Communication Dynamics – Selling Ideas: Professional Development Workshop
In February 2019, students from the UBC Master of Engineering Leadership (MEL) and UBC Master of Health Leadership and Policy (MHLP) professional master’s degrees participated in a professional development workshop that focused on effective communication strategies through the delivery of elevator pitches and presentations.
Led by Ivan Wanis-Ruiz from Speaking and Communication, the interactive hands-on workshop encouraged students to get outside their comfort zone and learn more about how improving one’s confidence can help them become effective communicators and public speakers. With topics such as effective elevator pitches to first impression techniques, the workshop educated students not only on the importance of communication and leadership, but the ability to stimulate curiosity in audiences.
The workshop began with an engaging ice-breaker activity that encouraged students to get outside the comfort zone and gain confidence among their peers. Afterwards, students were able to learn about the key presentation techniques such as ensuring that audience members can remember one fact or number as a takeaway from the presentation. Additionally, Ivan spoke about creating “perfect world” statements, which includes identifying a problem in one sentence and making the audience “imagine” to cut out unnecessary details from the speech.
“Confidence is a physical action you can practice and it has nothing to do with how you feel.” – Ivan Waniz-Ruiz
In the latter part of the workshop, the focus was on the importance of creating “appetizer” pitches instead of elevator pitches. With this analogy, appetizers are considered the most interesting part of the menu. Students were able to practice selling their ideas and pitching to an audience to make a group of people become excited about who they are.
“Ivan gave us very useful tools to improve our presentations” (Student Feedback)
“The techniques were easy to implement but impactful” (Student Feedback)
“It was very refreshing and informative. I really enjoyed the workshop.” (Student Feedback)
Understanding the importance of professional skill development and fundamental business practices is a key component of the UBC MEL and MHLP degrees. Find out more about the UBC MEL and MHLP graduate degrees and how it can work for you by exploring what our programs have to offer.
