Presentation delivery techniques and best practices

¶ … share several common characteristics or attributes. Of these several presentations, two that are the most memorable were delivered by Steve Jobs and J.K. Rowling. The first is the Steve Jobs' Commencement Speech, 2005 and the second is J.K. Rowling Speaks at Harvard Commencement, both of which are powerfully moving in the candor and honesty the speakers rely on to make the key messages resonate.

Analysis of Best Speeches

Both of these speeches and others that are comparable in quality rely on stories to bring the listener into the speech, getting them to identify with the key messages, points and lessons learned. These speakers drop the public persona and show who they really are, including their vulnerabilities, doubt, pain and confusion, which makes them inherently more believable than speakers who portray themselves as perfect. Both Steve Jobs and J.K. Rowling tell compelling stories of how they faced down defeat, rejection and in Mr. Job's case, cancer, to still attain their goals. They both show through stories that they doubted themselves and had challenges in mustering the courage to pursue their life's goals and dreams too. Yet in that doubt both also show that they both show unshakeable conviction that they mad to pursue their own unique direction, and that compromising on that would have been unthinkable. This makes both presenters complex as people and fascinating to listen to as they tell their stories of navigating through so many challenges to attain their goals.

The delivery style of the speeches are both heavily reliant on personal stories, which also differentiates them from many others who use 3rd party, often abstract stories. What also makes this presentation style so effective is that the presenter's passions are very evident in how they speak about facing challenges and overcoming them to attain their goals. As these two presenters speak of their stories and challenges, they provide a glimpse into how they chose a particularly challenging, difficult path out of problems that leads to greater introspection. J.K. Rowling speaks of the indignity of being very poor while working at Amnesty International and Steve Jobs talks about how he was given up for adoption and the adoption papers were nearly not signed. The next step he leaves the audience pondering is whether he would have ended up in an orphanage as an infant. These two circumstances would have crushed lesser people who did not resolve to attain their goals and stay focused on transforming their visions and dreams into reality.

Both of these presenters also move away from being overtly positive or self-congratulatory in how they describe their accomplishments. Rather, they both show how failure stripped away all non-essential aspects of their lives so they could concentrate on what mattered most to them. This was a very liberating aspect of the J.K. Rowling presentation. Steve Jobs uses the sober reality of cancer to make the same point. This is an advanced approach to making a presentation; they are both relying on the paradox of defeat to show how success comes out of the focus and discipline it requires. These are very powerful techniques in public speaking and presentations because both of these celebrities aren't afraid to admit so publically how far they fell in their lives before experiencing exceptional success. In doing this they make their presentations resonate with an exceptionally high level of trust and transparency. Combining this with the humility these globally-known celebrities have, they deliver two of the world's most known speeches.

Insights for Personal Presentation Style