Your Public Best - Lillian Brown [36]
Your voice is often as important as your appearance, your manner, and your message. It is the tool you use to transmit that message to your audience. The interchange between you and your audience is dependent on your verbal and vocal skills. You can use your voice to get your listeners on your side, convince them of something, sell them something, win their admiration or respect or trust or votes. You can wake them up or put them to sleep, alienate them or woo them, impress them or repel them. The human voice is a very powerful thing.
The important thing to remember, however, is that your audience expects—and deserves—an easy-to-listen-to and pleasant voice.
We live in an age of microwave and satellite communications, with our voices transmitted across the nation and even around the globe. Anyone can be catapulted into the spotlight and be heard around the world. The executive or expert who participates in a video conference that is transmitted via satellite can be heard in a timeless way, in perpetuity.
An unpleasant voice can be a disfiguring element in your public presence; it can cancel out your good traits. Think of a successful athlete who has a small, squeaky voice, or of the respected financier, who is successful but whose voice has a harsh, nasal sound to it. Think of how turned off you are by the telephone or door-to-door salesman who disturbs your dinner and seems to whine at you, his tone almost pleading for a sale. Such people could be more successful if they improved their voices.
Put another way, your voice should be an asset to you in your career, not a handicap.
Also, knowing that you have a good speaking voice can give you the confidence and authority to open the doors of opportunity in your life.
Why do we trust some of our news broadcasters, such as Walter Cronkite, Dan Rather, and Peter Jennings? And why do some of them remain favorites for years? It is partly due to the melodious, low-pitched, totally relaxed quality of their voices, which have no disturbing or attention-diverting qualities. Merely handsome or pretty broadcasters may fade into oblivion. The ones who survive are those with pleasant, elegant voices. Of course, they are also excellent journalists and correspondents. But give that same broadcaster a harsh, nasal voice, and he or she may not survive in the very tough, competitive business of broadcast journalism.
Another group of people who are universally admired for their beautiful voices are the announcers on many classical music radio stations. Such people often seem to have voices that are a pleasure to listen to. Although some of these announcers were born with such voices, many consciously worked to improve them over the years.
Turning to the business world, why are more and more corporations willing to pay to send their executives to voice-improvement seminars or private voice coaches? Because the corporations want their senior executives, sales personnel, spokespersons, and so on to be effective communicators. This means having accurate pronunciation, clear articulation, pleasant voice placement, and good vocal presentation skills. They want their executives to interact comfortably with other people and to be capable of a variety of speaking skills—from talking at business luncheons, to giving presentations and lectures, to making major addresses.
Also, clients or customers are more apt to listen to—and not tune out—the report or sales pitch of a speaker with a pleasant voice. This competitive edge can make a difference in the financial success of a business as well as in its public image.
No matter what voice you were born with, with practice you can achieve a voice that does justice to your skills and personality. You can lose or modify that regional or foreign accent by observing proper pronunciation. You can get rid of a high nasal placement by using a different part of your vocal apparatus. You can learn to carefully articulate the letters and sounds of our language. You can develop resonance in your chest, and you can learn how to project your voice to the last