I wish you to see that public speaking is a perfectly normal act, which calls for no strange, artificial methods, but only for an extension and development of that most familiar act, conversation.

—James Albert Winans, Public Speaking¹

The process of putting together a speech may be challenging, but what often creates the bigger challenge for most of us is contemplating or actually getting up in front of an audience and speaking. Many communication scholars have noted that anticipating giving a speech creates as much anxiety as giving one. Added to this uneasiness is the unfounded idea that speech delivery should be formulaic, mechanical, and exaggerated—that it is, in a way, unnatural or artificial. But as the early public speaking scholar James Albert Winans noted, a speech is really just an enlarged conversation, “quite the natural thing.”

Natural, however, does not mean unplanned and unrehearsed. Each component of your speech “conversation,” from the quality of your voice to your facial expressions, gestures, and manner of dress, affects how your listeners respond to you. As audience members listen to your words, they are simultaneously reacting to you on a nonverbal level—how you look, how you sound, and how you respond to them. If your verbal and nonverbal cues violate audience members’ expectations, they will lose confidence in your credibility as a speaker.² Developing effective delivery skills is therefore a critical aspect of the speechmaking process.