Do You, Um, Distract Your Audience?

Have you ever, um, listened, um, to someone who, um, has a distracting pattern to the way they, um, speak?

Or, like, have you ever, like, focused so hard on, like, one aspect of their speech pattern, that you, like, can’t hear anything else?

OrHowAboutThePersonWhoSpeaksSoQuicklyThatEveryWordSeemsLikeItIsPartOfThePreviousWordAndTheAudienceCan’tRetainAnythingBecauseTheSpeakerWon’tSlowDown?

The latest one, right, is when people end every phrase or sentence, right, by saying “right.” Almost like they are seeking constant affirmation? Right?

Seemingly tiny distractions in your speech pattern can become a really big deal in the work place. Because once people start to HEAR you say “um” or “like” or “you know” or “right",” they won’t hear anything else. Once they realize you are repeating the word over and over, their brain won’t let them focus on anything else. And then your message will gets lost. Your speech pattern becomes a distraction.

If we want to make an impact with our communication skills in the work place, we need to make sure we don’t do anything that will distract from our message.

So, record yourself sometime, and listen to yourself. Do you have any consistent (and annoying) little patterns in your speech? If so, make note of them, and work on raising your own awareness of that pattern. The first step to recovery is recognition. Once you start to HEAR the pattern for yourself, it now becomes possible to coach it out of yourself.

It will take time, but we all need to work on eliminating any distracting patterns to our speech. We want to get rid of anything that will get in the way of our audience hearing and acting on our message.

Good luck!