Kate's Voice

7 Triggers that will Fascinate your audience. In this post, Olivia Mitchell explores Fascinate – a book by Sally Hogshead about the seven triggers that fascinate people. They are: Lust, Mystique, Alarm, Vice, Prestige, Power, and Trust. Sounds like a great book, and Olivia approaches it from the perspective of public speaking with experience and grace.  I would add that each one of these has a vocal sound, a vocal image.  Read her article, and then explore the sound of your voice as your change your intention to reflect each of these fascinating triggers.

Why speakers should use the invisible visual Denise Graveline discusses the power of invoking images as you speak.  I love that term: the invisible visual.  As always, her research is spot on, and her suggestions extremely helpful.  Yet.  there is no more powerful way to evoke the invisible visual than by using vocal expression.  Words can be beautiful, gestures powerful, and you may time the exact placement of the picture you want to evoke, but a flat delivery without variety of inflection and expression will still leave most of your audience cold.  When you paint your picture, use your voice like the color on a brush.  Vary the volume, the intensity, the pitch and the pace of your delivery.  Use emotional memory to bring feelings into the words.  When the invisible visual is vivid to you, it will be for your audience as well.

Oprah’s farewell:  The final ovation for one of the world’s most influential public speakers In this post, Angela Definis pays respectful homage to  Oprah as she exits her beloved TV show.  I love that deFinis mentions that wonderful voice of Oprah’s.  “Her warm, deep voice, her broad inviting smile, and her easy tone and cadence are engaging. She is the consummate ‘connector.’ ”  I would add to this that Oprah’s talent as a storyteller is unrivaled.  Not only does she tell stories and get others to tell stories, but her entire show was a story every time.

Please share any posts you have found lately.  What is going on out there?

So, I ‘m going to pick on the word “so.” So, it’s so common at the beginning of sentences that it doesn’t mean anything anymore.   In fact, “so” appeared on the annual Lake Superior State University list of banished words as long ago as 1999.   So, blogger Terry Odell writes of a software for authors called Autocrat that analyzes your writing.  So, this software recommends NO use of the word “so.…” at all!

So, why do we use it?  Uh, well, it’s a habit.

I am not alone in this opinion (and perhaps grammar teachers would say, “Of course!”)   Sebastian Wernicke gave a TED talk that analyzed the difference between good TED talks and bad. In his talk, he showed a list of words that appeared in each.  The number one word that appeared in bad TED talks (and is therefore a word to avoid) is “So.”

“So” isn’t the only overused word.  In February 2004, the Wall Street Journal printed an article on “The Campaign Against ‘Like’.”
The point here is that many people  begin every sentence with a transition word, otherwise called a conjunction.   Others are “but,” “and,” “well” and the non-conjunction yet overused sound, “uh.” Although the overuse of transition words is distracting and even annoying, the problem is that most are coordinating conjunctions, a specific type of word that joins words or phrases of similar importance together.  This means that when we hear “so” before every sentence, we expect that everything we hear is of equal importance.  Our minds keep adding ideas or sentences together for meaning until we can’t follow anymore.  There is simply too much information to compute.

This is exacerbated by another common occurrence, which is the overuse of open ended cadence:  ending a sentence with an open, questioning sound.  To follow someone else’s thoughts, we listen for cues in their speech.  Besides language, we listen for punctuation and emotion.  When those elements are missing, it’s too much data and not enough information.  Using “so” to connect every thought and ending each one with an open cadence is akin to reading a long string of words with no punctuation.  Eventually the listener gives up on trying to understand, or falls asleep from boredom!

How to eliminate the over use of “so” and other habitual transition words:

• Try the Nike approach: Just don’t say “so. “
• Record yourself speaking and count how many times you use the evil word.
• Have someone else keep track and charge you a dime for every unnecessary “so” “and” or “but.”
• Resist the urge to use the word and let there be silence instead.
• Think through what you really want to communicate and pick a different word for the transition, one that is more specific to the situation.  Some possibilities are: Therefore, consequently, in addition, nevertheless, and on the contrary, to name a few.