Nursing Your Voice When You’re Under the Weather

It’s the time of year when cold and flu season is in full swing. That means sore throats, painful coughs, stuffy noses and scratchy voices. Clearly, not the best situation when you’re about to give a big presentation or speech. So, to get your voice in gear when winter illness tries to put on the breaks, try these few suggestions:

Hum or sing in the shower to get your vocal folds vibrating.

Try not to clear your throat. It actually harms more than it helps.

Take cough medicine, such as Robitussin if you are coughing.

Don’t eat or drink fatty foods such as cream cheese on a bagel or a chicken salad sandwich before your event. Eat a bagel with jelly, turkey sandwich with mustard and decaffeinated tea or coffee with non-dairy creamer instead.

Request a microphone if it’s a large group instead of pushing to project your voice.

Don’t even think of smoking a pipe or cigarettes!

If your voice stays hoarse for more than 2 weeks, consult an Otolaryngologist (Ear Nose and Throat Doctor).

Susan Miller, Ph.D. is a voice coach with The Communication Center®.
Contact her at www.voicetrainer.com with thoughts or questions.

The Voice of Reason

While the media reports on what “he says” –“she says”, how left and right sides disagree and what the pros and cons are -- one tactic to take is to remain the voice of reason; measured, calming and trustworthy. Though the media believes it provides balance on issues by finding opposing and sometimes extreme views, as a spokesperson you can defy being pushed into a corner and hold to your position with confidence and authority.


Tips for Maintaining Balance:
Body Language
Your body, face and voice will highly influence how confrontational you appear, or conversely, how reasonable. As the voice of reason, support your message with: an animated, yet unhurried vocal pace; an energetic, yet empathetic face and body language that reads as reassuring.

The Message
Choose your words carefully to reflect the tone you wish to project. You may undermine your own speech with apologies, disclaimers or space-fillers. Or, you may overreact with hyperbole and accusations. Hold the middle ground with phrases you’ve already tested on others ears.

Who’s the Real Audience?
Address the media issue or topic and not the emotion presented by the reporter or victim. Spokespeople often get railroaded down a track they hadn’t planned on by the sheer force of the reporter’s personality. Look under the personality, the emotion grabbing inferences and speak directly to the audience with concern and respect.

Shelley Sims is an Executive Coach with The Communication Center®.

Too much information or TMI, it's often the main culprit of long-winded presentations and PowerPoint shows that keep going and going. TMI is especially true for data and numbers. Numbers can be a powerful tool when used in a presentation, but often they are misused, overused or abused. Complex charts and unintelligible graphs can make your presentation seem more like a lesson for a college calculus class. So, ditch the tables and regressions and consider these techniques recommended by Rob Friedman, Senior Writer and a speech writer for Eli Lilly.

Compare numbers to give them context
A speaker makes a compelling argument that the costs to insurers of asbestos legislation are outrageous by comparing them to the costs of recent disasters:

• The California Northridge earthquake, which devastated much of the Los Angeles area, cost insurers $17 billion
• Hurricane Andrew, which ravaged the Southeast, cost insurers $21 billion
• Asbestos litigation will cost insurers alone $130 billion. Total cost for insurers and defendant corporations could reach as high as $200 billion. Where will those billions come from?

Through comparison you can sometimes make a statistical point without using numbers at all.

• Jesse Jackson says that a year in prison costs more than a year at Harvard.
• Women watch more sports shows and buy more tires than men.

Make it human
Distill a big number so your audience members understand what it means. For example – “It is estimated that 425,000 Americans die prematurely every year due to tobacco. That’s the equivalent of three fully loaded 747s crashing with no survivors every day, 365 days a year.”

A calculator is a great tool. Take the yearly number and divide it by 365. You get the number who die each day: 1164. Divide by another 24 to get the number who die each hour: 48. If you are giving a speech on the dangers of tobacco use to 100 people, you could ask half the audience to stand up. That’s how many people die prematurely from tobacco use in the US every hour.

Because you’ve cut down a big number into something everyone can grasp it has more impact. Notice the number is rounded. 1200 is an easier number to grasp for a listener than 1164.

Look for a startling stat: a statistic so dramatic it’s unforgettable

• Every three hours a McDonald’s opens somewhere on Earth. (From Tom Friedman’s Lexus and the Olive Tree)
• Losses for the U.S. airlines during their current slump – which began before 9/11 – have wiped out all the profits the industry has earned since 1945.

Bottom-line, always ask yourself if there is a better way to illustrate the data and statistics you’re presenting. Keep it simple and make it memorable. By boiling down the numbers, you make them understandable and your presentation will have greater impact.

Examples by Rob Friedman given with permission and adapted from his speech at the 2005 Ragan Speechwriter’s Conference; http://www.ragan.com

Next time you’re browsing through the newspaper, be on the look-out for quotes with negative emotionally- charged words, otherwise known as buzzwords. Check out our latest findings.

"Jack was sort of like a drug dealer. He’d give [DeLay’s staffers} a little taste and get them hooked."

-- Former GOP leadership aide, on Jack Abramoff’s style of bribing.

“This is not a widespread scandal. Our government is not corrupt, lobbyists are not bribing people, and members of Congress are not being bought for campaign contributions.”

--Paul Miller, president of the American League of Lobbyists, commenting on the Jack Abramoff controversy.

“It’s not anything sinister or malicious,”

-- Harry You, CEO of Bearing Point, explaining that poor training of employees on a new financial system is responsible for still overdue corporate financial results.

Camilla Carr is an award-winning journalist, international media consultant and media trainer. An Emmy nominee, Camilla began her career nearly 20 years ago as a local reporter and anchor for ABC and NBC affiliates in Maryland and Connecticut. There, she generated, wrote, and produced stories covering educational, medical, political and social issues.

On March 1, 2006 The Communication Center® finally retired susanpeterson.com. Please make sure to send all correspondence using @thecommunicationcenter.com.

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