How Improvisation Courses Help You to Deliver More Engaging Presentations

So, you’re finally ready with your work presentation! You’ve gathered all the insights and facts and created something graphically magical that’s compelling and important. The big day arrives. The board room or conference room is set up. All that’s left is for you to stride to the front of the room and…

You suddenly feel anxious, nervous, or even scared. You’re about to stand in front of your colleagues or clients and explain your knowledge and expertise. Your body freezes. Your mind is in chaos. Now what? Will your presentation fail because you lack some easily-learned key presentation skills?

No! By taking an improvisation workshop that’s curated and led by industry professionals, your career will remain on track, allowing all of your hard work to earn you the progress and recognition that you deserve. Our improv classes help participants gain the confidence they need to stand in front of others and speak. Here are five ways that our improvisation courses will help your business presentation skills:

Improv Develops Spontaneity & Creativity

Improvisation courses teach us the joyous skills of thinking on our feet and responding to the moment. Improv guides us to trust our instincts, be spontaneous, and think creatively. Even better, it gives us the experience of adapting to unexpected situations while keeping others engaged. These are the very skills that are required for delivering captivating presentations!

Improv Builds Confidence

Improvisation teaches us to trust our abilities, think quickly, and take risks. Learning, practicing, and developing these skills boosts our confidence and enables us to feel more at ease with ourselves. When we’re comfortable and confident, it shows in our tone of voice, our body language, and the overall energy that we bring to our presentations.

Improv Teaches Active Listening

One of the fundamental principles of improvisation is what we like to call “active listening”. In our improvisation workshops, we learn to listen with our eyes and our ears. Learning this practice develops the ability to better understand what is happening around us. This is known as “reading the room” and it’s a vital skill that allows us to better respond to our fellow improvisers. It’s also the very same skill we can use when presenting! Knowing this skill allows us to connect with our audience and adjust our presentation style to better meet their needs.

Improv Enhances Nonverbal Communication Skills

Nonverbal communication - body language, facial expressions, proximity, and gestures — all play a crucial role in public speaking. Improvisation helps us to be more aware of our own and other people’s nonverbal communication offers. Understanding and practicing this kind of awareness in our own bodies is key because it allows us to impact how an audience perceives our presentations. Improv teaches us how to use our body language to communicate our messages effectively. Improv also teaches us how to read other people’s body language to better understand what they may be thinking.

Improv Teaches Collaboration

Improv play is a collaborative art form. It requires patience, teamwork, and cooperation. In our improvisation courses, we teach participants how to work with others, trust in their abilities, and build on their ideas. These skills are valuable in many aspects of our work lives, but they are also key to building and delivering incredible presentations. That’s because a good presentation is just like telling a story. And as every good storyteller knows, you need to work with the audience - collaborate! - in order to tell the most successful and memorable story possible.

Unlock Your Bravery With Our Improvisation Workshops

Change Through Play offers the kinds of improvisation workshops that will help you excel in your career. Taking an improvisation course can be a game-changer when it comes to delivering engaging presentations. The skills we’ve explained above will make you a better public speaker and a more effective communicator in your personal and professional life.

So, join us! Take one of our improvisation courses and see how practicing the art of improvisation can transform your presentation skills.

For those who’d prefer us to come to your place of work: contact us! We’ll explain more about our customized business training modules and how we’ll help make your teams operate better than they ever have!

Change Through Play’s Improv Students performing. From L to R: David Fuks, Matt Keesler, Julie Osburne, & Sarah Faye Doney