Hi, this reflection is for my instructor, Christine Howell. I would like to take this
opportunity to discuss what went well in my individual Company Research Presentation,
as well as where I could improve, and explore strategies to implement these changes.
In terms of what I did well, I really feel like I started my presentation in the first 10
seconds with a solid hook to reel the audience in. Specifically, I said “Hello” in English,
Spanish, and Japanese to capture my audience’s attention while also incorporating
Pathos to get them emotionally primed for the rest of my presentation. I felt like I really
leveraged the Primacy rule here to make a solid first impression.
I tempered this Pathos with Ethos afterwards, discussing how I had taken an interest in
the Edtech sector and emphasizing that I intended to provide my audience with the data
and insights regarding Duolingo. They could then decide for themselves, based on my
presentation, whether they wanted to investigate further. Additionally, I clearly detailed
the audience’s reason to listen, being one that transcended the internship process and
was really more about them becoming engaged, global citizens. I thought this was nice
because it brought everyone in, regardless of what they were recruiting for at Fuqua.
I also feel like I excelled in using the Rule of 3 from the 1 to 4-minute mark. In my
agenda, I clearly detailed that I was going to begin by covering Duolingo’s market
dominance, moving on to its gamified business model, and then concluding with an
overview of the company’s financials. Whenever possible, I also tried to use hand
gestures to indicate what particular chunk I was talking about, and, in this case, I felt the
hand gestures were used tactfully.
Lastly, I think I did a good job with my Summary and Conclusion after all three chunks
were discussed, and I made sure to recap the key insights learned in each chunk while
also returning to the purpose of my presentation and, again, turning it over to the
audience to determine whether they wanted to investigate further. Finally, the closing
line of “Ciao for now” was another way in which I leveraged the pinpoint principles by
incorporating the Recency Effect. Regardless of what my audience remembered from
my presentation, they would be sure to remember that line and have a chuckle to go
along with it.
So that’s what I felt I did well.
In terms of what I can work on and the strategies I can use to improve, the most glaring
improvement was again, my overuse of “ums” and “you knows.” I do this when trying to
compose myself and gather my thoughts, but the downside is that it takes you out of the
presentation. In order to combat this, I can substitute these filler words with two second
pauses to gather my thoughts while at the same time not derailing the momentum of the
presentation.
Additionally, while I believe I did an overall good job at TELLING and not SELLING
during the presentation, I think I could have been better about being more objective
regarding Duolingo, especially when it comes to the second chunk I covered, which was
the gamified business model. While this model has a lot of merits, it can also be
addictive and superficial, resulting in users focusing more on completing streaks and
gaining XP points instead of actually learning for its own sake. I think, in hindsight, I
should have tied this into my presentation within this chunk to provide more of an
objective viewpoint of the company’s strategy. Since I didn’t, it came off a bit more as a
SELL rather than TELL. I will be sure to do this in the future, especially when giving a
TELL presentation.
Lastly, while having an audience member provide a stopwatch timer was helpful in
terms of pacing, I found myself getting a bit nervous when I was close to hitting the 4minute mark in my presentation. This resulted in my speaking quickly at times,
increasing my overuse of uhms and you knows, and also gesturing with my hands a bit
too much. Overall, this snowball effect can be prevented in the future if I just take a
deep breath and remember to pause to collect my breath.
Overall, I felt good about the delivery of my company research presentation, and I’m
looking forward to continuing to improve in the key areas I identified.