual
would able to complete their work without any guidance by senior.

2. Reflective cycle model:
Gibbs reflective cycle is inspired by Kolb's learning cycle or loop in which individual
learns from their experiences they have faced in past. It is a never ending cycle which starts with
description and then perpetually runs. Different elements of Gibbs' cycle is explained below
with the help of functional example,
 Description: This is the first stage of cycle in which description of the incident is
required. All the details should be write down when starting a reflective cycle as small
factor can change the whole scenario for the individual. For instance, when I found out
that my presentation skills are not up to the mark then only I wrote down all the elements
which happens at the time (Jackson, 2014).
 Feelings: At the time of incidents what does an individual feeling before it, at that time
and after it. Feelings which emerge at the time of incidents plays an important role in
reflective cycle. Before giving presentation I was worried and nervous and due to which I
lost my confidence and did not present myself up to the expectations of listener.
 Evaluation: Evaluation of incident is must as individual has to check what went wrong
or right at the time of incident. When I went home my first work is to evaluate my
performances on the basis of many standards which I have set (Ju, Zhang and Pacha,
2012).
 Analysis: This step includes what might have help at that time or what affects the
situation to be worse. Proper analysis should be done by individual to find out the real
reason of failure or success while presenting their work. After analysing all the factors by
myself, factors which affects my presentation were low confidence, lack of practice,
fluency at the time of speaking and stage fear.
 Conclusion: In this phase individual have to learn from the situation they have faced so
to improve it next time. Individual have to find out the reason of happening of incident
and with which skills it could be improve in future. I have make all the list which causes
hindrance at the time of presentation and make a plan that how it can be reduced.
 Action plan: It refers to plan that am individual made to transform their weakness in to
strengths. I have made all the methods which could improve my weakness and then
made plan accordingly. Proper practice of speech, improve in body language can change
my presentation skills into strengths

Conclusion:
Skill is the key factor which differentiate employees to employees. Proper skills is
required to accomplish any task which has assigned to them and it could only be attained if they
are equipped with it. Skills can also learned with the help of teaching, classes, workshops etc.
Hard and soft skills should be present in an individual according to their specific work as it helps
them to increase their productivity and efficiency while working for any company. Reflective
model is helpful for individual to improve their weakness and changes it into strengths.

References
Books and Journals
Andrews, G. and Russell, M., 2012. Employability skills development: strategy, evaluation and
impact. Higher Education, Skills and Work-Based Learning. 2(1). pp.33-44.
Collet, C., Hine, D. and du Plessis, K., 2015. Employability skills: perspectives from a
knowledge-intensive industry. Education+ Training. 57(5). pp.532-559.
de Guzman, A. B. and Choi, K. O., 2013. The relations of employability skills to career
adaptability among technical school students. Journal of Vocational Behavior. 82(3). pp.199-
207.
Fallows, S. and Steven, C., 2013. Integrating key skills in higher education: employability,
transferable skills and learning for life. Routledge.
Jackson, D., 2012. Business undergraduates' perceptions of their capabilities in employability
skills: Implications for industry and higher education. Industry and higher education. 26(5).
pp.345-356.
Jackson, D., 2014. Testing a model of undergraduate competence in employability skills and its
implications for stakeholders. Journal of Education and Work. 27(2). pp.220-242.
Ju, S., Zhang, D. and Pacha, J., 2012. Employability skills valued by employers as important for
entry-level employees with and without disabilities. Career Development and Transition for
Exceptional Individuals. 35(1). pp.29-38.
Pârvu, I., Ipate, D. M. and Mitran, P. C., 2014. Identification of employability skills-starting
point for the curriculum design process. Economics, Management and Financial Markets. 9(1).
p.237.
Rosenberg, S., Heimler, R. and Morote, E.S., 2012. Basic employability skills: a triangular
design approach. Education+ Training. 54(1). pp.7-20.
Speight, S., Lackovic, N. and Cooker, L., 2013. The contested curriculum: Academic learning
and employability in higher education. Tertiary Education and Management. 19(2). pp.112-126