Episode #86: Delivery Skills Rule in Presenting

Memorizing speeches and reading them are both bad ideas. Okay. Then what are we supposed to do? Find out in this weeks show.

The content was really great and the way the words were put together was quite clever. Obviously a tremendous amount of work had gone into this piece. The speaker had a previous professional journalistic background and the careful selection of just the right vocabulary and the descriptive flourishes were excellent. The speech was a dud. It failed miserably because it was a written speech, read to us.

The next speaker just spoke. He wasn’t such a fluent talker, sometimes stumbling over some of his words, occasionally stuttering, but he had everyone’s attention because he was authentic.

The issue here is how should we reproduce the content we have designed. Do we have to remember it exactly, memorise it so we can be faithful to our speech design and message? If it is a very short speech, you can try and memorise it, but these are usually very special occasions.

Don’t read it to us, if you can avoid it. If it is a highly technical speech, something with gargantuan legal implications if you get it wrong, a life or death statement to the media or on behalf of your absent big boss, then you may have no choice. If so, then please use as much eye contact with your audience as possible. You can study the text, such that you really know the content. You can read the first part of the sentence, then voice the last section while looking at your audience and still remain perfectly faithful to the sacred text.

You can read the words and add in gestures, to emphasis the message. You can stand straight and tall and project confidence, reliability, credibility and trust rather than hunching down over the microphone stand. You can have pauses, to allow the audience to digest the key points. You can hit key words for emphasis and can use voice modulation to bring the text alive. Do not have your head down, eyes glued to the text and cut yourself off from your audience.

Even better, read your audience not your text. Observe if they are buying what you are saying, see if they are understanding the point. You don’t have to memorise your talk or read it to us or read the slides to us. You can have speaking points and talk to those points.

For the vast majority of speeches, a conversational tone of talking to key points will work extremely well. If it is severely formal and you have either memorise it or read it, well go ahead. However if you don’t have that type of caveat, then look at us, talk to us and engage with us. We will forgive any sins of grammar, pronunciation or lack of speaking fluency in the delivery.

We will connect with you and we will receive your message and we will regard you highly as an authentic person who spoke from their heart. And we will remember you in a positive vein.