Public Speaking and Presenting as an Art

I've gone through life as a self-described conversationalist, a person who finds joy in discussion and interacting with others. While this has served me well so far moving into a professional speaking environment throughout my college experience slowly began to demonstrate that while being an eloquent speaker is a lovely talent, there is a great deal to learn about concisely communicating your ideas. 

I didn't take a course relating to Speech or one that required public speaking until after my first poster presentations freshman year which took place at Discover UofSC and the College of Nursing Research and Scholarship Day. I won some awards for my presentations of these posters but while presenting I realized how conversational I may have appeared, especially as a freshman who had started research just seven months from that day. There is a special quality in every talented presenter I've seen and while it may be innate in some it is something that with practice can also be taught: they are confident people who also command attention and make you care about the subject matter. They do not proselytize or patronize their listeners, rather appealing to them and making them care through persuasive speech. 

Speech 230: Business and Professional Speech was a class I ended up taking that changed the way that I presented, especially in a virtual space. I was hesitant about taking a virtual speech class in fear that I wouldn't gain the skills I wanted, but I ended up being incredibly grateful for the feedback and guidance I got from it considering I ended up presenting virtually at two national conferences in the past year. In this course, we discussed proper backgrounds and lighting, how best to start and interact on virtual platforms, practiced virtual recordings, and simulated the emotions and passion that come from being in a room when presenting to one another. While I am looking forward to the return of in-person presentation learning the art of virtual speech has proved incredibly valuable especially as interviews for graduate schools and jobs have made the move online, with some intending to remain that way.

Considering these forms of presentations, I also figured out the natural pattern and rhythm of my speech. I figured out the best parts of my natural delivery and cut down on filler words and repetitive phrases. While outwardly making jokes during presentations is generally frowned upon, finding humor may draw you closer to an audience and make dense content a bit more digestible. Finding relatable points in scientific presentation has also proven a beneficial element when I've spoken about my research. During most conferences judges are purposefully not related to the field you are presenting on, making it a fairer playing field and judging not just the quality of the research being done but on the way that it is communicated to some in layman's terms. For example, when presenting on "Medication Adherence in Patients Post-Hospital Discharge" I will usually follow up the title of my work with an aside about what that really means is: "Why don't people take their medication after leaving the hospital and how can we help them do that?" This simplified version allows people to see themselves (or their parents, grandparents, or friends) in the work making it more applicable and hopefully more interesting.

Presenting will be a constant in my life wherever I go, whether that is presenting more research, presenting a care plan to an attending physician as a medical student, or presenting a plan to a patient as their physician it will always be critical that I am able to find my voice and simultaneously be clear and effective in my speech. It is a skill I've developed in and out of the classroom and consider to be an underrated and incredibly important tool moving forward.