Tag Archives: Public Speaking

StoryFinding Workshop

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Yes, okay! Storytelling is important! You get it! But how do you FIND the stories to tell—the stories that will elevate your message—and how do you share them for the greatest impact? Can we guarantee that after this workshop you’ll elevate your presentations and be a more engaging conversationalist? Actually, ya, pretty much.

This is for you if you’re interested in: 

Strategies to find your stories 

How to know if you have a good story

The best way to make your story better

Bonus: 45 minute 1-1 coaching session to be scheduled within the next 4 weeks (value $250)

Click here to learn more about Adele and Mary.

To find out when the next StoryFinding workshop is, contact maryhoule@pronounced.ca

Kamala Harris: how about we just let her talk

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The morning after the Vice-Presidential debates, “I’m speaking” is trending and for obvious reasons. (Along with memes about the fly, but that’s not covered here.)

Women across twitter are celebrating Kamala Harris’ reaction to being interrupted. Because we have all been there. “This is unfortunately the reality for many professional women.”

Regardless of who won or lost that debate (except that obviously she won), I’m interested in how I felt when Kamala demanded her right to keep speaking. Sure, part of me celebrated it. I admired her gumption, her assertiveness, but there was something else.

Once interrupted, Kamala Harris has two choices. She can either be the demure, accommodating woman everyone is comfortable with: the one who smooths things over, doesn’t ruffle feathers, keeps it all positive and civil. She can let Pence take over the conversation and have his say, even though it’s her time. She can be that peace-loving, non-confrontational woman who is rewarded by society.

Or she can assert herself and gain the floor back.

Those are her only two choices. Because he interrupted her. A lot.

Well, Kamala Harris did not find herself in that chair last night by letting those around her take away her time. Would she prefer to simply be able to keep talking to make her point? Yes, of course. But Mike Pence took that option away from her at twice the rate it was done to him.

So she had to gain the floor back from him twice as often. She had to assert herself just to finish her point twice as often as he did. Having to ask for your turn doesn’t really look good on anyone. Think about it. “It’s MY turn!” may be necessary to regain the floor but it may come across negatively, even if our logical brain knows she’s doing what needs to be done. We can use our slow brain to see that she is just being assertive, that Kamala Harris is doing what she has to do to make her point, but our fast brain might judge. Mine did, even though I know better.

The Cost of Interruptions

Every conversation is going to have overlaps. Turn-taking is never perfect, and some of the best exchanges happen in those overlaps. But an imbalance in interruptions creates an impression, because interruptions have a cost. One cost to being interrupted is that regaining your turn could make you look rude or weak—man or woman. If you have to overtly request talking time, it explicitly points out that you have not been afforded respect. You have to tell your partner not to interrupt you, or assert “I’m speaking”. Even if our logical mind can appreciate that it was necessary, and even celebrate it, it’s not really a good look, no matter who you are. I once tried to instruct a group of women on how to graciously counter interruptions. It was a bit of a flop because it’s really an impossible task. “Let me finish”, “I’m speaking”, “It’s my turn,” are always going to leave a bit of a bad taste no matter how justified you are. It’s a reprimand and it highlights the fact that you weren’t respected. But if you’re continually interrupted, it has to be done. That’s the cost of regaining the floor and it’s worth it. Otherwise, you have no voice.

There are even more costs. Interruptions also take a speaker out of the game for a second. Whatever point you were in the middle of making, you have to momentarily abandon to deal with the meta-conversational task of gaining back the floor. On top of that you have to manage any emotion that might have surfaced after being interrupted, especially if you’re a woman of colour. In this debate, Kamala has to push that emotion down or risk looking—oh I don’t know—all that. Once regaining the floor, she then has to re-enter her initial thought that was interrupted. She has lost the flow, and the strength of her point will be greatly diminished, if she manages to find it again at all. And I think last night sometimes she didn’t. It was still a masterful performance, but imagine if she didn’t have to spend all those words defending her time.

The costs of interruptions are great. And Kamala Harris had to pay twice as much as Pence did.

If simply being the accomplished person that she is on the stage where she has earned a seat doesn’t afford her Mike Pence’s respect, then it’s either time to cut the other microphone when each speaker takes their turn, or for the moderator to step in and give Kamala Harris her time back, without her having to ask. (Update: that’s exactly what they did for the subsequent presidential debate.) We can argue about whether her demanding her turn is rude or assertive, but I say why does she have to demand it at all? Why should she be even be put in that position twice as often as her debating partner?

Kamala Harris obviously has lots of practice being assertive, but I suspect she would have preferred not to have had to muster those skills during the debate. She didn’t want to have to defend her time. She had a lot of other stuff to say. Important things. But she had no choice.

Mike Pence did that.

It happens to women too often, and we need to stop letting that fly. If a woman is speaking at the table—or in a Zoom room—how about next time just button it for half a minute and let a girl finish?

And when you see someone who isn’t getting her turn, don’t just stand by and watch. Step in on her behalf.

“Excuse me, she’s speaking” never looked bad on anyone.

In Defence of Speaking Moistly

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By now you’ve heard Justin Trudeau’s verbal stumble. They’ve even autotuned a catchy music video to celebrate it.

“Speaking moistly……oh what a terrible image.”
I laugh every time. A legit, out-loud laugh. Every time.

But it’s a kind laugh.
It’s a laugh full of empathy and humanity and, in fact, respect.

This guy has been speaking live to a national audience every day for almost thirty days. I suppose it gets easier, but still it must be a bit terrifying.

He must on some level think,
What if I don’t know the answers to their questions?
What if my mind just goes blank?
What if I say something embarrassing? Like ‘speaking moistly’?

His instant recognition of the ridiculousness of it is a gem of pure honesty. It gives us a little insight into his character. All of his prepared words don’t do that. His prepared words are necessary and important and are easing the worries of this country. But this moment shows us a little about the guy behind the mask curtain.

Well, ladies and gentlemen. Here it is.
This is what it looks like when your biggest public speaking fears come true.
And look, he’s still alive, he’ll be back out there today and quite frankly he seems even more human than he did yesterday.

Sure we’re laughing at his expense, but the underlying respect is still there.
As I’ve said before, the payoff to speaking genuinely is well worth the cost.
Be prepared, but don’t be afraid to show people your character.

So what’s holding you back from getting your message out there?
Prepare. Then do it.
Be clear. Be yourself. Be heard.

Don’t let your fears keep you from sharing what you’ve got with this world. Someone out there needs it.

I mean, come on.
“Speaking moistly.”
Again, out loud. Every single time.

Mean what you say…

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Disconnected.

For politicians, it’s a minefield out there, and speaking off the cuff is full of potential pitfalls. But playing it safe and reading exclusively from a script can be damaging too.

In this public statement, Trudeau did something he rarely does; he mentioned his late father. The pundits say it was a mistake. I say, “More of that, please.”

After politicians speak, journalists transcribe the words and decipher their meaning and dissect the legalities and the implications. But let’s be honest. The average Canadian pays much less attention to those details. From a content perspective they are mostly just hearing the messages that confirm what they already believe.

In my logical left brain, I agree that talking about his father seems like a bad idea politically. But personally and emotionally, that was the one part of his address that I actually felt –how to put it– I actually felt he was really SAYING something. With some frank honesty. It was the one part of his speech where he wasn’t being a teacher reading to us from the front of the class.

Connected.

It seems that he’s really talking to us, that he really means what he is saying. It’s not perfect. But I believe him. I’d love an EEG or functional MRI to confirm it, but I suspect that at the moment he begins this part of his speech, the right side of his brain starts lighting up like fireworks. The creative, emotional centres finally get in the game.

And when these parts of a speaker’s brain get in the game, so do those of their listeners. And that’s the magic of speaking off the cuff, from the heart.

From a speech science perspective, expressing novel content spontaneously has certain characteristics: increased pause lengths between thoughts, varied intonation patterns, varied speech rates, hesitations, revisions, increased use of fillers. So sure, you could fake it by reading the words and employing these features. Or you could skip all that and just mean what you say.

It’s a leap of faith to come off the page and speak from the heart. It’s scary and risky, but the payoff is big. It connects you to your listeners and convinces them in ways that encyclopedias full of hard facts cannot.

So even if what you are saying isn’t the best writing, the most adept messaging, the smartest political move–the connection that you make with your listeners may be worth more than that. Consider Mr. Trump to the south of us. When we see his words on paper, they are often ridiculous. Hell, sometimes they are not even words. But somehow, he’s convincing a lot of people that he’s an authentic guy. This is the somehow. Although we may completely disagree, we still think he means what he says. And strangely, that counts for a lot.

So the next time you’re giving a speech or a presentation, find a story you can tell, a personal anecdote that reflects your message. (Practice telling it. Record yourself and revise as needed.) Tell your story early on so that you can come off the page and connect to your audience. It will make all the difference. Get your right brain in the game.

It’s about trust, and if we trust that you mean what you say, you may just win us over.

Outside of that, you’re just a guy reading out words in front of the class.

Hillary Clinton’s Voice

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Here’s what voice science is telling us:

1. Men are more attracted to women with higher voices.

2.We are more likely to vote for women with deeper voices.

So if sex sells, can we surmise that Hillary Clinton lost out on a few votes?  We can at least say that she was unfairly criticized because of her voice.  She was called shrill.  Screechy.  Nagging.

And when Brit Hume from Fox News said that Hillary “has a not-so-attractive voice“, we of course see that as a criticism.  But in fact I suppose he’s right.   That’s why she got elected in the first place.  If it were an attractive voice according to the studies, then it would likely be higher pitched.  High-pitched voices don’t get elected. Seems unfair, but welcome to womanhood.  Lo and behold, you can’t have it all.  When it comes to your voice, you can either be electable, or attractive.  But apparently not both.

So, when I hear Hillary Clinton at 21 years old with a whole lot of head voice (that men find attractive), I think yeah, sure, it’s nice enough to listen to, but I probably wouldn’t vote for her.  And something told Hillary the same thing.  So she changed.  She decided to become electable, consciously or not.  That’s how the voice works. We make changes as we go, usually subconsciously.  Sometimes those changes work out for the best.  Sometimes we regret them.  (Which is where I suspect vocal fry will end up in about 10 years, but I digress.)

And society changed.  In these modern times, North American society doesn’t have a lot of respect for women who speak exclusively in head voice.  Think of Melanie Griffith’s character in Working Girl.

They all thought she was sexy, but no one was going to promote her.

Here’s Hillary still in head voice in 1983

So she adapts.

Hello society, you only respect deeper voices?  All right then!  Here’s my chest voice.  I’ll use it as much as I possibly can.  Hey!  I got elected!  Well that worked out great!

Except for when they say she sounds like she’s lecturing or combative.  “You should sound softer!  Kinder!  Gentler!”

Also, Hillary got older.  That tends to happen with humans. (Crazy!)  Both aging and using chest voice lower women’s voices.  This article does a great job of explaining the science behind Hillary’s changing and adapting voice.  Kudos to the author for tracking down voice scientist Ingo Titze.  He really knows this stuff.  The good thing about lowering your voice is that it gets you elected.  But the problem is, and Ingo Titze wrote this to me in an email a few years back, the problem with women using primarily chest voice (WHICH GOT THEM ELECTED), is that  “Women will be at a disadvantage if they lower their speaking pitch to the male speaking range. The generally smaller female larynx drives less airflow, which means females will likely “press” more to increase their vocal power. This comes at a cost.”

What is the cost?  Ingo, what is the cost?!

Well, it’s that when they try to get louder, when they want to increase their vocal power, women who use chest voice tend to press their voice.  And that can make her sound Annoying! (Thank you Sonny Bunch.) Or Screechy! (Thank you Joel Achenbach.) Or like she has a Very Average Scream! (Thank you Donald Trump).  Oh hey,  speaking of the Donald, guess who else presses his voice?

Standing in front of a crowd of thousands, it’s pretty hard not to want to increase your vocal power.  Sure, there’s a microphone, but it’s thousands of people! When Hillary or Donald are in front of a crowd, they press their voices.  But very different things come up when you google Hillary Clinton Voice and Donald Trump Voice.  (That is the “sexist double standard” part of all this.)  And after years of pressing a voice, it can become more and more hoarse.  Indeed, there is a cost.

I’d like to suggest that criticizing Hillary Clinton for using her chest voice is like criticizing a giraffe for having a long neck.

Giraffe!  Sure, you can now eat leaves from the tops of trees, but come on!  It’s SO HARD for you to bend down and drink water.  The lions might get you! What were you thinking?!

And the giraffe’s all like, “Dude, I was thinking about NOT DYING OF HUNGER.”  My long neck is what helps me survive!  I didn’t really consider the water-drinking, but I guess I’ll just have to take my chances.

Yeah, but you might get eaten by LIONS!

Yeah, but I wouldn’t even BE HERE if not for my long neck.

The giraffe adapted.

The lions can only take you down if you actually exist.  But first you gotta survive.

Bottom line, maybe we need to stop criticizing the giraffe for having such a long neck.  It’s what got her this far.

Do you press your voice?  Ingo Titze has something that can help: