Power-packed presentation: Tip no. 1

Wherever you go, student or adult, presentations are inevitable. Today, we are going to learn a few tips to allow ourselves to stand out from the crowd. The tips mentioned in this series “Power-packed presentation” will be going in sequence from preparation phase to the presentation phase. By the end of this series, you will be able identify with a few simple points that can make a huge difference in your presentation.

This series has been broken down into a few articles to give quality content designed specifically to produce effective results.

#1: Wrap your package

Ever heard about the phrase “First impression counts” ? It is still valid.

By “wrapping your package”, which in other words, meant packaging yourself, you open doors to the following benefits:

• Assume an authority figure over your subject / presentation.
• Audience pays attention to what you have to say
• Audience finds you visually appealing
• Audience remembers you and the information you presented
• Higher chance of achieving your goal / objective of presentation

Begin with the way you dress up. Match the occasion. If you are a student, presenting to your teachers, class or school, put in the extra effort to keep the loose ends of your shirt tucked. Ensure that your attire is neat and ironed with the intention to impress. Remove any accessories that students should not don – such as bracelets and necklaces.

Ladies, you have plenty of room to play with when it comes to your hairdo. Choose one that is neat and impressionable. Refer to the ones that are acceptable by SIA Air Stewardess standards. Make up is not necessary if you are a student, but do drink plenty of water to keep your overall appearance healthy  and hydrated.

Gentlemen, prepare your hairdo by a couple of days in advance. Go for a neat and clean trim, one that prefably does not have your fringe covering your forehead. Remove facial hair such as your moustache and your chin area. This is particular for guys – sleep in early for a couple of days in advance to ensure you look radiant on the presentation day.

If you are an adult, and you are doing a business presentation, dress up a notch slightly higher than the occasion calls for. If it is a casual occasion, you want to be dressed in smart casual. If it is a business scenario, black blazer and white inner shirt – no questions asked. Dress pants fit neatly without any hint of bagginess, likewise for the inner shirts. Gentlemen, read up on how to tuck in your shirt the right way.

The choice of colour for your tie, or for the ladies – your blouse, can have very different impacts altogether.

Pitching for anything that is related to money – be it sales, charity or budgeting, go for red.
Yellow would be a good colour if you like to gain acceptance from your audience, or wants to be seen from a distance, just like a marketing billboard.
White – the human factor, in touch with emotions and establish trust rapidly.
Blue – Calmness, quiet authority, eases tensed situations.

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Next, watch the way you walk, stand and gesture – before, during and after the presentation.

If you want to position yourself so that you can make an impact, it begins with your entrance! Lift your feet off the ground. Dragging your feet instantaneously creates a sloppy feeling that will not match up to the image that you are trying to portray. Having said that, walk in a natural manner. Any awkwardness will raise bells in the audience mind that you are not who you really are.

During presentation, if you have to walk – make it a purposeful one. Do not walk because you are feeling nervous or get carried away by the content you are sharing. Take slow paces to address each flank of the audience. Pause and address them as though the entire flank of audience is just one person. Gesturing should be in alignment to your content. Do not allow your hands to be inside the pockets or to be folded – unless it is to demonstrate a particular point using your body as a demonstration. Likewise, naturally speaking, do not allow your hands to go limp and lifeless even if you do not know what to do with them! Standing in a tall and strong stance, your hands can connect with each other in front of your solar plexus area, away from your body, elbows bent at an angle. You can either interlock them in a purposeful manner such that you may break out into any gestures that may aid you in your presentation, or you can mentally imagine yourself playing with the ring on your finger.

After presentation, walk away confident and strong. Confidence is the one of the major keys in presentation!

This sums up the first tip for making power-packed presentations. Do let us know if you find these tips and information useful!

Finding your Path in Life

The alarm goes off and it is yet another day to get over with. Most people literally crawl out of bed and drag their feet to school or to work daily. Till it reaches Thursday, they motivate themselves, knowing finally it is just one more day till the weekends. This monotonous weekly cycle gave birth to the term “TGIF” or otherwise better known in its long form – “Thank Goodness It’s Friday”.

The question bounces back to us, “What is the meaning of Life exactly?”

While the answer remains evasive to even the most accomplished philosophers in history, we look to many successful individuals out there that have seem to have struck the balance point. Life is definitely not just about working. Hence, many students received the same misconception about studies as well. Even ourselves as students, many times we ask teachers and our parents, “Why do we need to study?”

One of the most common answers would be “So that you do not have to sweep roads in the future…” and while there is certain truth in that statement, students have been programmed in a way that having good grades is so that they can have a good-paying job and hopefully they will not need to handle too much work.

Yet, why are some people seem to be absolutely passionate about their work? Why are some people seem to be able to work tirelessly day in day out on their work? For an example, some of us find it a total chore to even doodle a 2-D stick man on a notepad. However, some professional artists in the world can magically conjure a massive piece of artwork on a wall of canvas with a flick of finger. Maybe not the flick of finger part.

The magic lies in their passion. This brings us to today’s topic of finding your path in life. If you do the exercises mentioned below seriously, you may discover very much more about yourselves and possibly even discover your path in life. The formula, like most mathematics and science formulas, is not perfect yet – but it will get you to a good decent track in life.

A disclaimer needs to be stated in advance. This formula may cause you to reconsider about yourself and your current lifestyle. It may also cause you to take action and alter your current path. It will, however, allow you to have a better quality of life by understanding yourself better, and hence acts as your inner compass.

 #1: Passion

 

List down at least 10 things that you are truly passionate about.

These are the things you would be absolutely so enthusiastic about and even if you are not being paid for them, you are still willing to do it. These are also the things you find meaning and purpose in.

(Examples: Singing, dancing, playing music, sports, fitness, body building, games, making websites, building a business, trading, innovating, inventing etc)

#2: Talent

 

List down at least 10 things that you are talented in.

This can be a hard section to fill up. Denying that you have talents is a form of ego. Let the ego go and embrace what you are good at. What do your friends, family and colleagues say that you are good in? What do you find yourself competent in?

(Examples: Learning, Brainstorming, Good in Language, Organizational skills, Analytical thinking, Planning, Managing people, Leading, Teaching, Coaching, Speaking, Negotiation Skills, Interaction Skills, Accounting etc)

Pause. Mix and Match.

We all have been to candies shop and came across the mix and match section where you can pick the candies you like. Likewise, once you have your passion list and talent list, match and map out all the possibilities.

For example: One of your passions may be playing music and you can sit on the piano all day long, then later wonder how come time passes so fast. And then you also realize that you are very talented when it comes to coaching. Hence if you combine music + coaching, you may come up with the possibility of being a music coach. Avoid limiting yourself as to how much you may make as a music coach because more often than not, we are unable to see the future. Furthermore, this possibility that you have discovered has already improved your odds of being wildly successful in life, simply because you are naturally passionate towards music.

Another example can be, you are still very passionate in music and your talent is analytical thinking, as well as organizational skills. The possibilities generated can be totally beyond our current knowledge. It can be someone who analyses the science behind music and may be hired to choreograph a special piece to suit a waterfall performance or even to organize an orchestra to go on around the world as one of the most famous orchestra ever.

Now let’s move on. There are still at least 2 more critical factors to The Formula of finding your path in life.

#3: Network

Now that you have generated a whole list of possibilities from mix and match of passions to talents, let us find out how to turn your passion into profits.

Ever heard of this saying: “Your network is your nett worth.” ?

The richest people in the world look for and build NETWORKS. Everyone else looks for work. – Robert Kiyosaki, touted as the financial literacy guru of the century

Who are some of the people you know, that are in the fields and industry of the possibilities you have just drafted? Find out what are some of the associations, societies and organizations out there that matches your possibilities. Then ask, and explore how you can serve them.

Also take the time to consider who are the top 5 people you send the most time with. Are they successful in life? If they are, what are some of the characteristics that you think made them successful? Think about 5 people whom you would think are successful in life and describe the character and traits about them. It can be famous people such as Richard Branson, Bill Gates, Abraham Lincoln, Steve Jobs, or even Thomas Edison.

Model after them and treat them as your mental counsel. Call for a counsel advisory in your head when you encounter challenges. Put yourself in their shoes, “What will Bill Gates do if he were in my situation?” or “How would have Steve Jobs faced this challenge?”.

#4: Action

This can be the easiest, as well as the hardest. Action always beats inaction and life rewards action takers. Two persons can be given the same opportunity and one of them takes it up, while the other didn’t, guess what happens? Bingo. He who takes action, nearly always wins!

Take action if you would like things to happen for you.

In summary…

Passion + Talent + Network + Action

We wish you the best! And we hope once again we have delivered “Impact Beyond Education”.

6 Productivity Tips

The questions remain the same for both adults and students:

1. How do we do lesser and yet produce more?
2. Is there really such a thing called work-life balance?
3. How are some people able to generate tons of results yet they do not even seem like they are working!?

In reality, as much as we spend a number of hours on a certain task or job, not all of the time spent is necessary to produce the exact same results! If you ever read up a little more about the 80-20 rule, or otherwise known as The Pareto Principle, you would have known that there is a general statistic relevant to efficiency.

The Pareto Principle states that, for many of the events, 80% of the effects comes from 20% of the causes. In business, 80% of the profits comes from 20% of its clients. And what is more relevant to productivity, in this article, is 80% of your results comes from 20% of your overall efforts.

That is to say, majority of the time, people are doing things that do not significantly impact the outcome / results. Conversely speaking, what is truly needed to generate massive results are little, yet effective actions!

#1 Draft a To-do Check list… Before Bed.

The to-do list have been proven effective over decades. It helps you stay on track and stay focused on what needs to be done by today.

Here are some additional suggestions to your checklist if you already keep one:

• Label the checklist items according to their priority. This enables you to know immediately what needs to be done next. It also cuts down time wastage just to process what is up next.
• Draft your next day’s checklist before you head to bed. The timing and situation not only puts a closure to your day’s work, it also helps you think straight and careful as to what has to be done the next day. Drafting before bed helps reduce anxiety the following morning.
• Having specific goals written down, gives you better chance to focus better and achieve them on time.

#2 Develop a morning ritual

The first thing you do in the morning should NEVER be checking emails.

Emails set you up to become reactive instead of being proactive. They get you into working mode and pretty much mess up your emotions the moment you wake up. So do yourself a favour, even if the email notifications show up on your smart phone, shelf them and grant yourself the luxury of starting the day on the right foot.

Have a great breakfast to fuel your body and mind for the rest of the day, and get your body doing at least basic workout each morning. This is part of the conscious effort in maintaining our body and hence will prove to be productive on a long term basis.

The key is to grip hold of the reigns and be in control. Start the day calm and peaceful.

#3 Schedule breaks in between tasks

Putting oneself into overdrive mode couldn’t be in any ways helpful towards productivity.

Working without breaks WILL give you the following:

• Tires our eyes fast
• Additional stress on body
• Clouds up the mind
• Increase in anxiety

Also as a form of psychological subconscious affirmation to yourself, breaks act as a pat on the shoulder to yourself, renewing your passion to focus and drive hard on the next task. Breaks clear up the mind from the previous task and allow one to move on with better efficiency.

#4 Put your smartphone / smart devices away

Unless the information you require for you to work is in your phone, notifications from everywhere assembles on your phone with one intention – to pull you away from your work and vie for your attention.

The key is to focus.

Developing this habit to keep our devices away during work or meetings, may help improve productivity by a whopping 50%! That is to say, alternating between texting your colleagues and typing report may take you 3 hours, whereas concentrating and putting all distractions away may reduce time spent to 1.5 hours.

By the way, this is for students: It is also respectful to keep your devices away during meals and gatherings. Be amazed by how much more information you pick up from your friends when you do so.

#5 Cut the meetings short

Effective meetings usually take about an hour. Applying the same Pareto principle, rethink whether the things listed on the agenda are really necessary to call for a meeting. For items that are necessary, define objective and aim straight to get to the point.

And if at all possible, reduce the number of meetings.

#6 Water is Life

Strange as it might be, or might not be, water plays a massive role in our life. Water and the brain has a direct relevance. Being 85% composed of water, the brain functions (such as thought processing and memory) are heavily dependent on water to provide electrical energy.

Keeping our minds sharp can help get things done in a shorter period. Drink up periodically to refuel the body.

With these productivity tips, Pay What You Want Tuition hope all educators, parents and students can produce better, stand out from the crowd and ultimately lead a better work-life balanced lifestyle. Thank goodness it is Friday, isn’t it?

4 Foods That Can Help Boost Memory In Students

Students admit it, having better memory and better information retention not only can help in your grades but also at the same time makes your revision a lot more easier. Having to cope with multiple subjects and topics, one of the worst enemies any student can possibly face is bad memory and poor information retention.

Today, we aim to help improve your memory through eating! By means of that, we hope that better memory helps cut down time in revising and easier recall of the information when needed. And as always, at Pay What You Want Tuition, we aim to give you the best skills, knowledge and education that can serve you for life. Let us get into it.

#1 Salmon

This catch of the sea has been very well-known for its richness in omega-3 fatty acids. Essential for brain function, omega-3 fatty acids are structural components of the brain that enables neurons to conduct signals and and communicate with other cells. They also contain anti-inflammatory substances. Studies have shown that fish eaters experience slower rates of cognitive decline as they age. Other fatty fish options include sardines and herrings. Recommended: 2- 3 times each week.

 

#2 Berries

Blueberries have been found to protect brain from oxidative stress and help to reduce effects from age-related conditions, premature aging and dementia. Diets rich in berries significantly improve memory capacity, motor skills, learning ability and other cognitive functions such as logical reasoning, decision making and verbal comprehension.

In 2012, a Harvard study has revealed that women who ate at least 1 cup of blueberries and strawberries in a week, experienced a significant delay of mental decline by a whopping 2.5 years, as compared to women whom did not have such diets.

 

#3  Nuts and Seeds

Walnuts and almonds are great sources of Vitamin E, omega 3 and 6 fatty acids. Vitamin E has been shown to protect the brain from free radicals which can help prevent many forms of dementia and hence higher levels of Vitamin E results in lesser cognitive decline as one ages.

The unsaturated fats also help to ensure a continuous supply of oxygen and nutrients to our brains. Pop a handful of cashew nuts, sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds and almonds into your salads. Not only do they taste good, they really offer a lot more nutritional benefit than we would have thought of.

 

#4 Avocados

A rich source of monosaturated fats, omega 3 and 6 fatty acids, promotes healthy blood flow which directly contributes to a healthier brain. It also contain Vitamin E, which as mentioned previously, help delay the cognitive decline in aging brains. Avocados help in the absorption of antioxidants and offers many other health benefits such as reducing the risk of hypertension and stroke.

Likewise, toss the avocados into your weekly dose of salads or simply explore turning it into many other possible side dishes to promote better diet, better living.

In conclusion, these foods are not the only foods that can help improve mental health, memory and overall better health. They act as the benchmark in providing rich sources of omega 3 fatty acids and Vitamin E. We hope such tips can benefit more families by having healthier diets and ultimately boost our memory just by having these little food-hacks implemented.

Have a flavourful week ahead.