Q & A session – a vital component of any presentation

Presentation skills are necessary for doing well at work. Your control over the language and articulation is important alright; however, it is also necessary that you clarify all doubts that may exist in the minds of the audience. After all, people who attend your presentation are there for a purpose and if you are unable to clear their uncertainties, your presentation has no meaning.

The idea behind any presentation is boosted if you urge the audience to ask questions and more importantly, respond to them well. This expertise is as important as your ability to be fluent in delivery. Here are some methods by which you can manage question and answer sessions successfully:

·  Discern your audience:  You should be able to make out the type of the people who are in attendance and their capability to comprehend and retain issues. Accordingly, you should figure out their possible doubts in advance and decide on the plane or degree of your responses.  The very fact that you are giving a presentation implies that you are considered a specialist in your field; and hence the audience evidently seeks to gain knowledge.

·  Foresee audience queries:  When you prepare for a presentation, you delve into details. But you must think a little beyond and reflect on the grey areas about which questions may be posed by the audience. You should prepare yourself well to respond to such queries. In case, your audience happens to be seniors and experienced people, it is important that your preparation is directed to details about theoretical issues and related perceptions as also their practical relevance. 

·  Rehearse listening abilities:  Good listening skills entail letting any person having a doubt to put across his query uninterruptedly and then restating the same differently so that you convey your understanding of the question. Paying attention to accompanying gestures will also help you understand the intensity of the doubt and proceeding with your response appropriately and sans any supposition. You may also feel that the question put forward has not been done accurately; under such circumstances. You should indulge in a short conversation to elicit a reasoned inquiry that can be suitably attended to. 

·  Evaluate and speak:  You must not attempt to reply in haste. After reflecting for a while during which time you should be able to shape your reply, you must communicate unmistakably and in a manner that you are understood by all. If your response is byzantine or bombastic, you will be seen as a person sans lucidity and intelligibility. Your answer should be accurate, brief and clear; it will go a long way if you illustrate it with examples. If you think that a question by itself comprises more than one query, you must proceed with your answers accordingly.

·  Confirm approval: After you finish responding to a question, you must ask the person question if he or she is satisfied. This will help you to be certain that the question asked was put across and inferred correctly. In case you do not do so, you may think that you responded intelligibly but your answer may not have achieved the desired impact. If you have the slightest doubt in this regard, you must visit the question all over again and respond fittingly.

·  Confess your inability to respond:  If you are not in a position to take on a question, there is nothing wrong in admitting the same. You could assure the questioner that you will get back to him with an answer at the earliest; and you have to ensure that you do. There can be nothing more dangerous than to fabricate an answer that is extraneous or not pertinent. In doing so, you would be misinforming many who would have come to learn from your presentation.

·  Guard against possible hitches:  There will be an odd person in the audience, who because of professional rivalry may try to let you down by asking unwarranted questions and show that he or she is equally knowledgeable. You should avoid any disagreement and exhibit sensibleness and mellowness in handling such people.   

Presentations or for that matter question and answer sessions are communication processes. The major quandary with any communication process is the false impression or delusion that it has been brought about well. When you stand in front of an audience as an expert, your duty is to make sure that what you speak in general and what you clarify in the form of answers to queries raised in particular do not leave any question mark.