Gnawing

This morning i gave a lecture to a group of new-comers to introduce the work that my department does.  It was my 2nd orientation group and the 1st one a few month back had passed rather uneventfully.

We arrived early and caught the end of the preceding lecture.  I was quite surprised when there were questions (!) from the audience.  Perhaps it was because it was a hot topic, so i brushed it aside.  After i was done, i got ready to leave and bam! questions came in.  First one was ok, and the second and third were not directed at me.

Question number four was for me and try as i might, i could not seem to be able to get my point across. On hindsight, I did not flesh out my points in detail. Maybe i did not understand his question fully and i am quite sure i came across as being too defensive.

It is something very "me" to be unable to be objective.  (though some people think i am, it is only because i am bo chup.)  So i gave two goes at answering but each time he just forced smiled and i knew that i had missed the mark.  This gnawed at me for the whole day, mainly because (1) he was a newcomer and yet I could not get my point across.  how am i do communicate effectively to my boss? (2) it could and most probably was also because my content knowledge was not up to scratch (3) it seems to me that my lack of speaking up has cost my valuable practice in communication, which is also why i had failed.

This got me very concerned, as it simply means that i am doing my job well enough to understand it or give it enough thought.  I hope to improve on this and if given another chance to present to the next batch of new-comers, to be able to redeem myself.