The fourth component of public speaking

Public speaking involves three components:

The logical component, which deals with the content of your speech. This component addresses issues like structure, facts and statistics, how many points you will cover, and so on.
The mechanical component, which is the “showbiz part” of your speech. It addresses issues such as visual aids, props, and nonverbal communication.
The emotional component addresses how the audience will feel during and after your speech.

These three components, taken together, cover more than 95% of your needs when you deliver a speech. But there is an extra 5% which does not necessarily fit any one category.

That extra 5% can be the difference between giving a great speech and giving an outstanding speech. When that 5% is present, most people will not notice. In fact, only trained professionals are likely to notice and appreciate the efforts you make to deliver a technically sound presentation.

To the untrained eye, that 5% only rears its head when it is painfully obvious that the speaker has not dealt with it adequately. That 5% is what I call the technical component.

The technical component comprises all of the small and minute details that professional speakers go to great lengths to control. Although they know that no one will notice when they do it right, they know people will notice when they do it wrong. There are many different aspects to the technical component but I will address three only.

The microphone: whenever you address medium-sized or large audiences, you will be required to use a microphone. The microphone can be your best friend or your worst enemy: it all depends on whether you know how to tame it or not.

There are many types of microphones: the handheld, the lavalier, the headset, the lectern, and so on. The two most common microphones are the handheld and the lavalier, that you attach to a jacket or shirt. Most of the time, you will be working with wireless microphones, but once in a while you may have to deal with a wired microphone.

Whenever you can, choose to work with a lavalier instead of a handheld mic. Lavalier microphones are usually less of a hassle, unless you're wearing clothes that don't allow you to attach the transmitter. Otherwise, you simply attach it, turn it on, and speak normally. The microphone is sensitive enough to pick up your voice.

The handheld mic is more difficult to master, because its use is unnatural for most of us. If you ever need to deal with a handheld mic, use it as close to your mouth as possible and hold it almost parallel to the ground. When you turn your head, remember to move the mic along, otherwise it sounds as though you are moving farther away from the audience.

If you learn to manipulate it well enough, you can have a lot of fun with a handheld microphone. For example, you can cover it with your hands, move very close to it, and imitate Darth Vader, or a heartbeat. Since many audiences have seen inexperienced speakers fumble with hand-held microphones, when you use it properly it projects greater confidence.

With any microphone, take the time to walk around the room in order to discover the hotspots, which are liable to generate feedback into speakers. When you locate them, remember those spots and walk around them during your speech. Your audiences will be grateful!
Logistics: logistics have to do with the way you set up your room. In many instances, you have no control. You are given a room with a big table in the middle, very little space to work with, and you just make do as best you can. But in other instances, you do have control and there are some setups that are more effective than others. Here are two tips to remember.

Set yourself up as close to the audience as you can. The closer you are, the better the contact. However, don't get too close to the people in the first row if it is going to prevent people in the back from seeing you properly. If you can, always have some sort of elevated platform to ensure that everyone around the room can see you.

Don't leave an empty aisle in the middle of the room. This is often the setup that you will be given when presenting in front of a room where there are no tables. For some reason, half of the chairs are on the left side of the room, the other half on the right side, and there is a long, empty aisle between them. With such a setup, all of your energy disappears into nothingness. When you speak to the audience, there is no contact because most of the time you'll be speaking from the middle of the room. Your voice, will go down the empty aisle and all the energy it contains will dissipate. Instead, make sure the centre of the room always contains chairs. If you absolutely need to have aisles for people to move around, put them on the left side and the right side of the room, not in the middle.
The screen: if you are using PowerPoint, as many people do, avoid putting the screen in the middle of the room, behind you. Once again, this has to do with positioning on the stage as you're speaking to the audience. The strongest position of any stage is centre stage.

If you put a screen in the middle of the room, and you stand between the projector and the screen, you will never be able to stand in your position of power without having the projector illuminating your face. It looks awkward, and it makes the audience look at you funny. Furthermore, you will have a tendency to stay on one side or the other side of the projector, in order to avoid that situation. In other words, you will avoid your position of power because of the PowerPoint slide. There are a few ways to address this.

Put the screen in one of the corners, and project the image at an angle. If the screen is positioned properly, everyone in the room will still be able to read the content. When the screen is in the corner, though, it liberates centerstage and allows you to be in your position of power, without getting in the way of the projector.

If you can not put the screen in a corner, and you are stuck using it in the middle of the room, you can always temporarily hide the image of your PowerPoint slides by pressing the “B” key on the keyboard, or the blank key on your projector's remote control.

As you can see, not addressing these details in your presentations will not completely diminish your effectiveness. Many people will not notice these small elements, either because they are not aware of how it could be done better, or because they've seen it so often that they tune it out.

But if your goal is to project the best image, to be the most effective, and to be the most polished speaker you can be, then you don't have a choice: you must sweat the small stuff.