characteristics of effective Delivery 13.3 269
• Pay special attention to your facial expression when you begin your speech. Your
audience sees your face before they hear what you are going to say. Thus,
you have an opportunity to set the emotional tone for your message before
you start speaking. We are not advocating that you adopt a phony smile that
looks insincere and plastered on your face, but a pleasant facial expression
helps establish a positive emotional climate.
• Naturally vary your expression to match your message. Present somber news
with a more serious expression. Monitor your expression so that it commu-
nicates the emotion you intend.
• Use a pleasant expression when you can. Unless you are presenting sad or bad
news, have a naturally friendly, alert facial expression to signal your interest
in communicating with your listeners.
• Adapt expressions for video. When presenting a speech that will be seen only
on video, take care not to overly exaggerate your facial expression. Close-
ups can amplify the intensity of your emotional expressions.Vocal Delivery
Have you ever listened to a radio announcer and imagined what he or she
looked like, only later to see a photograph of the announcer that drastically al-
tered your mental image? Vocal cues play an important part in creating the im-
pression we have of a speaker. Based on vocal cues alone, you make inferences
about a person’s age, status, occupation, ethnic origin, income, and a variety of
other matters.
As a public speaker, your voice is one of the most important delivery tools
you have as a public speaker for conveying your ideas to your audience. Your
credibility as a speaker and your ability to communicate your ideas clearly to your
listeners will in large part depend on your vocal delivery. Vocal delivery includes
pitch, speech rate, volume, pronunciation, articulation, pauses, and general varia-
tion of the voice. A speaker has at least two key vocal obligations to an audience:
Speak to be understood, and speak with vocal variety to maintain interest.
sPeAk to be uNderstood To be understood, you need to consider four
aspects of vocal delivery: volume, articulation, dialect, and pronunciation.
volume The fundamental purpose of your vocal delivery is to speak loudly
enough that your audience can hear you. The volume of your speech is deter-
mined by the amount of air you project through your larynx, or voice box. More
air equals more volume of sound. In fact, the way you breathe has more impact
on the sound of your voice than almost anything else does. To ancient orators, a
person’s breath was the source of spiritual power. To breathe is to be filled with a
positive, powerful source of energy.
To breathe properly, you need to understand how to use your breathing mus-
cles. Your diaphragm, a muscle in your upper abdomen, helps to control sound