Is your voice a secret saboteur?
The disconnect between appearance and reality
She looked the part for the role she'd undertaken, leader.
Her bearing and clothing choices underlined it. Everything about the preparation of the room for the meeting confirmed it. And then she opened her mouth.
What happened next was confusing. Her voice didn't align with initial impressions. While they cumulatively said competent and professional, the voice said, 'little girl'.
Unfortunately, this woman's voice was breathy and high. Her delivery: pitch, tone, pace, articulation and inflections, stripped credibility from her content, (which was good), making it so much harder to take her seriously. With every word she spoke, she was self-sabotaging without realizing it.
If you are in any form of leadership/communication role, or aspire to be, please analyze your vocal habits. Do they actively support you or do they undermine what you're wanting to achieve?
This is important. Your personal presentation needs congruency to create the positive impression you want. Sometimes we are the last to know the truth about how others perceive us.
If you find it hard to be objective about your voice, get some help. Summon up the courage and ask someone whose opinion you trust, whom you know will understand the reason behind your question and, has the voice qualities you desire.
Unlike lots of things about ourselves, for instance, how tall we are or our shoe size, a voice can be changed.
For a little more on the subject open the link: vocal image secrets. You'll find a handy checklist plus suggestions to align purpose, or intention, with presentation.
PS. If you found this beneficial, feel free to share it and click the ❤️ button so more people can discover it on Substack. 🙏Thank you.
PPS. As I said last week, and I’ll say next, if you have ideas for topics you’d like to see covered in this newsletter, or if you’d like to share an article on some aspect of public speaking, or a speech of your own, please get in touch. Either reply to this email or contact me through the form on my about me page on my website. I’d love to hear from you!