I’ve been watching a lot of presentations lately and so I’ve been thinking about the relationship between content and delivery. Up until now I have tended to think that content is more important in putting together an effective presentation than delivery. (Admittedly, we’d like to have both excellent content and a strong delivery, but that goes without saying). To be more specific, I have always felt as if the way to improve a mediocre presentation is to work on the content, to make it more engaging, more focused and more audience-appropriate. Focusing on content seems, in most cases, to take care of problems with delivery because most delivery problems, in my view, have to do with the presenter’s inexperience with or disconnect from the material. If the presenter really knows his material, has worked hard to package or frame it in an interesting and exciting way and has addressed that content to the needs of the audience, then the presenter will have gained some confidence about the material itself and hopefully, also a strong desire to share his or her material with the audience. That strong desire to share the material, wanting to talk to people about something, to connect with the audience, seems to alleviate many delivery problems. In addition, minor delivery problems don’t bother me as much if the content of the presentation is logical, dynamic and engaging.
Maybe I feel this way because it seems easier to help a speaker improve her content than her delivery. Of course, we can address the obvious things like eye contact and developing rapport, but somehow I find that those things are hard to teach because they seem like natural outcomes of a person’s strong desire to share ideas. (Extreme nervousness is a different issue, one which seems like it needs to be overcome in the realm of psychology rather than rhetoric. But even that can be alleviated by making presentations routine—it becomes easier to face an audience when we do it every day and when we know our stuff).
However, I’ve had several occasions to rethink this lately. I’ve seen several presentations which were very dynamic in the delivery, but only mediocre in content—not very logical or consistent, for example. (Maybe I’ve been listening to too much talk radio; or too much of Alberto Gonzalez’s recent testimony on Capitol Hill.) But that lack of logical content in many cases (not all, I know) seems easily overshadowed by powerful or a very smooth delivery. Clearly, many others have noticed and commented on this but in some less public cases I seemed to be only one of few to notice. If so, what does that mean? I’ve heard the statistics that say the most important part of a presentation is not what we say, but how we say it and I don’t want to believe it, that appearance, the way a person looks and sounds is more important than what she says. But fear I may be in the minority here. Is this the dreaded Curse of Knowledge at work?
In my personal view, I beleived that the delivery is more important than the content. Some of the presenter might not have a choice of the content that they have to deliver. He/She need to make that content more appealing to the audiences by delivery or presenting techniques/skills. For me, I think it’s very intereting.
I would like to give you one example about the why delivery make a better presentation. Do you recall Tammy presentation about Taipe 101 ? I watched this presentaion before from my Effective Communication class. One Taipe student, he present under the same topic and it didn’t get me attention. Tammy did it very well, i have to admit. Her delivery is very powerful and passionate. I think this is good example to say that delivery is more important than contents( in case that presenter can not choose the contents).
At last, I would like say that both of them are very important. If the presenter can pick or choose the contents that direct to their target audience as well as hold a strong the deliver skills. It will make a great presentation.
First of all, both content and delivery have a direct relationship. in order top maintain the level of professionalism, everyone should rich a certain expertise in both of them. Content is all the ingredient to cook your meal, and delivery is the way you are going to present it in the table.
Thus, delivery will show how efficiently your master your topic and how could you are in terms of presenting the data. Indeed, content will show the high level of accuracy and how clear is it to convince your audience.
To sum up, content is the engine and delivery is the fuel needed to drive the required distance.
I have seen many presentation, which has good contents, but failure to deliver the content to audiences. I can not say the name, but you should be able to notice from a presentation about “How to develop good resumes?” at Tyson Amp at JWU Harborside on Tuesday April 24, 2007. He was really bad in delivery content. Half of the room didn’t even care what he had said. He was full of energy and knowledge to teach us, but he did not do anything to “engage” audiences at all. The result in professional education world was as good as it should be. Why? Because audiences are students just want to keep the professionality of education, so they pretend they like the presentation!!!
Look at some politician, do they really have good content? or just “what they try to make us beleive”. For me, it is the last one. Some politicians can success in theirs careers, some are not? Why? That’s because they can not make people listen to them!! There was one time, I gave a presentation at Bangkok Bank in Thailand. One executive came to see me after the presentation, and he said he sure I could be a good politician because I talk and pople listen!! How about my content? Did I have a good content? I don’t think so! However, I can delivery some engaging to audiences anyway.
Anyway, content should be “King”, and delivery should be “Queen”. They have to come together, show up to people together. That’s how people say, good presentation.
This is a very interesting idea to think about. It is true that we always have to look at the content first and then see how to present the data. I think what that person watching the presentation in the audience wants is something catchy, which will make him/her be interested and glued to the speaker. This is where the WIIFY comes in, and that is what we should most consider when planning the presentation.
On the other hand, we should also ensure that we have the right tactics of delivery. Well, some of it like confidence becomes better with experience, but there are things we can try to work on like the visual aids we use and also the physical appearance to match the topic we have.
In conclusin, I would like to say that both planning and delivery are important, but in the end it all depends on who our audience is and how we plan to get them to listen to us.
I think this could defiantly be a curse of knowledge on the authors end. While content is important it is not the most important aspect of a presentation. I feel that a good presentation depends on the audience, the speaker and the content. The significance of each may shift in different situations/topics. For instance, if the speaker is not well known to his or her audience, their appearance and the way they present themselves might be a driving factor in the establishment of credibility, than knowledge of the topic (content) might follow. While, I do agree that content is important in presentations, I feel that proper understanding of content comes from the speakers delivery tactics, so they work hand in hand. I think that we should all strongly consider the quality and organization of our content as well as emphasize on our delivery. This in turn will allow the importance of our content to be strongly expressed in our delivery.
Content vs Delivery
I personally think that presentation is like verbal competition. When you had prepare a good content to present. People will start to picky or I should say pay attention the way how you delivery your presentation to the audience. Therefore, balance is important. Obviously, a good speaker or presenter is able to hide he or she weak sides. Think about some good speaker that you had listened or met before. Don’t you feel that they had balance content and delivery?
I like the way of Addessamad Gada explained. It is true that they both are depend on each others to become success. And, Sonni, you gave a very good example to allow me to understand the content and delivery power. Thanks.
I believe that this is one of those topic that can be debated any way around. One could say Delivery is important, another could say content is important, and still many could say both of them are important, in order to make the presentation an effective one. This is mainly because, from time to time, people have proved all these categories to seem very powerful and convincing, regardless of any shortcomings.
However, I strongly contend that its all about the right kind of audience for one’s presentation.
For instance, let’s talk about the Presentation on Global Warming, that we watched during our class session. I personally liked it but I don’t think it will impact the audience in my neighborhood, the same way.
Hence, I would say, its all about the Audience. If the presentation is appealing to the audience for whatever reason, that’s the effective presentation.
I’ve been thinking about the issue seeing many presentations these times also. Both of factors are important, of course, I think contents are still more important.
Thinking the purpose and aim of the presentation, the purpose should be delivering the contents. Organized structure of content, logics, WIFFY, relevancy between the audience and content are all about contents to grasp the audience’s attention and make them listen and engage.
Delivery such as eye contact, PowerPoint techniques, appearance, voice tone, is certainly important to highlight the presentation, but it is secondary issue. Even though we cannot ignore the role of ‘delivery’, because it is true that well-delivered presentation covers much weakness of contents, I believe delivery is only tool to support to make the content obvious.
Personally, I believe that both content and delivery are equally important in a presentation. If one of them is poor, it will have a direct impact on the presentation. Therefore, this latter will not be successful.
Many people have an excellent content, but in the absence of communication skills, they fail to deliver their message. Therefore, I see that the presenter should care about both content and the way to present it to the audience.
At the same time, I agree with Dr Sisco about the point that if the presenter is mastering his/her topic, there will be no difficulties in the delivery.
The relationship between content and delivery, hmmm…although it certainly is critical to have a grasp of the content, but it helps to be an effective speaker when you can automatically project the content successfully through the delivery by having a passion for the subject. This will be evident in the delivery. But I think you can go further than content, delivery and passion.
Personally, after being in the class for the last several weeks, I find it very difficult to pull it all together be it the content or delivery or passion. I have trouble with the WOW factor, which highly effective presentations need. I believe that to speak with authority, passion and credibility you have to approach it as more of an art than a science. On the contrary, when your using PowerPoint or any other technical program you have to know how to use it to raise that level of effectivess by bringing out the artistic element.
I totally agree with Professor Sisco that engaging the audience, giving the presentation more focus and making it more audience-appropriate kicks it up a notch. Yes, the more you speak- it becomes easier and if you know the subject.
Looking the part in a professional presentation is an important component but it is secondary to content and delivery. It should be the whole package with content and delivery executed passionately. Yes, there are plenty of speakers who claim to be believers in their subject and have great delivery at making us think they are passionate. They have all the bells and whistles it takes to give a dynamic speech, but you can see right through their veneer.
After I finished reading. I started to think: it is a really tricky about how to figure out what is important, content or delivery? When someone did the presentation, audiences are the people to make a decision for if trusted or interested in what a presentner or speaker said.
Sometimes I even think it doesn’t matter about what the way that presentner shows, doesn’t matter about if the presentner shows how much confidence, most time I feel its depends on audience “ego”. Therefore, I always feel confused and upset about how to get balance between the content and delivery.
In point of view, I think the reason that we can’t hide the fear is because we have no idea about what consequence of presentation going to be, because we think too much, or because we try to give ourselves pressure. I really agree with Sky&Sea that audiences are picky, and that’s the reason why I had presented so many time but still feel nervous, because I can’t understand what they really want.
Somehow I feel that both are equally important and we need both of them for an effective presentation..
The knowldege I got from reading was very clear – one needs matters and manners in a presentation.
After reading all the comments and the article, I think
Without content, one cannot do a presentation – for example the informative presentation I did for the first time.. one cannot expect anyone to take interest where you do not have the content.
On the other hand, if you have something very interesting or surprising thing to be presented – even if you are not confident, the interest of the audience will help u gain confidence.
in short,
Though I strongly believe we need both manners and matters, if I have to select one, it would be matters (specific and clear).
In my opinion, the effective presentation comes from both content and delivery.
I know that good delivery can make the presenters gain more attention from their target audiences. But the thing is after the presenters finish their presentations, they won’t leave anything in the mind of the audiences if the content has no benefit at all for the listeners. I once heard that good content gives the information memorable !!
Also, if the speakers have good and useful information but they have no abilities to deliver it in effective way, the presentations cannot gain any attention from the audiences as well. And it is like the speakers waste their time in speaking and telling the stories.
Honestly, I really like the way Prof.Sisco teaches us in the class. Normally, when I have to sit in the long class, I feel so bored. But I don’t feel like that in Prof.Sisco’s class because Prof. teaches us with high quality content and very effective manners such as eye contact and very clear tone of voice. Those can gain more attention from the students.
In order to get a successful presentation, The delivery method must go hand in hand with the content. Both these elements are considered to be the two pages of the same piece of paper. We cannot shred page 1 without shredding page 2. However, the delivery approach seems to be the key element. In other words, if we have 2 speakers presenting the same/exact content; there will certainly be different levels of audience engagement simply because each presenter uses different ingredients in the delivery process. Among the factors that can govern the success of a good delivery process is the simple voice tone for instance.
I agree with Lynn, there is a possibility of having a fear of not knowing what the outcome of the presentation is. But I have also noticed something else, especially after watching the last two presentations we had in class.
Most of the people who had so much fear in their first presentation had so much more courage in the other two. The first presentation, we didn’t have guidance from our instructors, but in the second and third we got an idea of what we are to concentrate on to improve our audience focus and establish clearer goals.
This made our presentations better by far.
In this case, since we won’t always have somebody to guide us when we go out to the world, I think it is important to critically look at what we want to say, establish it, and plan our presentation to be able to say exactly that and not waver from our focus.
I think both of them are so important to make an effective presentation!!
If we choose the content that not engage audience’s attention, they won’t care much and can’t recognize it. However, delivery is one of the factors to make audience care.
For example, I really like Amy’s presentation. Even I never have any idea about how to loose weight or not even care!.When I was listening her presentation, I thought that she could catch all attentions from everyone. I like the way she presented and recommended us how to do. She had stong content, her passion and also she had several good techiques in delevery. Audiences believed in her credibility and tried on her recipe.
In my opinion, i think content is more important because because of the topic and its contect can lead audience to pay attention and listen to the speaker, i think if audiences have chance to choose which speaker they will listen, topic will be the first thing they will look for.
For the deliver part, it helps support the topic and content. it can help catch audiences attention and may be involve them to the topic.
But if there is same topic, now it up to the delivery process that with audiences can deliver it effectively. Different speakers have different style of dilivery and ways to organize their content.
When I confused about what is more important- content or delivery, for a presentation, many people think both of them are factors to make a successful speech; and also gave some opinion about how to make content and delivery work together. Therefore, I started to rethink, if content is more important than delivery, does that mean it has to involve with the experience and emotion to try to make people think about it? Or believe in whatever we said? Also, if content cannot make an efficiency consequence, does is mean that we cannot reach the goal of delivery?
Actually I still feel so confused, because the world is change, the way of people thinking is changing, too. I agree with Evelyn that we have to think about what we want to say very carefully, because there is not always someone can guide us in the future.
How to delivery a good presentation? This question always been in my mind. Actually, I found out the answer from this artical. The writer wrote about “eye contact and developing rapport, but somehow I find that those things are hard to teach because they seem like natural outcomes of a person’s strong desine to share idears.” I complete agree this point.
For example,most of time, when i doing my presentation, I always don’t know where should I look at, or where should I pay attention to. This is really hard to learn. However, I fould the idea for my self to act like good presentater. That is, I took my contact leness before my presentation. So, I couldn’t see anyone very well in my presentation. Maybe this is really bad, but for me, it helps me keep scared, and nervous away. Also, I can delivery good information as much as I like.
Everyone should find the idea for themself to keep scared, and nervous away. Than is the time to delivery good presentation to everyone.
I have to say that they both work hand in hand. You really have to have both. The content is important, but if your delivery is not strong it really doesn’t matter what your were looking to say. I feel you have to make sure as a presenter you have to make sure you are able to deliver the content very well and make sure the centent makes sense.
In the technology world the content is normally boring information with a dry presentation. Most of the time people are stuck giving the standard company slide format with many bullets of information. It is the same presentation over and over again. The content should be directed to the audience; also it is important for the person giving the presentation to know the information inside and out. Having the knowledge of the information will help build confidence in the delivery. It seems both are equally important but sometimes the information is so powerful that the delivery does not matter as much. On the other hand it would be nice to have a boring technology presentation have a great delivery.
well , i think that the delivery is more important than the content . if you don’t make the audience care then they would’nt pay attention to the content . sometimes , the content is very interesting but the presenter is so boring and doesn’t makes his audience want to listen to his speech. when i did my presentation about islam , it has scored poor because i didn’t make my audience care. the topic was very interesting and my audience through the feedback session said that i was short and i was complex in giving my presentation. so, i have learned that it’s not the content that matters most but it’s the way you deliver it.