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Effective Presentation Skills and Communication

I stumbled across this video on Youtube and found it rather amusing and entertaining. Not only does the speaker poke fun at his ethnic background, but he manages to effectively grab the audience’s attention!

Presentation and verbal communication skills are very important skill sets in the business world. These soft skills are sought out from a Human Resourcing perspective. Notably, on a resume, these resume keywords are quickly challenged by an interviewer to confirm validity.

Anyways, getting back to the video, the presenter does a great job of keeping the audience listening. Active listening is defined as paying close attention to detail and drawing the full attention of a listener. In the noted seminar, the speaker satirizes Asian stereotypes to grab the audience’s attention. By doing so, he stops them in their tracks by switching to his regular speaking pitch.

He does poise some great thoughts nonetheless. At a general level, people prefer to communication and associate with others that they can communicate with easily, without ambiguity. For myself, I prefer associating with users with strong communication and verbal skills as it minimizes ambiguity. I hate to admit it, but like the video, I tend to avoid situations where I have to deal with people with poor English skills.

So what some ways to improve your language skills?

Derek Foster DRiPs stock advice

In the past year, I have abhorred the consequences of investing in a recession due to the economic times. However, now that the economy is starting to pick up and considering that the Bank of Canada has announced that the recession is over, it has shed some light on investing during a recession.

Over the past couple years, I have spent some time reading books by Derek Foster. The acclaimed ‘retiree’ claimed to have made himself known by retiring at the age of 34. Contrary to your ordinary millionaire, he explains that he lives a frugal yet comfortable lifestyle. Nothing extraordinary and a simple outlook.

For many, it’s hard to put aside money for investing. What Foster suggests is putting aside $200 / month every month to get started. $200 x 12 = 2,400 / year and by 4 years, that adds up to approx 10,000, which should be plenty to get started.

In Foster’s book “The Lazy Investor”, his main piece of advice is to invest in companies that offer DRiPs. DRiPs or Dividend Re-investment Plans are dividends that are automatically used to rebuy additional shares within a company. For example, if you have 100 shares and a company pays $0.10 in dividends, you would typically be paid $10 on a quarterly basis. Instead of being issued a cheque for $10, the company would purchase $10 worth of its own shares with the dividends.

The strategy is relatively straight-forward: invest in recession-proof companies. Foster suggests that an indicator for a “good investment” is to look for companies that have historical increased dividends. This is a good indicator for companies with potential growth (attractive investments).

I must admit that the advice from his book has been beneficial thus far. Although my investments are currently associated with my workplace, the tips from his book hold true with my current holdings. As the adage goes: buy low, sell high.

Please note that during the recession, Foster had sold all of his investments due to panic. This is a common trait with investors who try to mitigate their losses.

The important thing to note is that there is always a rebound. Hold and never sell. Warren Buffett is a great example of this. Buy when people are panicking (cheap stocks); never sell.