If you are nervous when speaking in public and prone to stage fright you may sound hesitant, unsure or flustered. Your voice may tremble; you may speak too quietly; or mumble and rush through your speech too quickly. Here are some tips for you, therefore, on how to sound confident when public speaking. When you sound confident the audience is more likely to take note of what you have to say.
Make your diction clear. Precise, clear diction suggests decisiveness and confidence. Therefore, put effort and energy into your diction. There are particular sounds, such as t/d/k, which, when spoken at the end of your words, need to be crisp and clear in order for you to project confidence easily. For example, practise saying "Bake the cake", with the final K sounds being crisp. When people are nervous they tend not to form their words well. In contrast, when people are confident they do tend to form their words well. So if you speak clearly you will sound confident.
Maintain your voice volume. Confident people can be heard easily. If you speak too quietly people may think you are nervous even if you aren't. Or they may think that what you say is not important. Keep your volume up. Be easy to hear. Don't be afraid of the sound of your own voice. Speak up. Sound confident. If you find it hard to project your voice then order a microphone, or go and see a speech and drama teacher to learn how to project it more easily. Whatever you do, make it easy for your audience to hear what you are saying. An audience does not want to strain to hear you. Add volume to your voice and you will add confidence to your speech.
Pause. Don't rush through your speech. Pause, and pause often. It may seem like an eternity to you but to the audience a pause can provide the time they need to absorb and take in what you are saying. The general rule is the bigger the audience the longer your pauses need to be. Confident people pause and look comfortable during the silence. Pause and the audience will think you are confident whether you are or not.
Come to a full stop/period.Instead of rushing through your speech or presentation, clearly separate out one sentence from another. Sometimes people, when they are nervous, fail to come to a full stop/period at the end of a sentence. Instead, they insert an "um" or "er" between phrases or sentences and everything they say gets joined together. This lowers the impact that your speech will have on the audience. Trust that what you have said has been good enough and stop. Then wait before starting your next sentence. Do not fill in the space between sentences with anything other than silence. Confident people are comfortable with silence. The silence is your thinking time. Give yourself thinking time. Stop at the full stops/periods.
Control your speech rate. Nervous speech is usually fast speech. I have seen some speakers appear breathless because they are in such a hurry to get their speeches or presentations "out of the way" or "over with". Confident speech is often well-paced. Some confident speakers even speak quite slowly. They place importance on their words by slowing their speech down. The words that are said more slowly would often be considered the most important ones. Don't throw away the significant messages that you have by speaking quickly. Modulate your speech so that you sound confident and your words sound important.
Have an inflection that varies.It is very easy to flatten your voice out when you are nervous so it becomes a flat, boring monotone. Don't do this. Keep variety in your voice. Modulate your words so that the pitch of your voice goes up and down. In other words put "light and shade" into what you are saying. If you have something important to say make it sound important and interesting. A voice with modulation is more interesting than a monotone and will make you sound more confident.
Drop your voice at the end of a sentence.
When you are uncertain your voice may go up at the end of a sentence. An upward or rising inflection in the voice is usually used for asking questions. When your inflection goes up at the end of a sentence when it is not a question, i.e. when you are making a statement or giving a command, you are likely to sound uncertain or open to negotiation. Your so called "command" will sound like an option. For example, if you watch a TV newsreader, listen to what they do at the end of a sentence. If they want to sound confident and to make the news have authority and importance they go down at the end. I used to train the TV newsreaders to read the news – and they were certainly not allowed to go up at the end, not even when it was good or exciting news. Drop your voice at the end of a sentence for extra authority and confidence.
No comments:
Post a Comment