Gravitas Archives - Page 2 of 4 - How to be Awesome at Your Job

Pete Mockaitis
Diane, thanks for joining us here on the How to be Awesome at Your Job podcast.

Diane DiResta
It’s great to be back.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah. Well, it’s great to have you back. And, boy, yeah, a lot of things have evolved since our last conversation.
Well, so much of your business has now shifted to a whole boatload of virtual meetings, presentations, trainings, interactions. Tell us, how has that shift in experience gone for you?

Diane DiResta
I love the virtual world. Now, what’s interesting is I’d already started virtual coaching before COVID hit because I had some people who were from North Carolina, Canada, Texas. So, what I was doing ideally when I could is either they were coming to New York for the first visit or I was going to them. And then it worked really well virtually. But once COVID hit, it was all virtual.

And I didn’t get any pushback from people. I had one client who I started with in-person, he had one session left, and he didn’t want to do it virtually. And then, finally, he realized this might be a year or so, and he said, “Let me do it.” And so, he realized it’s working really well. So, I’ve done training sessions, speaking engagements, and coaching virtually. I really like it.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Cool. Well, so you’re a pro and you have made the transition like a pro. Can you share with us any surprises in your own personal experience as you’ve made the transition?

Diane DiResta
Well, the first thing I did immediately is I went for certification so I’m now a certified virtual presenter.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, interesting.

Diane DiResta
Yeah.

Pete Mockaitis
Where does one do that?

Diane DiResta
Through eSpeakers.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Oh, that’s right. I have seen that little icon there. Sometimes we recruit guests from eSpeakers because they have a huge database of experts. Pro tip, podcasters.

Diane DiResta
Yes. And so, well, it was important for my credibility. And a big surprise to me was how bad some of these presentations are from people at higher levels. So, the first surprise was I was watching TV and I saw this senator that I had seen many times on the news, who was a spokesperson, who was very media savvy, very good, and I witnessed her first Zoom presentation, and it was like this – side of a face, looking down. She didn’t even know where the camera was, and I’m shocked. Like, how could this happen?

[03:31]

And then someone explained to me, “Well, when you’re in the media at that level, people are doing things for you. You’re talking into a teleprompter, there’s a producer, so they don’t really learn this.” So, I realized there is a market here and people need me. So, I start to rant when I see these kinds of things happening.

I was working with a physician, I was a facilitator or an interviewer for a health summit, a virtual summit. We had a conversation beforehand, we met five minutes before the meeting, and I was shocked, once again, because here he was, in his office, with a ceiling fan, a rotating fan. So, I got rid of that through manipulation of the laptop. But then his backdrop was so messy, there were tons and piles of books and papers and files, and there was nothing I could do.

So, here’s what people need to realize. You are communicating a message, and that messy background interferes. Number one, it’s a distraction to the message but, secondly, it’s communicating another message about your presence. So, there are some people who feel or believe that if they have really good credentials and they have very good content that that’s what counts.

But, no, if you have a mess behind you, you’re communicating sloppiness. So, what does that mean? Is your research sloppy? Is your presentation sloppy? So, it’s really important.

Pete Mockaitis
Wow, boy, there’s so much there in terms of, one, those associations. And I’m reminded of, well, I’ve got that book in my background, Pre-Suasion by Bob Cialdini talking about how we have associations. Like, if a resume is on a heavy clipboard, we sort of associate some weight to it. If you’re given a warm cup of tea, you might have some warmth toward the person who shared that. And so, there are some studies that point to that, and so then how much more so when it’s your entire background, that which is in my field of view as I’m beholding you, is messy. Like, that association will pop up all the more so.

Diane DiResta
Absolutely. So, this is what’s different and this is why I’m helping people translate stage presence into screen presence because the 3D world is very different from the virtual platform. So, one of the things people have to realize is they need to stage themselves. When you go into a meeting in a 3D world, the meeting room is there. You go into a conference room, the overhead lighting is there, the table is there, you don’t do any of that. But when you’re recording from your home or office, home office, you need to change the way that looks, you need to take control, so you become a producer. And the staging is very important, it’s the backdrop, the background.

And so, when I talk about staging, it’s what’s your backdrop. So, you have a few options. One is a screen. I have a room divider and what that allows me to do is hide any mess so that I can be camera-ready in a pinch. And we just had this experience a moment ago. You saw the mess behind me and there was no dial to change the backdrop so I took my screen up. So, that’s the first thing, it’s a physical screen.

Secondly, you can change your backdrop. I use Zoom a lot, and so you can upload your own backdrop. Now, here are some choices. One is, if you want to promote, if you want to communicate your brand, you can create your own. So, what I have is my logo on one side and my book and my Certified Virtual Presenter on the other side, so it’s speaking for me.

But you can have a nice scene, a beach scene, or a mountain scene, and that’s very calming. Or you can have a regular real-world backdrop. So, for instance, if you have a lovely living room or a very calm soothing office, and that’s real, use it, but make sure that it is supporting you, that it supports your brand. So, I would say be mindful and be strategic. What is it that you want to communicate?

Now, let me explain why this can impact you on your job. People take this lightly. When we first came to the virtual platform, post-COVID, people were very casual, they were showing up in their hoodies. But then we got over that because we realized this is here to stay. Well, I had a client who said to me, “Listen, Diane, full disclosure. In the beginning, we hired a vendor and they did four hours of virtual training, and I still don’t like how my team is showing up. They’re too casual. They’re too lax.”

So, I came in and I did a two-hour workshop, and one of the things we did is staging. And so, they learned how to center, they learned about lighting, they learned about backdrops, they learned about anything that would distract. So, what was fun is I had them look at still pictures of people in a frame and they had to critique it.

And then I had them do it on each other. So, I’d call on someone, I say, “All right, Pete, we’re going to have someone else look at you. So, Joe, take a look at Pete right now. What would you say about him if you were coaching him on his backdrop, on his staging?” and it was very enlightening for them, and they realized that, “Oh, this is about presence.” It affects your executive presence, so your screen presence can’t be lax.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, absolutely. And I feel that in many regards in terms of visually as well as auditorily. Before I go there, since that’s a whole other ball of wax, I love that technique there associated with having peers review each other because they…and sometimes they may have something they’ve been wanting to say for months, “That thing has been annoying me…”

Diane DiResta
Well, we don’t do it that way.

Pete Mockaitis
Certainly. I’m sure it’s constructive and uplifting and positive and useful and so forth. So, that’s great right there in terms of a great way to get feedback because I think, a lot of times, we don’t even see that stuff because we’re just so accustomed to it. Sometimes I don’t even see my own mess in the house if it’s been there for a long time, it’s like, “Oh, yeah, I guess there’s no reason whatsoever for that thing to be hanging out there.” But someone else coming in will say, if we’re good friends, like, “What’s up with that random thing shoved in the corner?”

Diane DiResta
Exactly. Well, I had another client and I had done a similar workshop for them, and then they got a new CEO, and the HR person contacted me and said, “Listen, I want you to talk to his assistant because the way he’s showing up, he really needs your training.” So, I worked with him and he said, “You talk away. Tell me what I need. I don’t have the equipment. I don’t know about my backdrop.” And he had a backdrop that he created, and I said, “No, that doesn’t work for you. Let’s come up with something else.” And, afterwards, the next day, or the next week, his assistant called me and said, “Wow, I really see a difference.” So, it really is skill-based. People don’t know, a lot of times, what they need to do and they don’t know how they’re coming across. And so, that’s where I come in.

Pete Mockaitis
Absolutely. And, actually, to also follow up on the point you brought up at the beginning, it’s skill-based. And if you are senior, you may very well have people that are handling all things for you, and so you need that skill and it could really be a blind spot. So, great that we’re shining a spotlight on that right now. But, now, I got to hear, if this person made the time to construct their own background but it wasn’t working for them, what makes a background bad?

Diane DiResta
Well, here’s the thing. He didn’t construct it, it was one of those backgrounds that you can download, and it looked like it had flipcharts on the floor, and I said, “It doesn’t look right. Let’s take it out.” In fact, when he had no backdrop and he was in a regular office, that actually looked better. So, he just needed the feedback.

Pete Mockaitis
Sure. Okay. So, yes, there could be any number of reasons why something doesn’t fit. And maybe flipcharts on the floor, I don’t know, if you’re a design-thinking coach, it might be perfect, like, “Oh, that really gives me a creative space.”

Diane DiResta
Yes, but not for CEO.

Pete Mockaitis
Right.

Diane DiResta
It did not communicate his brand and his level. So, again, I tell people, “Be strategic. How do you want to be perceived? Because you have the power, you have the control over how people are going to perceive you by how you show up.” And we all know the studies about the visual and the impact and it takes seven seconds or less to make a first impression. And, boom, as soon as you turn on the camera, they see that and that’s their first impression, so make it positive. Make it powerful.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, we talked about sort of the visual components here. I’d love to talk about audio, and I’m going to try not to dork out too hard here because I’m pretty intense about this. Well, Diane, you’ve seen the booking process. The choices are, “Are you going to be in a professional studio or should I send you a headset?” Those are the only two choices.

And you can debate what constitutes professional in terms of audio, but that is my experience, that if something is unpleasant to hear, well, one, there’s those associations again. It’s like, “Hmm, I just don’t like the feeling of you talking.” Like, you don’t want that associated with you just because of a bad microphone.

Diane DiResta
True.

Pete Mockaitis
And, two, I’ve got hard data from podcast listeners. Bad or even a little bit worse than mediocre, so like maybe slightly disappointing audio quality, results in lower engagement. People just tune out and stop listening earlier – I’ve got hard numbers on this – when the sound is lame. So, tell us, how do we make sound not lame?

Diane DiResta
Well, you’re exactly right. If you have to air, people will forgive you, let’s say, on YouTube if your lighting isn’t great but not the audio. The audio is really key. So, how do you make your sound good? The first thing is the worst kind of sound is when you talk directly to the computer because it sounds tinny. And I know when I see these new shows and they bring in experts and they’re talking to their computers; it’s irritating for me to listen to.

Pete Mockaitis
Now, do you mean the computer’s internal microphone, talking to the computer?

Diane DiResta
Yes. In other words, you don’t have any external mic. You’re just talking to the internal mic and it’s tinny. It’s not the best quality. So, at the very lowest level, put in some earbuds. I’ve used them, they work really well. Get an external mic. The Yeti is one of the top-level mics. And, again, when you have microphones and you test them, it’ll be much more effective. You can also use a headset, and Logitech is a good brand. I actually was on a very high-level podcast, and this podcast host required a certain headset.

Pete Mockaitis
John Lee Dumas, the Logitech H390.

Diane DiResta
Yes. Yes. Yes. Entrepreneurs on Fire. It’s John Lee Dumas, yes, and he actually tells you which one to get. And I got it. And I don’t use it that often because, it was interesting, in my network group today, a question came up, “What about headsets and executive presence?” And I thought about it and said, “You know, it depends on your level. I would not recommend someone at a high level, at the senior level, to be wearing a headset. It just doesn’t look like an executive. But, at other levels, it’s appropriate. It really depends on the venue, the culture of your company.” But headsets are good because they have the built-in mic, you don’t have to worry about anything. It’s all there. So, it depends on what you like. If you’re a podcaster, headsets are the best. Usually the best choice.

[15:50]

Pete Mockaitis
Well, yeah, it’s sort of like, in our world, so we send headsets to guests because, it’s like, “Hey, we’re only recording the audio so it doesn’t matter to listeners what you look like and it doesn’t matter to me.” You look great with your backdrop there. That’s really lovely.

Diane DiResta
Thank you.

Pete Mockaitis
So, I think that’s great. I will make a shoutout. We’ve spent dozens of hours testing many, many headsets and we love the Sennheiser or IMPACT EPOS SC30 or 60 in terms of bang for the buck, in terms of mic quality. Not the most comfortable or durable or best headphones, but, darn it, for a great-sounding mic at a great price, that’s, I think, the best game in town.

And I got to comment on the Yeti, and I think the key to using that well, and please chime in, Diane, if you’ve got some perspectives on this, is that you want to set it to the cardioid pickup pattern and speak pretty close to it and have enough stuff in the room so it’s not super echoey because I’ve seen a Yeti in a closet is a dream come true, a yeti in an empty room is echoey and unpleasant.

Diane DiResta
Yes, there is the acoustics factor and there are certain microphones that are unidimensional or multidimensional, and you need to know which they are so that you can speak differently. So, there are certain microphones where you speak right to the head, and there are others that are standup and you speak to the side of the mic, depending on which kind of microphone it is.

Pete Mockaitis
Totally. So, I think that’s great. And that notion of just stepping into your thought process is excellent in terms of thinking about the headset and the presence and the impression that that gives. I can totally see what you’re saying with regard to if you are a CEO or a senior executive, a headset kind of makes you think call center, like, “Wait a minute. That doesn’t feel quite right.”

But then, again, if you are an analyst, I’m thinking about like with Jack Bauer, CTU, the 24 TV series, like CIA analysts who are like fighting terrorism and using computers and being brilliant at them. That can kind of fit in terms of, “Oh, look at you. You’re a hardcore and you don’t have time to waste. You’re going to be clear and get right back to coming up with brilliant insights from your analysis.”

Diane DiResta
It goes back to your style, the culture, what you’re trying to communicate.

Pete Mockaitis
Totally. That’s cool. Okay. Well, we’ve got a lot of great tips here. Let’s talk more about maybe sort of like mindset or thought process or key questions to go through because we can get the particulars in terms of what’s a great background and what’s a great meeting platform, software, and what’s a great microphone. I just want to hear about how we should go about thinking through these questions to make the perfect choices for ourselves.

Diane DiResta
Well, the first thing, is people are not familiar with the technology, and there are so many different platforms. There’s Zoom, there’s Teams, there’s Google Meet, there’s WebEx, and so you need to know which one you’re on and get familiar with it. And, in fact, I went to a seminar that was virtual court, yeah, the virtual courtroom. It was for lawyers but I thought it’d be very interesting.

And one of the things that they said, the judge said, is, “We offer jurors, or people coming for hearings, the day before, to meet with a court officer who will train them and take them through the process.” That’s really important because, too often, people are on mute, and people don’t know it. And, in fact, there’s a coffee mug I’ve seen, it says, “You’re on mute,” and I think that is brilliant because it happens on every call. So, you need to get familiar with the technology. You need some help.

One of the worse situations, there was a professor recently, and he was giving a lecture and it was really interesting, but he started out and he didn’t even know he was on mute. And because there was no video, they were trying to let him know, and it took a while. And then, finally, “Oh, the wife is coming. She knows technology.” And then he said, “Well, you know, I’m a technophobe.” You’ve got to be prepared. You can’t let that kind of thing happen. So, that’s really key.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s true. Either you got to have the skills or you have to have a team immediately available whenever the situation calls for it.

Diane DiResta
And even then, things can go wrong.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, sure. You’re talking about virtual court, we’re just going to have to link to this because it’s the funniest thing I think I’ve seen this year. Have you seen the cat?

Diane DiResta
Are you talking about, “I’m not a cat”? Yes.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, my gosh.

Diane DiResta
I blogged about that and I said the same thing, it’s like, “Get there early. Test it out.” Because that so embarrassing and it was funny but it was embarrassing. So, we don’t ever want to be at a position. For those of you who don’t know what we’re talking about, there was a viral video, there was a lawyer in court, and he couldn’t get his video to work except for an animated cat. So, every time he spoke, it was his voice through this cat. And the judge was saying, “Well, check your filters,” and he still couldn’t get it to stop. And that’s an embarrassment, you don’t want that to happen on the job.

Pete Mockaitis
“Oh, I’m here live, judge. I’m not a cat.” And it’s the funniest thing I have seen, thus far, in 2021, so do yourself some favor and pull that up.

Diane DiResta
I will tell you, one of the things that people don’t realize is, and this is my rant, the talking head is dead. Truly, the talking head is dead. So, if you think you’re going to come online and lecture, you’re not going to be successful. People will tune you out. So, I talk about the two Es which are very different in the virtual world, and that’s eye contact and engagement.

Eye contact, when I coach people in the 3D world, I tell them, “Look at one person at a time and spread it around so you’re looking at the whole audience.” The reverse is true online. You want to look directly at the lens of your camera. Now this is hard because it’s like having a satellite interview. So, here’s what I do.

When I’m speaking, I look at the lens. When you’re speaking, I look at you so I can catch the nonverbals. But if I don’t look at the lens when I’m speaking, I’m not making a direct eye connection. The second thing is I always encourage people to start out with interaction. A poll is great or a question where they respond in the chat.

Because if you don’t do that and if you don’t engage them immediately, they’re on their phones, they’re going through their papers, they’re doing other things because they think they can just flip you on and listen as if it was on an ongoing webinar. So, don’t do a slide show where you’re just a voiceover slides because you will not have an audience paying attention. So, those are key.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, that is big. And that’s a great point on the eye contact with regards to just getting into that habit in terms of, “Now, I’m looking at the lens, and now I’m looking at you.” And I’m sure, someday, one of these tech people are going to make a lens inside a screen so that…

Diane DiResta
It’s happening. I think it might be Invidia. It’s already happening but it’s not going to be available for us, but, eventually, it will.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah. So, here we are and I think that’s a good point with regard to conscientiously choosing that because it makes an impact in terms of, like, “I have a different feeling when you are looking right at the lens and I’m seeing you do that than the reverse, even though it’s so weird that we are not actually able to both make eye contact with each other at the same time.”

Diane DiResta
I know. And that’s one of the downfalls of the virtual world. But just think of yourself almost as a broadcaster or an actor, and you’re talking to the camera, and I can see you, I cannot see your face but I see you there in my peripheral vision. But, now, when you talk, I’m going to look at you.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, that’s great.

Diane DiResta
And that’s what I do these days.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s great. Well, let’s talk about the engagement piece in terms of interactive, a poll. I would love for you to just rapid-fire share your favorite tips, tactics, tricks, brainstorms on how to engage virtually. I think a poll is great. What are some other ways you can do that?

Diane DiResta
Well, it depends on your platform. Some are more robust than others. I have the enterprise version of Zoom, and you can do a lot of things. So, polls are great. It can be a question-and-answer, a one-word or a sentence response, or it could be multiple choice. What’s great about polls is they’re fun because we can see them in the moment.

One of the things I do after a presentation is I raffle off a digital copy of my book Knockout Presentations. And the way I do that is there’s a virtual wheel, and I input everybody’s name before the presentation, and then I go to that wheel and spin it so they can see it and they can see their name, the spindle landing on their name, and it’s a lot of fun. It keeps people engaged and it also keeps them engaged to the end because they know that they’re going to get a prize. So, you have to have something at the end that they’re looking forward to.

There are some other ways that you can engage people. And, of course, we have breakout rooms, in that way people are getting into small pods and they’re talking to each other which is great. I love some of the icons, the hand raising. Now, you can do this a couple of ways. One with the icon or you can just have people raise their hand for a visual aid.

Sometimes when you need an icebreaker, if you see there’s a lull in the conversation, what you can do, I have a friend who does fabulous footwear, she’ll say, “All right, everybody, take off your shoe and hold it up and let’s see who has the most interesting shoe.” And, again, that can be something fun. You can use music. And I like to do something called square dancing when I want to get energy going. And so, you put on the music, you crank it up, and then people start dancing in their squares. And, again, people are moving to the music.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, that’s kind of fun to watch in the gallery view, everyone moving at the same time. Okay.

Diane DiResta
Yes. Now, of course, if you’re talking to an investor, you’re not going to use that technique, but it depends. Now, here’s something that is a lot of fun. It’s an investment because you have to pay for this. But you can go online and download software games such as Jeopardy, Wheel of Fortune, and Let’s Make a Deal, whatever those are. And then you can use them as part of your learning.

So, let’s say you’re doing sales training. Instead of the typical lecture and who has the answer, you can have two teams and you can input different answers beforehand and then you call in the team, they give you an answer, and either they get it or they don’t. So, it’s a lot of fun and it’s very engaging.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, that is cool.

Diane DiResta
So, some of the software games are fun.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, I love to zoom in on a couple of these in particular. So, software games, there’s a training company that does this. Is there one in particular that you can mention here?

Diane DiResta
The Training Arcade.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, The Training Arcade. Okay. So, they have like a Jeopardy piece over there. Okay. Excellent.

Diane DiResta
You can download them. You’re going to pay for them but it’s worth it if you have a lot of people. So, I would say, if your goal is to train or to have fun or to motivate, if you’re in a sales culture, a training culture, you might want to do that.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Excellent. And then your little spinney piece.

Diane DiResta
The spinning wheel?

Pete Mockaitis
What was that?

Diane DiResta
That is called WheelofNames.com.

Pete Mockaitis
Wheel of Names. Okay. Very cool.

Diane DiResta
And what you do is you input the names in advance. So, let’s say I have 20 people who are coming, I would put those 20 names in. And then, when I was ready, I would go to that page online and I would start spinning. It’s so much fun.

Pete Mockaitis
And I think that’s so cool, it’s that just the ability to share your screen enables tons of things to be possible. And this is very rudimentary, but I remember when I have my mastermind meetings with my fellow podcasters, who are awesome, everyone has been on the show and vice versa as it should be with the mastermind, we have…even just someone having the notes and the timer, and then sharing that screen so we’re looking at the notes and the timer, makes it more engaging than, hey, we’re just kind of talking.

So, those little things can make a world of difference even when it’s nothing fancy at all.

Diane DiResta
Using a whiteboard and actually drawing in real time. You see, here’s the thing with the brain. Every time you do something different, it stimulates attention. So, even the act of going to share your screen to show a document, people are, “It’s something new.” They’re going to go and look.

Pete Mockaitis
Great point. It just feels good to task-switch or multitask, even though that has its perils, which we’ve discussed several times. So, too, the switching it up feels good in that way. And I’m thinking about, I think, Miro – hey, they were a sponsor once, they’re awesome – has a lot of cool ways to like whiteboard and engage interactively there.

And I’m also thinking about even just like a Google Sheets. We’ve had some moments where it’s like, “Okay, guys. We’ve all talked about these options and now it’s time for us to, each on our sheet, rank or rate how well we think each of these options hits each of these criteria.” And then there’s sort of a top-level sheet that summarizes.

And, sure enough, I find that supremely engaging because my heart is stomping and I’m kind of wondering, “What number are they putting? What number am I putting? Should I check what number they’re putting? No, Pete, don’t be like the Olympic judge. Stand by your own opinions. Don’t sneak a peek.” It’s like, “I wonder if the one I’m supporting is going to be the winner.” Anyways.

Diane DiResta
Yeah. And, also, video clips. You can show a quick video clip that everybody watches and then can comment on. So, there are a number of ways you can do this. You can actually have people write their responses in the chat or you can open up the mics. Call on someone and say, “Let’s hear your voice,” because people want to talk. They want to hear their own voice. So, a number of techniques help to engage.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s good.

Diane DiResta
So, the more variety, the better.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s good. Well, Diane, tell me, anything else you want to make sure to mention before we shift gears and hear about some of your favorite things?

Diane DiResta
I would say a couple of things. People don’t realize that this is a skill. And I always say that gifted speakers are born but effective speakers are made. So, make a commitment to learn these skills because, years ago, I used to say that tomorrow’s speakers would need broadcasting skills, and we are here. We are way beyond that. So, you need to start thinking of yourself as a broadcaster, not just a speaker presenter.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Thank you. Diane, now, could you share with us a favorite quote, something you find inspiring?

Diane DiResta
The quote that I put in my high school yearbook, which is, “A quitter never wins. A winner never quits.”

Pete Mockaitis
Thank you. And a favorite study or a piece of research?

Diane DiResta
I like some of the research that’s coming out about women. The one I read recently was, you know, the belief that women are talkers, and yet when they show research, I believe it was Harvard or Stanford, women actually talk less than men do in meetings. So, it really blew away a stereotype.

Pete Mockaitis
And a favorite book?

Diane DiResta
The Science of Mind and Think and Grow Rich. The Science of Mind is a huge textbook-like book by Ernest Holmes but it’s all about spiritual, mental training which really helps people understand the power they have when they use the power of their mind.

Pete Mockaitis
And a favorite tool, something you use to be awesome at your job?

Diane DiResta
A favorite tool. I love Zoom. I use Zoom all the time.

Pete Mockaitis
And a favorite habit?

Diane DiResta
I don’t know if it’s a favorite habit but I have a habit of getting up early now, and that makes a big difference in my productivity. I get up at 5:30 in the morning. To me, that’s early. And that allows me to create certain rituals, so prayers, affirmation, and I read one page of something spiritual before I look at my phone.

Pete Mockaitis
And is there a particular nugget you share that seems to connect and resonate and get quoted back to you frequently?

Diane DiResta
What I said earlier, that gifted speakers are born and effective speakers are made.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And if folks want to learn more or get in touch, where would you point them?

Diane DiResta
The best place is my website DiResta.com. And I want to tell people that I’m going to be starting a group coaching for women, for women business professionals so that they can feel more confident and have the support of a group as well as work with me in a coaching capacity. So, that’s coming up. If you would like to learn more about that, send me an email through DiResta.com. And you can also get my book Knockout Presentations on Amazon or any of the online stores.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And do you have a final challenge or call to action for folks looking to be awesome at their jobs?

Diane DiResta
The final challenge is commit to being a good communicator. I don’t think there’s any skill that’s more impactful or important than communication. It doesn’t matter how technically proficient you are or how smart you are, you need to be able to be a good communicator. So, make a commitment. And make a commitment to be able to do that on a virtual platform because this is not going away.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Diane, this has been a treat. Thank you and I wish you lots of luck with all presentations, virtual and in person.

Diane DiResta
Thank you. And I wish you success on the platform of life and may all your presentations be a knockout.

Pete Mockaitis
Caroline, thanks for joining us here on the How to be Awesome at Your Job podcast.

Caroline Goyder
My pleasure, Pete. Looking forward to it.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, I’m looking forward to getting into it as well. And I understand you’ve been in my shoes many times interviewing over 40 A-list actors. Any noteworthy stories that come to mind from that?

Caroline Goyder
Ooh, gosh. That book I wrote a few years back, and it was fascinating. And the thing that was so interesting was just how nervous all of them got about auditions and new gigs and new jobs. It was just a revelation that people like Helen Mirren get shaky hands when they have to make a speech, because it made me feel, “Well, if that’s okay for them, then it’s okay for me, too.” It released me to be nervous in lots of ways.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, you know, it’s funny. That’s exactly how I feel as you share that, it’s like, “Huh, okay then. It’s okay. It doesn’t mean there’s something wrong with you. That’s how all of us, even the greats, are feeling.” So, that is handy. Thank you. Well, could you share then, so you’ve done a lot of work and research and hands-on experience in this space. Could you maybe tell us what’s maybe the most surprising and fascinating discovery you’ve made about confidence and having it and finding it, and not having it?

Caroline Goyder
So, when I started out, I definitely thought that confidence was something kind of out there that some people had. And when I was training as an actor, I would look at people and you’d see that he had it and she had it, and I knew that I didn’t. But 20 years on, I know when I see those people that they’re just really present, they’re just really in their bodies, they’re just able to center themselves when they have to. And I know that everybody can learn that skill, and that’s been the big revelation for me, that confidence is not a birthright. It’s a set of habits. And I wish I’d known that at 23, 21, when I started work. Even at 30 I wish I’d known that.

Pete Mockaitis
Confidence, ooh, that is good, not a birthright, it’s a set of habits. Okay. And then maybe for people who think that they’re doing it, they’re fine when it comes to speaking or being confident and having gravitas or voice. Could you just really lay it out for us in terms of what’s at stake there in terms of when you’ve got those habits sort of well-developed and are rocking and rolling and cruising and firing on those cylinders versus when you’re kind of stumbling and you haven’t found your voice? Why does it matter for the average professional?

Caroline Goyder
Gosh. Well, I’ve known those two zones. I’ve known the zone of not feeling confident really well as a person, and I know that when I didn’t feel confident in myself, I wasted a lot of energy worrying what people thought about me. I would worry that I was speaking too fast. I was worried that my voice was too thin. I would worry that I didn’t have enough presence. And that takes your attention away from other people. You stop listening. And, of course, what makes people effective in their jobs is that they are present and listening and able to tune in and be empathetic to others. Pretty much in any job that you do, that’s the success factor. And when you’re worried about yourself, you don’t have bandwidth to pay attention to other people.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah. Ooh, there’s a lot there. you’re saying that your focus, instead of being on, “Oh, my gosh, what’s everybody thinking. How am I doing?” you should be redirecting it toward serving and being present. How does that work inside your head?

So, let’s say you have the stage. Can you get really clear in terms of, “Let’s turn away from these sorts of thoughts running in our brain, that voice, and shift toward these other kinds of better thoughts and focus areas”?

Caroline Goyder
So, that’s really interesting, and I think what I would say to that is it’s an actor’s training, and I learned a lot from actors even though this is the theater of life we’re talking about. An actor’s training would say, “Actually, the thoughts are for rehearsal, the moment when you step out on stage…” and your stage could be a meeting or it could be a presentation, “…almost let go of your thoughts and get into a flow state where you’re really tuned into your body, your breath, what you can see in the room, someone’s tone of voice, so it becomes a very sensory experience.” And I think that’s what performers are taught. There’s a moment where you prepare, and then when you get into the stage, you just get present and you pay attention. And so, it becomes…it goes beyond thinking, and it becomes about flowing into the space. It’s almost like diving into something.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. So, it’s not about thoughts at all but rather sort of experience. it sounds like you’re saying, ideally, there wouldn’t be much of an internal monologue, like, “Okay, now I’m about to say this. Now I should walk over here. Now I need to be really angry or powerful or pause.” But rather your attention is pointed towards, “Oh, that person seems interesting.”

Caroline Goyder
Exactly.

Pete Mockaitis
Or, “That person is looking away. And, ooh, I’m feeling there’s excitement here,” as opposed to internal conversation.

Caroline Goyder
Yes. And, of course, there are moments where you might need to tweak it and someone might not get what you’ve just said about Q3 or your budget for next year or whatever it is. And you might have to talk to yourself to tweak it. But when things are going well, just be in it. There’s a lovely Greek word which is Kairos, and it means it’s the place in the armor where you can pierce it, and it’s a bit of a kind of battle-heavy metaphor, in a way, but it’s the idea that it’s being able to spot the moment. And whether you’re pitching a big idea at work, or trying to influence a new client, or whether you’ve got to get the boss on your side, your ability to see that moment is everything.

Pete Mockaitis
So, now I’m imagining, in the context of pitching, I was just talking to someone about how I might kind of automate the process of getting headsets to my guests. I’m glad our audio is working out. Thank you. And then he said something like, “Oh, yeah, we have a program where we send headsets. We call that our ‘Agent In A Box’ program where we do this, this, this.” And then I think I was very explicit, it’s like, “Oh, I love that. So, you’ve done this thing before in which you send individuals all the gear they need with some explanatory stuff, so that’s just handled forever, and I don’t have to think about it anymore, or keep making purchases on Amazon one at a time.”

And so, in a way, I guess you don’t need to be too observant there, because I said, “Oh, I love that.” But I guess I’m imagining, if I’m reading it like that, you’re saying we can observe and witness those sorts of moments of openness or interest or intrigue from the people we’re communicating with, and we should seize that.

Caroline Goyder
Exactly. And we’re basically nervous systems meeting each other. And the people who have the most success at work are ninjas at reading other people’s nervous systems. When they get excited about a new product that’s going to help them with their podcast, or when they hold their breath because they think they haven’t got enough budget, or when they lean in because they’re curious. Your ability to notice moment by moment what’s happening in someone else’s nervous system is what makes you good.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Well, there we have it. How do we do that?

Caroline Goyder
The first rule is get present to yourself because until you are present to the shifts in your own nervous system, “What’s my diaphragm doing? How am I breathing? Oh, my heart rate is going up,” you’re not going to be able to notice it in someone else. So, get to know your own instrument, get to know, become self-aware, tune into your own emotions, and then you’re going to be able to tune in to someone else.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And so then, in a daily life kind of way, I’m just sort of doing my thing, is there a particular process you recommend that we do that to check in? Because I think it’s quite possible to go hours or days at a time and not actually really do that at all, to say, “How do I really feel about this? Or what’s really going on here?” So, how do you recommend we stop and make that happen?

Caroline Goyder
Well, I’ve been the person who couldn’t do this right. So, when I left Oxford where I studied English, and I went to drama school. And when I got to drama school, here I was, this girl who had spent a lot of time reading Shakespeare, I mean a lot, and I turn up in drama school and they go, “You’re in your head,” and I think, “What on earth are they talking about?” And what they meant is that I was trying to process everything through my brain, through the internal dialogue.

And the learning for me, which was quite a hard one, I have to say, is that in order for me to be good on stage, in order for me to have presence, I have to learn more about my body and not my brain. And I agree with you that most people at work, we’re all in Zoom jail at the moment, we’ll get back to the real office jail eventually, we sit a lot, we tense our shoulders, we lean forward into our laptops, we lose our breathing, our hips get tight, we have too much coffee, we don’t drink enough water, and then we kind of get into meetings, and we wonder why it’s not working.

And the simple thing that you can do to become more self-aware is to just notice your body. Notice that it’s not just carrying you around. Notice how you’re breathing. Notice how you’re standing. Adjust yourself. Go for a walk. Maybe do some yoga. Maybe go for a run. But just embody your whole self not just your brain. And I wish I’d learnt that in my first week at drama school rather than struggling through the five years.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. So, notice your body, and it sounds like we’re getting real precise, I guess, like in terms of, I could say, “My right elbow itches right now.”

Caroline Goyder
Yes.

Pete Mockaitis
“And my neck is tensed.” So, I’m just sort of internally noticing and articulating these things. And is that it? It’s like, “Well, noted. Moving on.” Or what’s the next step?

Caroline Goyder
There’s a yoga teacher called John Stokes who talks about…it all gets quite easy, but he talks about sensation rises from the ground up. So, you can notice all the sensation from your feet upwards, and it meets consciousness which comes down. And then somewhere in the middle is thinking. And so, we spent a lot of time thinking, probably not very much time in consciousness and very little time in sensation. And, for me, it was the fact becoming more present to sensation. And then I’ve also learnt to meditate and do yoga stuff, and consciousness is something I’m only in the foothills of, but that’s an interesting one too.

Pete Mockaitis
And that is intriguing in terms of splitting that into three segments because those are quite distinct from each other, as I’m thinking. It’s like, okay, sensation? “Boom! There’s warmth in this cup.” Thinking is like, “Okay, what’s my expression here?” And so then, what is consciousness?

Caroline Goyder
I would probably pass you to John Stokes on that one. What is consciousness?

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, man, just making small talk over there.

Caroline Goyder
I mean, we could start a Ph.D. on this question. I’ll tell you in about 10 years when I’ve done some more meditation.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, I mean, I suppose I have a pretty succinct definition for consciousness. But I guess, maybe, one’s experience of consciousness in this narrow context of that thing which is distinct from thinking and sensation, what is it kind of like when you’re in the consciousness mode? Because I know what it’s like when I’m in the thinking mode and when I’m in the sensation mode, but what’s it like when I’m in the consciousness mode?

Caroline Goyder
Well, I was thinking, this is one of your earlier podcasts, and it gets into the Csikszentmihalyi flow state for me. I know when I’m present to consciousness because it becomes more, the field opens up. I’m tuned into the room in a bigger way. I’m not locked into my own, “Oh, you’re in it. This is…” that I’m open to something bigger, something more connected. So, that’s my experience of consciousness, but there are people who are way further down the path than me on this one.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, yeah, I think that mission accomplished in terms of clarifying that question for me there because in terms of, yeah, I know what that experience is like, and it is distinct from, “Okay, I’m thinking about some things now,” and it is distinct from, “Ooh, there’s a tickle in my throat.” It’s sort of like you are conscious of what is going on and you’re flowing in it but it’s kind of like…boy, gosh, I’m almost thinking about sort of like levels of abstraction there. Like they say, oh, man, I’m thinking about my professor.

So, they say, hey, there’s data, there’s information, and there’s knowledge, or something like that in terms of we could say that, “Data would suggest like sales are $5 million and costs are $4 million.” Information would be, “Oh, we have a gross profit margin percentage of 20% with one million profit over five million sales.” And then knowledge would be like, “Oh, and that’s good based on my experience and my industry and comparables, yadda, yadda, yadda.”

And so, these are sort of three different layers of, I guess, wisdom maybe, you might say, just as these are three different layers of experience. And consciousness is higher in a way in that it’s abstracting and encapsulating broad stuff underneath them. Caroline, I’m just thinking through this real time. Comments or thoughts.

Caroline Goyder
I refer you to John Stokes and his new book. It’s fascinating because it made me think how much I had to learn sensation in order to dissolve my thinking and in order to access a bigger field to be in the room, not just locked away in my head. And, for me, coming through the body through sensation was the way to dissolve the thinking.

Pete Mockaitis
Wow, you know, it’s funny because, in a way, what we’re talking about is a smidge abstract and, yet, I think, experientially, I maybe feel, as opposed to just thinking, exactly what you’re saying there in that…

Caroline Goyder
And there’s a really simple way, there’s a really specific, to make it not abstract, actors will say when they get on stage, “Feel your feet on the floor. Feel the air on your face. Feel the clothes on your skin. See something across the space that you haven’t noticed before.” So, although it is quite abstract in some ways, in other ways it’s just incredibly practical.

Pete Mockaitis
And in doing those things, you are exiting your thinking mode. And, as a result of having exited it, you may well be on your way to the consciousness flow mode.

Caroline Goyder
Exactly. Exactly.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Cool. Well, I mean, that’s huge right there, is that we’re going to take some moments throughout the day and just before big performance times to check in and sort of get the sensation going. What else do you recommend we do in terms of getting those confidence habits working for us?

Caroline Goyder
The thing I’m noticing a lot at the moment with people in busy work lives is that they’re saying to me, “My voice is tired at the end of the day. I feel really flat. I feel really compressed.” And so much of our lives right now, whether we’re working at home or back in the office, that takes us into a bit of a hunch, and it closes our breathing down, and it compresses us. And then when we try and show up in a meeting, we’re all small and closed.

And so, one of the things that people can really do to help them at work is to open up their breath and open up their voices. And I’m saying to people a lot at the moment, “Just sing. Put some music on in the morning and sing for five minutes and just enjoy it, and it doesn’t have to be tuneful, and you will show up in your meetings with a different kind of resonant frequency because your voice isn’t stuck in your throat. It’s moving, it’s fluid, it has tone, it has resonance. And people will be attracted to that because it makes them feel good.”

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. So, in a world in which we’re kind of hunched over and we don’t have ergonomically an optimal setup and we’re just sort of moving from thing to thing to thing, and maybe even trying to watch our volumes, you’re saying we can sort of shift a gear by doing some singing when we’re alone, and that’s just going to kind of follow us into having resonance when we’re with people.

Caroline Goyder
The thing about voices, voice is the expression of your aliveness because voice is breath. It’s exhaled air. And when we get really tensed and compressed, we express a real fight or flight adrenal reaction to people in our voices and our breathing. And singing, humming, chanting, long outbreaths, all of those things take us into good vagal tone. And in good vagal tone, where the vagus nerve is firing on all cylinders, we show up, we smile when others smile, we laugh when others laugh. Our voices reflect and mirror each other.

And the experience of speaking, when we’ve warmed up just by singing, it’s completely different for people. They feel at ease with you. And I think there’s nothing more important in a tensed stressed-out world than making people feel at ease with you.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, let’s dig into some of these terms which I’m somewhat familiar in terms of resonance and vagal nerve. Are these sorts of anatomical experiences that we can sort of check in for ourselves? Like, “Oh, I can feel my vagal nerve rocking and rolling,” or, “Ooh, I can feel resonance,” or, “Ooh, I’m feeling an absence of resonance.” How do we kind of…? You mentioned those are some exercises to activate it. How can we sort of check in and say, “Yup, that’s going,” or, “Ooh, that’s not going”?

Caroline Goyder
Well, the way that people often test this is when they hear themselves on audio, and people will often say, “Oh, I really hate my voice.” And what that tells me is that someone hears their own voice through their ears. They really don’t have an accurate sense of it. But when you’re tuned into your resonance, you’re tuned into the buzz of your voice.

People who are tuned into how their voices feel, back to the sensation thing, are much more in control. Now, how do you do that? You just put a hand on your chest and just hum. Just do me a little, “Hmmm…” then you can feel the bones kind of buzzing in your body. And you can do a low note, you could go, “Hmmm…” maybe put a hand on your tummy, “Hmmm…” And you might do a higher note, “Hmmm…” that’s going to be higher up in your head, in your nose.

And so, you can just play. You can even do a pitch play. And the sound, the high notes resonate in your head, the low notes resonate in your gut, the middle notes resonate in your chest. We know this from altos and tenors and basses. We know that some people have chest voice. And if you start to tune into the sensations of where your voice buzzes in your body, A, you’re much more in your body, less in your head, and, B, you’re going to have more control. And when you hear your voice on a recording, it’s not going to be such a shock because you can feel it. So, that’s resonance.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And so, resonance, we want it, and so a humming can activate it, and so we might even just check in as we’re talking. And maybe could you give us a demo? I mean, in terms of audio style, what’s a voice sounding like with resonance and without resonance?

Caroline Goyder
So, I can tell you how I used to sound.

Pete Mockaitis
All right.

Caroline Goyder
If I stick my head forward, and if I breathe into my upper chest, and if I tense my jaw, and if I talk to you and it all becomes a bit flat, and I can really feel it. I can feel it in my teeth, and I can feel it in my pharynx and in my throat. And it’s an experience of being a talking head. Okay? So, I spent a long time doing a version of that.

And I’m no Brian Blessed. I don’t know if you know the actor. He’s got the most incredible bass voice. I’m no Barry White, but when I speak now, what’s different is that I can feel my voice kind of buzzing in my chest and my shoulders. It feels more open in my throat. I can feel it a bit in the back of my head. And I know if I have to do a play, which I wouldn’t anymore, I would spend half an hour warming it up so that my fingers buzzed with sound when I spoke. So, it’s just the physics of it. It’s the bone conduction. It’s feeling the effect of sound buzzing through your bones, really, that’s what resonance is.

Pete Mockaitis
And what’s so interesting is, and we’ll see what the listeners feel in terms of their own speaker setup after we do the audio processing, etc. I guess my experience though of listening to both of those voices is that when you were non-resonant, I felt a little bit, I guess, I don’t know, was it nervous, uncomfortable. It wasn’t a big deal but there was a slight unpleasantness that I’m picking up from the emotional atmosphere when you were doing that. Is that normal? Tell me about this.

Caroline Goyder
I think it is because, as humans, we’re wired for trust, aren’t we? We are constantly filtering, “Can I trust this person? Will they eat me? Will they rob me? Will they attack me? Am I safe with them?” So, if we talk about the vagus nerve now, because this is when we get onto the polyvagal theory, there’s a scientist called Stephen Porges who talks about something called polyvagal theory. And it sounds really complicated but it’s actually really simple.

What he says is when we’re tensed and nervous, it’s like we’re closed behind a wrapper. And that voice that I used to live in is the voice of someone who’s tensed and hiding behind a wrapper, and we feel uncertain about that because we don’t know if we can trust them. And he said when we have what’s called good vagal tone, where we’re in the parasympathetic nervous system, the rest and digest happy part of the system, then we take the wrapper off, and that’s when our voices have music, that’s when we smile, that’s when things are easy, and that’s when someone gets a sense of “Can I trust you?” And I think, as humans, we’re wired to notice those things, and we don’t know maybe why we get worried by the first voice, but we do. I think it’s universal.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s cool in so many ways. One, that’s just sort of the experience we had right here points to a body of research. Well, now, I’m curious about all of the studies and experiments and numbers that may exist in terms of describing this phenomenon.

So, with the research associated with good vagal tone and the impact that makes, have there been any noteworthy sort of studies or experiments that put these results on full display?

Caroline Goyder
I would point listeners to Stephen Porges’ website and his book The Polyvagal Theory because there’s an enormous and emerging body of research that backs up his theory, and it’s all on his site. So, just have a look at it, just put Stephen Porges into Google and have a look. They’re constantly reporting these studies. And it’s being picked up in psychology and psychiatry and trauma therapy. It’s becoming quite a big body of work with lots of attached research.

Pete Mockaitis
And what’s so fascinating, I’m sure there can be many variables, but it sounds like we’ve uncovered one potential hidden variable for all kinds of things, like, “Why does everybody like that person and they don’t like the other person? Why does everyone seem to respond and nod their heads when one person says something at a meeting, and when someone else says the same thing, it doesn’t seem to be connecting and resonating?” This could be one of those hidden mystery variables that can shed some light on it.

Now, you mentioned the phrase good vagal tone. Is that the same thing as having resonance or is there a distinction? And how do we get it?

Caroline Goyder
So, I only ever really knew about resonance and the importance of the diaphragm and the importance of breathing, and it was when I discovered polyvagal theory and how much Stephen Porges talks about voice that I joined the dots on it. And, in a sense, it really all comes back to what our bodies do when they’re safe. And when our bodies are safe, our breathing opens up, our diaphragm moves freely, our shoulders relax, our jaw untenses, our tongues relax, our sole and muscle in the hips relax, and we show up as easy and fluid and present. That’s what good voice is, that’s what actors are taught to do on stage, and it just so happens that Stephen Porges’ polyvagal theory backs up why it works for voices because when we’re safe, our voices have music.

Pete Mockaitis
Wow, so many implications there. I’m reminded of we had a previous guest, Alex Banayan, who interviewed a lot of people including Larry King. And so, one thing that Larry King told him about interviewing, which is really connecting here, is that he said, “The reason that I get good results with my interviewees is that I am very comfortable in my seat, and the person I’m interviewing then kind of picks up on that, and then they are comfortable in their seat.” So, in a way, it matters less about what style and specific approach, and tactics, and questions you choose so much as you get in that groove of, “Hey, I’m really comfortable and safe and having fun and rolling with this,” and then the person that you’re interacting with feels that too, and then you naturally just have a pretty cool, fun, insightful conversation flowing from that.

Caroline Goyder
Exactly. It’s massive, isn’t it? And what it takes is the awareness to take yourself into safety. When he’s got people shouting in his ear and people telling him they’re running out of time and some of the lights have gone, he’s got all sorts of reasons to feel stressed and unsafe, and the professional is able to switch that on. That’s the success factor.

Pete Mockaitis
Well said. Okay. Well, boy, Caroline, this is so much good stuff. So, we’ve got some key things to do in terms of finding that safety, returning into sensation, doing some humming or some singing, connecting to that resonance. Are there some things that you recommend we stop doing, things that we should cut out of our speaking, of our lives before we get into the speaking that make a world of difference in terms of this confidence?

Caroline Goyder
I’m thinking of what I’ve cut out. What have I cut out? I’ve really cut out the things that make me too speedy because it’s hard to project a sense of safety when you’ve had three cups of coffee, when you’re slightly late for a meeting, when you’re rushing, when you’re not making time. And so, the thing that I now know is that if I want to show up centered and able to make people feel safe and able to connect, I need to just carve out, ideally, half an hour, 15 minutes is good, five will do it, where I turn off my phone, where I switch off the Googling and switch off the thinking about other things, and I just come back to my feet are on the floor, my bum is on the chair, the air is on my face. What does this person want from me today? How can I help?

And if I take myself through that, that is a protocol, get present, quieten down, “How can I help?” I have good meetings. If I don’t make time for that, I don’t have good meetings.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, I like that. It’s funny as I’m reminded of a time. I had a meeting with somebody who, you know, I’d done a lot of work for him but almost never interacted with him personally, so it was kind of a big deal, if you will, that I was having this meeting. It was a phone call, because we were going to pursue maybe some new projects, initiatives, which would have revenue potential for both of us. So, it was exciting because the stakes were up there.

And I remember when, at the beginning of the meeting, we were talking, and he said something like, “Okay, so, let’s see, what are we talking about here? Ah, yes, we’re discussing dah, dah, dah.” And what was intriguing was, in a way, I somehow felt comforted by that as opposed to pissed off, like, “Dude, you’re totally unprepared? Are you ready to like rock and roll and jump in and do this? Time is ticking. We got a short…” In a way, I could have had that kind of a reaction but, instead, what was clear to me is that he was totally comfortable just being himself and talking his mind and not sort of withholding anything from me, and I actually felt more comfortable and safe and positive about him in the meeting than if he would’ve gone hard charging like, “Okay, there are six key points we need to cover, and this, this, this.”

Caroline Goyder
Yes. It’s the meta state that matters more, isn’t it? It was his ease that was more important than his perfect deck of slides.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah.

Caroline Goyder
And we forget that. When we get nervous, and we’ve all done it, we think, “I have to prepare. I have to get all of my collateral looking perfect,” and to some people, that does matter, but for most people, it’s back to the meta state of “Do you make them feel comfortable? Can they trust you? Do they get a sense that you trust yourself?” Because confidence means to trust yourself, faith in yourself. And so, this is always the thing that we forget about but it’s the thing that matters most.

Pete Mockaitis
Excellent. Well, Caroline, tell me, anything else you want to make sure to mention before we shift gears and hear quickly about a few of your favorite things?

Caroline Goyder
The thing I’m saying to people all the time is stand up. If you are doing a presentation currently in video conference land, which is going to be here for a few years, if you’re nervous, stand up. Stand up.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Perfect. All right. Stand up. I’m at a desk that I’m currently sitting so that’s why I’m a little bit ashamed. You can see me sitting.

Caroline Goyder
But it’ll be more for the big pitch or the big presentation or talking to the executive committee. The thing is that this is your sweet spot, you’re at ease doing this. If you suddenly have to go and pitch to a big film company or something, then I would say, “Stand up,” because you will feel more confident.

Pete Mockaitis
And I think I tend to stand when it’s just sort of like my body is in a standing mood, like having that option, or it’s like, “Oh, I’m getting a little sleepy. I should not get comfy. I should stand up and have a little bounce.” So, yeah, today, right now, I’m in sitting mode. Maybe next interview standing. But, certainly, when sort of high-stakes situations and you want to project those good things, great tip to do the standing.

So, now, can you share with a favorite quote, something you find inspiring?

Caroline Goyder
I love the Fritz Perls quote “Fear is excitement without the breath.” I think that sums up pretty much what I’ve learnt over the last 20 years, that you can flip fear into excitement if you become self-aware of breath and body.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, thank you. And how about a favorite book?

Caroline Goyder
I mean, a voice coach in the UK has to mention Cisely Berry because she is, was, she died last year, the goddess of voice work, so any of Cisely Berry’s books I recommend. She’s brilliant.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, thank you.

Caroline Goyder
I’m talking about her in the present tense because she hasn’t really gone in my mind.

Pete Mockaitis
And how about a favorite tool, something you use to be awesome at your job?

Caroline Goyder
For a long time, neuro-linguistic programming was really, really fundamentally useful, and in the last few years, Alexander Technique has replaced it. I love Alexander Technique.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And is there a particular nugget you share that really seems to connect and resonate with folks; they quote it back to you often?

Caroline Goyder
The “How can I help?” principle as a way to walk into a meeting and switch off your nerves and turn them into excitement is powerful. Not worrying, “How do I look? Is this any good? What do they think about me?” but “How can I help these people get what they need?” That’s a game changer. And I was taught it by the actor Bill Nighy.

Pete Mockaitis
The Science Guy?

Caroline Goyder
He’s the guy in Love Actually with the glasses.

Pete Mockaitis
Bill Nye, The Science Guy?

Caroline Goyder
No, no, there’s two Bill Nighys. Yes, I wish it was that Bill Nye, but it’s not. Bill Nighy is a British actor who’s in Love Actually and all sorts of…he’s in Pirates of the Caribbean. Google him, but it’s N-I-G-H-Y.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Okay.

Caroline Goyder
And he said, “When I get nervous, and I go into an audition or I go into a film set on the first day, I can either be paranoid or I can think ‘How can I help? How can I help these people do the job?’” It’s a game changer. Just try it when you get nervous. It flips everything.

Pete Mockaitis
And if folks want to learn more or get in touch, where would you point them?

Caroline Goyder
My website CarolineGoyder.com.

Pete Mockaitis
And do you have a final challenge or call to action for folks looking to be awesome at their jobs?

Caroline Goyder
You may never have thought about your voice at work apart from maybe sometimes when it shakes or it squeaks or it doesn’t sound like you want it to, but my invitation to you would be to start to notice your voice, and to start to notice when you are at your best, and to start to be curious about how you can bring that ease and that power to moments where you feel nervous. Because I promise you, that if you find that ease and power in moments where you feel nervous, you will skyrocket your career.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, Caroline, this has been a treat. Thank you. I wish you much luck and inspiration in all of your adventures.

Caroline Goyder
Thank you so much, Pete. It’s been a great chat. It’s made me think as well, which is always good.

Pete Mockaitis
Lisa, thanks for joining us here on the How to be Awesome at Your Job podcast.

Lisa Wentz
Thank you. Thank you for having me.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, I’m excited to dig into your expertise. You’ve done a lot of work coaching folks with speaking and in many different contexts. So, I’d love it if you could open us up by sharing a fun story about working with either a famous pupil or on a famous talk.

Lisa Wentz
You know, that is a great question. It’s a tricky one, and I’m going to tell you why, because many of my clients are anonymous so I can’t say the person’s name really. The other thing about the word fun, a lot of the work I do is very in depth. Certainly, it can be fun but it makes me feel like you want me to tell you something entertaining.

So, here’s what I’m going to tell you. This is the story I’d like to tell you anyway because I thought it was fun. There’s a particular CEO that came to see me. He’s very successful. He’s had his company for 10 years. He’s a great public speaker. And he came to me with an interesting problem. And his problem was that in meetings he would become extremely nervous and thrown off if any of his team members seem disappointed even in the mildest of ways.

So, if he ever had to deliver anything that was bad news, or even mildly bad news, it was really challenging for him to the point where he would start shaking, sweating, his voice would contract, he wouldn’t be able to speak very well. And this was all due to an internal pressure he was putting on himself to please others, and too much pressure to take care of not just to take care of the company, which is his job to lead the company, but to take care of the people in it.

And so, after the first session, we did a couple of sessions on the physiological responses he was having, so the voice and speech problems, the not breathing enough, counteracting the adrenaline rush he was having when he was feeling nervous, and that kind of thing, and also worked on his mindset a little bit, you know, where was all this internal pressure coming from and so forth.

By the, I think, third or fourth session, I felt it was time for him to just face the challenge. So, what I ended up doing was I hired five or six very good San Francisco actors that I knew, put them into a conference room, told him that he was going to deliver them bad news, and he was going to have to deal with their responses.

Pete Mockaitis
You don’t get the part, guys.

Lisa Wentz
And they were phenomenal. He delivered a little bit of bad news about possible layoffs, and one actress was nearly in tears, “How could you do this to me?” just completely guilt-tripping him. Another one was really sort of angry and asking for accountability and those kinds of things. But, basically, these five actors just railed on him for about 45 minutes, and he handled it gracefully, he kept his composure, he didn’t take it on as if it was his fault, he made leaps and bounds, and afterwards thanked me. And the actors had a great time doing it. I gave them backstories and names and everything.

And he was really pleased that after just four sessions he thought this was going to be something that was going to take 10 to 20 sessions because he’d been dealing with it so long. After four sessions, he had it, he was ready to move on like a different person. But that was a fun experience for me because that’s unusual. I don’t usually hire actors to come in and give a CEO a hard time.

Pete Mockaitis
Boy, I mean, that just sounds like what a service to have. That’s kind of cool to be able to simulate all kinds of things when you have access to a network of actors there. That’s pretty cool. Well, boy, I want to talk about a lot of things. You got this book “Grace Under Pressure” but now you got my interest piqued because I, too, I don’t know if it’s as dramatic, but I sure do have a resistance to disappointing people or giving people an unpleasant experience whether I have to fire somebody or if I’m just sharing something that they’re not going to like.

So, any pro tips there? It sounds like there’s a physiological thing for breathing. But you’re able to crack this in four sessions. What are some of the key takeaways for us?

Lisa Wentz
Well, I think, first and foremost, to figure out think about where it stems from. Because, usually, that kind of thing, when we’re giving ourselves a lot of internal pressure, it stems from something. It’s a pressure to be perfect. Maybe we’re giving early messaging that we had to please others that either comes from your caregiver of your parents, or you could’ve learned it in school or from friends, too much responsibility for other people’s feelings and so forth.

Now, of course, if you are a sensitive person, firing somebody isn’t easy and we want to be human as well, and so I’m not advocating for being just cold and not feeling anything of course. But there is something about, like I said, the mindset, thinking through what’s really your responsibility and what’s not your responsibility.

So, is it your responsibility to handle something very professionally? Yes, absolutely. Is it your responsibility to be a kind person? Yes, but it’s also your responsibility to not take on other people’s emotional responses. So, staying with your own purpose and the greater good and sort of what has to be done, if it’s a fire that has to happen, I think it’s that. It’s kind of going to the logic of it. Does that make sense?

Pete Mockaitis
Absolutely. That’s pretty helpful right there in terms of you’d be clearly seeing some things in and out of your zone of responsibility. Cool. Well, what else?
What else should we do if we are struggling with the “I don’t like disappointing people, delivering bad news” stuff?

Lisa Wentz
Yeah. So, first of all, I always start with logic. So, what’s the logic of the situation? Like I said, what’s really your responsibility? I also think that if it’s really something, if anything is really nagging at you that’s pervasive, figure out where it stems from and unravel that part of it. I’ll give you an example. Let’s see.

Let’s say, I’ll make this up, hypothetically speaking. Let’s say you had a caregiver, let’s say, to parent who constantly needed you to be overperforming, and there’s a lot of that. I get quite a few clients who will say to me, “You know, if I got an A, it should’ve been an A+.” “Why didn’t you do even better?” And as if the parent is personally hurt or dissatisfied with them as children. And that kind of a thing, any early childhood messaging we get, we can really hold onto it. And if it’s a situation where there’s not direct abuse or something really, really overtly painful then we might even hold onto it longer because we don’t see how much it affected us. We just take it as, “Oh, this is just how I am.”

And so, to go deeper with this, once you get to the logic of it, I think dealing with the emotional side of it eventually, and this is talked about a lot in the self-help world, sometimes you have to be your own parent, and the side of you that was a child and had too much pressure as a child to please others or to take care of others, then needs to be acknowledged and some healing around that needs to happen so the more adult side of you can do that, say, “Okay, that wasn’t fair. My parent may not have been a bad parent, but that’s too much pressure for a five-year old to take or a 10-year old to take, and I don’t need to do this to myself anymore.” And those kinds of real decisions can really affect you. They can unravel a lot, take a lot of the pressure off.

Pete Mockaitis
Lovely. Well, thank you for that. Well, yeah, that’s just the opener. Let’s talk about your book “Grace Under Pressure.” What’s the big idea here?

Lisa Wentz
You know, I wrote the book for a couple of reasons, but I think the big idea, really what I want the readers to get is that, one, you do not have to be some special person to be a great speaker. It’s not as though only a few people can do this kind of thing. Maybe only a certain percentage of the population have decided to really become great speakers because they needed to for their careers and this kind of thing. But anyone who really wants to be a great speaker can be a great speaker. That’s the first thing.

Talent, and we all have talent, talent really boils down to who you are. It’s you in your most authentic form and the rest is training. The rest is technique.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Excellent. Well, that reminds me a little bit of Aristotle there, some of these components. So, let’s talk about some of these things in particular with regard to technique and things that show up and impact things. Now, you are also an expert on posture, which is pretty cool. So, let’s talk about posture here in terms of its impact on presenting, and how should we think about it, and adjust it, and what difference does posture make when we’re presenting?

Lisa Wentz
Yeah, there’s a few areas we can talk about. One is your internal experience and, of course, then the experience of the audience. If you have, really, what we call a collapsed posture, sort of looking like a marionette with loose strings, like you look weighted down, like gravity is pulling you down too much. You know what I mean by that?

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah.

Lisa Wentz
So, oftentimes, the head goes back a little bit, hips forward, you know, slouching is another way of saying it. Now, for speaking, that’s not ideal because your ribcage and your throat are not going to be in a balanced position, neither will your head. And since we want, when we’re speaking, especially for long periods of time, we want to be speaking in a neutral posture, a lighter posture not one that’s weighted down because we want our breath support to be there, we want to be able to breathe freely. We don’t   want our chest collapsing because then we’re going to take in less air.

If our head is back, we’re going to strain our voice box and overuse it, too much tension, then it creates a strain on the voice. So, a lot of people who speak in their profession, even receptionists or lecturers, will have strained vocal folds. And by the time they start getting real damage then it gets to be too late pretty quick. So, there’s that part. There’s the physical, just the physical health part.

Then what’s interesting too is the audience’s perception of you. If you’re standing on stage, or even if you’re in a meeting, and you’re in a really collapsed state, what kind of a message does that give? Now, most people will not look at a speaker, unless they’re somebody like me who’s a coach, and say, “Wow, that person has really collapsed posture.” No, that’s not going to happen.

But what will happen is that there’ll be subliminal messages. They will read the person who’s speaking as too casual, too relaxed, not to be taken as seriously, sort of not low-low status, but not high status. And anything that distracts, physically distracts an audience, is you’ve got to get it out the window. Anything that distracts from your message should be gone. And being in neutral, you’re not distracting anybody.

The other thing I notice that happens to audiences, especially if it’s, say, a whole day of conference, or a very long speech, or something like that, if the speaker has a really collapsed posture and has that sort of weighted-down quality, the audience will start getting tired, yeah.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah. It’s like using to convey a little bit of sleepiness, and so they’re picking up on that as well.

Lisa Wentz
Yeah.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, so let’s review then sort of head to tail, what does a non-collapsed, neutral, optimal, presenting posture look like?

Lisa Wentz
Right. It’s a hard thing to just talk about, isn’t it, without the visual? So, neutral means that the skeleton, basically, is in a balanced position. The head is balanced on the neck, the shoulders are relaxed, they’re not pulled back, they’re not rolling forward, they’re in sort of a healthy neutral. The hips are just under that, in line with the shoulders. They’re not pushed forward, they’re not pushed back, and so forth. Knees are not locked.

I can certainly give you, there’s many examples of great posture out there because there’s great speakers out there. I have no idea why, but Laurence Olivier is popping into my head, first and foremost. Or you watch some of the older films where it’s expected that people would have really great posture and present themselves really well, yeah. Is that helpful at all?

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, yeah, sure thing. And so then, let’s talk about the neck angle. Is it just sort of like straight ahead, like my eyeballs are kind of forming a 90-degree angle with, if we were to draw a straight line down from neck to the ground? Or how do we go about that?

Lisa Wentz
Yeah, think about it like, let’s start with the top of the head. If you were to think that the top of your head has a paintbrush on it and the bristles are towards the ceiling, and you could paint the ceiling with it, just little bits, that would be a balanced position. If that paintbrush is pointing back, or if the paintbrush is pointing too far forward and it’s not pointing directly to the ceiling, then you’re out of balance.

I think for most people the habit is to pull their head back and their chin forward. And so, I think most people can simply just drop the chin just a little bit. And remember that your eyes have a huge amount of range. You do not need to pull your head back to look up. For instance, you do not need to pull your head down to look down. For the most part, your eyes are in horizon line level, typically if we’re speaking, or if we’re just socializing, or whatever. Your eyes have a lot of range. You don’t need to pull your head around to get them to see what you want to see typically.

Pete Mockaitis
You know, it’s amazing, as we’re having this conversation, I’m realizing that, oh, I could bring my desk up a little bit because where my microphone is relative to my posture.

Lisa Wentz
Yeah. Ergonomics, yeah.

Pete Mockaitis
It’s a handy feature of a stand desk because I could just pop it up an inch or two. Okay, lovely. So, that’s kind of the posture side of things. And so, you’ve got a bunch of suggestions when it comes to speaking and presenting well. I’d love to hear which ones do you see most often tend to be the most transformative in terms of your practices that you’re suggesting?

Lisa Wentz
The most transformative? Let’s see. I think, like I said a minute ago, people are unique, but if I have to choose one, I’d say developing a healthy mindset.

Pete Mockaitis
All right.

Lisa Wentz
Because if we go into situations and, let’s just talk for a second here about what is the sort of dictionary definition of stage fright. Usually, it’s a combination of an expectation to be perfect and a fear of being judged. But when we really look at it logically, that expectation of being perfect comes from your own internal pressure. We aren’t trained to be speakers. Most of us are not trained to be speakers, right?

We don’t learn it in school. We don’t practice it in the home in the same way, and then suddenly we might find ourselves in a career where, “Oh, you’ve got to speak at a conference,” or, “Oh, you’ve got lead a meeting,” and we don’t have any practice with that or any training. So, you have an unrealistic expectation. So, looking at that and letting go of the pressure is a great way to start sort of a transformational movement to being a better speaker.

And the other part is fear of judgment. Most of the time when we’re watching a speaker, we’re at meeting, or we’re at a conference, we’re not thinking about how well they’re speaking or even about them personally usually. We’re just thinking about the content. And so, if you can take your mind off of, “Oh, what are other people thinking of me? How am I doing? Are they liking me? Are they buying into what I’m saying?” and just put your mind, your focus, on the work, or focus on your message, then you can make huge leaps and bounds. You could be more present, more in the moment with your audiences, more effective.

So, going back to answer your question, I think one of the key things that I focus on because it’s so essential is the way you think about how you’re going to present the material and what matters to you most. And, ultimately, whether an audience likes you or not doesn’t really matter. What matters is the work that you’re presenting or the idea that you’re spreading.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Thank you. And so then, that’s handy in terms of just making everything flow in terms of not freaking out and kind of readily get more so into the groove of things. And so, I also want to get your take on a couple particulars. How about breathing? How should we do that ideally?

Lisa Wentz
Ideally, we think of breathing into the lower torso, so into the belly and the back and sides of your ribcage. Most of us will think, “Oh, I’m going to take a deep breath,” and then we pull our chest up. Well, really, the shoulder girdle and the clavicle area have nothing to do with how much air you’re taking in.

When you relax your belly and you breathe in, and your belly muscles move out forward, and your ribcage kind of swings out a little bit, that’s when your lungs are really getting filled with air. And if you’re speaking, particularly for, like I said, a long amount of time and you want the support and the power in your voice, you want to be thinking that way, “I want my belly to move. I want my ribcage to move.” Lower ribcage, that’s where all your power comes from.

Pete Mockaitis
We had Roger Love on the show earlier and he talked about a speaking phenomenon in which you start off with a whole lot of air, but then as you go on, it kind of gets a little that weaker, and he calls it the squeaky edge. And so, how should we think about avoiding that kind of situation?

Lisa Wentz
A really good warmup, a good breathing warmup so that your body is set and ready to go. Yeah, the kind of thing he’s talking about, I think, is going to happen if you’re really holding a lot of tension   because you’re getting in your own way. Ultimately, we’re meant to breathe, our lungs know how to work. Our body knows, thankfully, “We know how to do this,” right? It’s that we interfere with it is the problem. So, if we get nervous, we tense up and we forget to breathe or those kinds of things. But if you just access what’s naturally there, build on it a little bit, then you should be in the green light. You should be fine.

Pete Mockaitis
What’s a good breathing warmup look like?

Lisa Wentz
What does it look like? Starting in a neutral posture is always a good idea. Exhaling first just to empty the lungs so that your lungs want to take in more air. Breathe in very slowly into the belly, even though the lungs are not housed in the belly. That’s just an image. You breathe into the belly. Touch the sides of your ribs, see if they’re moving. And when you have a very full breath, let it out slowly on an S-like Sssss. And when you empty the lungs, pause before you breathe in again.

And you repeat that about four or five times. That’ll open up the voice for you because, again, in order for it to be resonant, you have to have your breath support. And get rid of excess tension. Plus, you’re getting more oxygen to the brain and, hopefully, combatting any kind of nervousness.

Pete Mockaitis
And so, when you’re breathing in, you’re breathing in through the nose?

Lisa Wentz
If you want more of that rib movement, you want to breathe into through the nose. By the end of the exercise, if you do four or five breaths, let’s say, you can start to breathe in through the nose and mouth at the same time, which is how we breathe when we talk anyway. So, you want to mimic speech. If I do a breath warmup with someone, or a vocal warmup with a client, then I will take them through sort of an aggressive actor’s warmup to a five-minute warmup.

By the end of it, we are breathing in the way that we breathe when we speak, it’s just that we’re accessing the belly muscles and the ribcage more so that we have more breath capacity. And then, instead of the S, we’re actually letting out speech, because you want to build up to get closer and closer, which we normally do.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. So, after five-ish of the in through the nose S, then you’re kind of breathing more kind of mouth and the nose at the same time, and then exiting or speaking real words, and air is flowing out of your mouth that way. So that’s a nice little wind up there. Any thoughts for how long we’re inhaling and pausing and exhaling?

Lisa Wentz
You’d only want to pause for a few seconds. As far as much how you’re exhaling, you just want to exhale until you’re basically out of air. You don’t want to be pushing at the end of it or tightening. You know what I mean? Let it out and then pause for a second and then let it come back in.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And so then, likewise, is the inhalation just as long as it takes to fill up, no need to count or anything?

Lisa Wentz
No, you don’t need to count it.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Cool. Well, so that’s the breathing side of things. You mentioned resonance and how breathing is essential to get there. What is resonance and what does it do for us as speakers and how do we get more of it?

Lisa Wentz
So, when we talk about voice and speech and we talk about resonance, what we’re really referring to are the sound waves that are leaving the vocal folds, so the sound of our voice. We’re not talking really about pitch or things like that.

One of the nice things that happens when we build up our breath capacity with exercise like that, we can then start to warm up the voice. So, instead of an S, you might start using a Z, so just a clean Zzzz sound, and that warms up the vocal folds. It can also really clear the throat. You don’t really want to cough or create any tension to clear the throat. You’re better off doing a resonance exercise.

Pete Mockaitis
Could you give us a sample? Like, what would a resonant thing sound like versus a non-resonant thing?

Lisa Wentz
Sure. Okay. So, right now, I’m going to assume that I have a relatively resonant voice because I don’t feel particularly tense and I feel like I have a pretty good access to my breath. So, lack of resonance would be, let’s say, if I started to talk like this, you know, maybe I had a virus. Or if I went to my roots and I went to my valley girl accent, then I would start to talk like this and the resonance would be like in the back of my throat. So, that would be sort of a lack of resonant sound.

Pete Mockaitis
Got you. So, it’s kind of like that maybe vibrational like [sound] going on and compress it there.

Lisa Wentz
Yeah, resonance really is the sound waves that are leaving your oral cavity.

Pete Mockaitis
Certainly. Okay, so the Z is a means of warming up to get there. Any other thoughts to make sure you’re more often in the resonant zone?

Lisa Wentz
If you like to play around with it, you could start with the Z, bringing the sound more forward in the mouth, and then start to play with vowels. Like, ahh, or another vowel and just keep checking in that you have good breath support and that you can feel the vibrations. No need to push for this. Again, the voice is a really strong instrument.

And so, when I say feel the vibrations, you’re putting your hand on your chest, which can also be very calming, you know, right under the clavicle and you could feel the vibration really working, or putting a hand on your nose or any area of your mouth can kind of encourage the sound to increase.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Cool. And so, also, I want to hear your view on when it comes to pausing and stressing words differently, I mean, there’s all sorts of ways you could speak a sentence. What are some of the impacts or how do you think about using pauses and different word stresses to really make your sentences sing?

Lisa Wentz
Yeah, you have to pause. You have to use pauses when you’re delivering a speech, even if it’s a short speech. And I think that many people will have the internal experience when they first start trying that as it being a really long time. It feels like it’s forever when, really, it’s not. So, I try to encourage clients to pause even longer than they think they should. And I try to encourage them to pause logically where they want the greatest effect.

So, let’s say right before and/or right after a key message that they’re delivering, something they really wanted audience to walk away with. Other places that you can pause are when you’re changing topic. So, you might say something that’s really important. You can be delivering, let’s just say, a pitch to an investor and you’ve already talked about your background, and then you’re going to go into, say, the money of it all and what you’re asking for, but you just continually speak. Well, you have given them no time to digest the information on the previous part before you move on, right? And you need that. No matter how smart an audience is, we need time to digest the information. So, those key places.

Also, questions. And this is something I see a lot of people miss. They like to ask a question to the audience when they know the audience isn’t really going to answer the question, but it’s a way of starting off a topic, but then they just start talking or they tell the answer. But think about giving a pause there, even if you don’t expect the audience to answer, you’re telling them, “I want you to think about it,” or, “I respect you enough that I’m giving you time to think about it. I’m not just going to give you the answer.” Does it make sense?

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, absolutely. And what I find is like when people are effective pausers, sometimes it’s sort of like my mind was drifting off somewhere else and then because there’s a pause, I go, “Oh, I’m supposed to…” I was like, “What’s going on?” It kind of like brings me back even though they’re not saying anything. It’s just sort of like, I guess, the contrast of speaking and then not speaking. It’s like, “Oh,” it’s sort of like it actually reclaims my attention. And so, you say people should pause maybe longer than they feel comfortable with.

Lisa Wentz
If they feel uncomfortable with it, yeah.

Pete Mockaitis
So, some folks may think a pause is going on forever but it’s really not. So, what kind of range of time are we talking about here when we pause?

Lisa Wentz
Well, first, let me say the way to measure it is to record yourself. So, if you’re nervous about that kind of a thing, run through your speech, record just an audio recording, play it back and listen to it, and then you can tell, you can say, “Oh, my gosh, that felt like I was pausing for five minutes and it was actually only three seconds,” you know, something like that. So, there are ways to measure this that can increase your confidence. But how long if I had to count the seconds?

Pete Mockaitis
Right.

Lisa Wentz
Five seconds could be an effective pause.

Pete Mockaitis
And you bring me back to, boy, a number of times I’ve done some keynote speaking, and it does feel a little bit terrifying the first few times you do it. But then, afterwards, you just feel, I don’t know, for me at least, I just feel powerful. It’s like, “I don’t have to feel it every second. I’m cool with this. Are you? Can you handle this because I can? What?” I don’t know. Not so aggressively but I like that feeling.

Lisa Wentz
No, I love it. It should be. It should be a feeling of empowerment, yeah.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. So, that’s the pausing element of things. And how about word stress?

Lisa Wentz
So, word stress, for me, again, I usually just start very logically and simply. In English, we stress content words. So, we’re going to stress nouns, what is the thing, we’re going to stress verbs, what’s the action we’re taking, and adjectives, what does this look like, and everything else is pretty much secondary. I think that that can make a huge difference when somebody can just look at their speech.

And even for those listeners out there who don’t necessarily want to write out their speeches because they don’t want to be boxed into a particular delivery. That’s okay, but you could try as an exercise writing out one of your speeches and then decide to deliver it differently later, or writing out an elevator pitch or something like that, and underline the words you really want to stress, and those should be content words.

And the way in which you stress them can depend on the type of delivery you’re giving. It could be that you slow down that word, it could be that you give it more weight, it could be that you over-articulate it, there’s many different ways to stress a word. You can even use the pauses for that. A pause right before and after a word, yeah. But, basically, you’re looking at the content words, what do you really want them to hear.

Pete Mockaitis
And I’m thinking when you started talking about that notion of the stresses and pause, I’m just sort of thinking like the musical quality of some speakers. And I guess I’m thinking about Zig Ziglar, Tony Robbins, and Jim Rohn right now and, boy, when I hear some of their best recordings, of some of these folks, it’s just a thing of beauty in terms of like, “Oh, my gosh, it’s just like this musical phrasing at times that I just want to curl up and listen for long stretches.” So, I know we’re talking about some world-class masters of the craft here, but how do we be more like that?

Lisa Wentz
Well, it’s an interesting thing, isn’t it, because when think about people who inspire us or we think about a great speaker, that’s pretty subjective. There certainly are people that most people would agree are great speakers because they had a lot of conviction, they had good physical and vocal use and all of that. Like you said, it’s almost as if they’re singing or something like that.

But how do we get there? I think that that really inspirational effect on others has to do with being very committed to what you’re saying, removing your ego, trying to remove your ego any way from the occasion, so that again solely your focus is on the idea, or the work, or what it is that you’re presenting and what you want buy-in.

And it’s interesting that you mentioned Tony Robbins because I have nothing against Tony Robbins and he’s had a beautiful wonderful career and helped a lot of people. However, listening to him is hard for me. He clearly has vocal damage because of his speaking past.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, yeah, I completely have some of his recordings a couple of decades ago. I mean, you can hear it now.

Lisa Wentz
Yeah. So, I wouldn’t put him on the top of my list for like a really beautiful resonant voice. But how do you get that way? So, the answer is backing up what you’re saying with conviction, and then making sure your instrument, your vocal use, is in good shape.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s good.

Lisa Wentz
And we hadn’t talked about articulation yet and that’s a big part of it if we can talk about that.

Pete Mockaitis
Please do.

Lisa Wentz
Yeah, so when we are physically very articulate, when we’re really shaping sound well, that’s an interesting thing as well in terms of subliminal messaging. So, we talked about posture and how people could be affected by posture if they’re watching a speaker on stage. You can also be affected by how they articulate the language. And that’s not necessarily an accent thing there. I mean, there’s hundreds and hundreds of accents in English, right? But rather that they are really firmly articulating their consonants, and that their vowels are very what I would call fleshed out.

And you can see it in great actors because they go through all the training for that. You can see it in some of the politicians that you would probably consider great speakers and maybe a few others. But, basically, really great physical articulation is one of my favorite things to teach because you get a lot of bang for your buck. You get your message across very clearly, people will hear you, they don’t have to strain to hear you. And on the subliminal level, I really truly believe that audiences see physically articulate people as smarter.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, yeah, I buy it.

Lisa Wentz
They see it as leadership.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, so could you give us an example of maybe a sentence with some great articulation versus poor articulation?

Lisa Wentz
Do you mean from specific people?

Pete Mockaitis
Well, just in terms of I’m imagining you can say the same words with great articulation versus poor articulation. Can we hear how that sounds?

Lisa Wentz
Sure. Let’s see. So, the book I wrote was called “Grace Under Pressure.” Now, that’s in my accent “Grace Under Pressure,” that’s articulate. If I wanted to say “Grace Under Pressure” then I barely move my lips and sort of sped through it and I was sort of slushy-sounding. Or for those of you at home listening, you could do a little articulation warmup, record yourself, then drink a couple of glasses of wine, and then say the same thing again and see how you sound.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Oh, that’s perfect. So, we have a nice contrast there. You’re reminding me my buddy Avon who, whenever he used to read at church, we used to razz him a little bit about his speaking style but in a way it was excellent. As he would describe it to us, he was Indian. Well, he’s still alive, and he still is Indian, he said, “I pronounce every letter of every word.” And he did and it was very clear. It was easy to understand what he had to say, and he did come across as very smart. He is very smart. So, then, can overdo it though, I guess, when it comes to articulation?

Lisa Wentz
If you overdo it, you’re probably going to come across as slightly condescending. So, I guess the answer is slightly yes. Do you know what that reminds me of? It reminds of the show “Friends.” I don’t usually quote sitcoms but there was a character on that show, which was very popular show, I forget his name now, shoot, the one that was always playing Jennifer Aniston’s boyfriend.

Pete Mockaitis
Let’s see, there’s Joey.

Lisa Wentz
What a slight to not remember him.

Pete Mockaitis
And then there’s Ross.

Lisa Wentz
Ross. Ross. Sorry. And so, the other characters on the show would give him a hard time for being too articulate but, really, it was that, he was being condescending. So, I suppose there could be overdoing it but, in general, no. Most people will not overdo articulation.

Pete Mockaitis
And I think that’s just a great way to frame it in terms of because I find, a lot of times, you’re trying to find a sweet spot. It helps to overdo it in one direction for a moment and say, “Okay, we’ll just back it up a little bit from there.” And so that’s a great way to say it. So, on the continuum from drunken slurring your words together, to pomp is articulation. That’s certainly seems like you think you’re far too good. I guess a British accent will come into play maybe as well. You sort of get the idea, it’s like we want to sound not like the drunk speech-slurring, and not like the “you think you’re better than me” but just a couple notches away from the pompous.

Lisa Wentz
Yeah, it’s funny. I think that that’s a great way of putting it. I think that the second there, the being over-articulate. It’s tone as well. If you’re being warm, you can over-articulate anything because of the tone. They’re going to pick up on the tone anyway, whoever is listening to you.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s good. Well, tell me, Lisa, when folks are trying to learn and improve and grow in these dimensions, what’s sort of the biggest mistakes you see folks make over and over again as they’re trying to grow?

Lisa Wentz
I think I touched upon this already but one of the things is being liked, being focused on “How did I do? Am I great speaker?” those kinds of things, instead of focusing on the content, delivering the content in a way that’s really about the audience, making it bigger than yourself. I think that’s one thing. That’s a trap. I mean, we’re all human. We have our egos.

But setting aside your insecurities and your egos and being able to just focus on, “Why are you there? Who are you speaking to? And why does it matter?” I think that’s a mind shift that I see happening a lot in my office. So, I would say that might be a mistake that people make when trying to improve their speaking when they first start. Sort of like they’re trying to improve for the wrong reasons.

Pete Mockaitis
Thank you. Well, tell me, anything else you want to make sure to mention before we shift gears and hear about some of your favorite things?

Lisa Wentz
Make sure to mention? No, I think I’m good.

Pete Mockaitis
All right then. Well, could you start by sharing a favorite with us, something that you find inspiring?

Lisa Wentz
Yeah, absolutely. One of the quotes I put in the book is from Martha Graham, it’s kind of a longer quote but I’ll read it here, it’s in front of me, “There is a vitality, a life force, an energy, a quickening that is translated through you into action, and because there is only one of you in all time, this expression is unique. And if you block it, it will never exist through any other medium and will be lost.”

Pete Mockaitis
Thank you. And how about a favorite study, or experiment, or bit of research?

Lisa Wentz
That’s someone else’s then? Deborah Tannen is a great person to look at. She’s a linguist, teaches at Georgetown. She’s been around for quite a while, written several books. But I notice that I refer to a study she did relatively often, and it was in the corporate world. She sort of went into the corporate world to study how people communicate, and she boiled down sort of two personalities, two common personalities within the corporate world, and named them cats and dogs, and decided that there has to be a way for cats and dogs to communicate together and learn each other’s needs to make the working environment and the communication environment more effective.

And you can see it. When you really think about it, you could see it in many people. The dog-type personality is a personality that says a lot, they use a lot of words, they tend to over-explain, maybe even ramble on a little bit. They tend to even physically move more. I think that’s where she got the dog from, they sort of physically move more. They are people who tend to be more interested in being liked than respected, and they can be incredibly warm and very valuable.

But their counterpart, the cat, is someone who, by the way, cats are always executives and higher. They’re the VPs and the C levels. They need less words and they become very impatient when somebody is over-explaining. And they move less. They are more still and they’re quick-thinkers, sort of what we think as higher status. And I tend to refer to that every once in a while when I’m trying to explain to somebody, “If you’re faced with this personality, it’s not that they don’t like you, or you can’t work well together, it’s just that you have to meet in the middle on what each other needs.” Does it make sense?

Pete Mockaitis
Gotcha, yes. Thank you. And how about a favorite book?

Lisa Wentz
You know what? Anything written by David Sedaris.

Pete Mockaitis
I saw him live once. That was fun. And a favorite tool, something that helps you be awesome at your job?

Lisa Wentz
Favorite tool? I’ll say a bone prop. Yes, a bone prop. A bone prop is an articulation device that you put between your teeth, and you practice articulation that way. It helps you move your lips and your tongue tip more. It’s quick. It’s effective.

Pete Mockaitis
I’d buy one immediately. Thank you. And how about a favorite habit?

Lisa Wentz
Favorite habit is breathing. Remembering to breathe even in high-stress situations.

Pete Mockaitis
And when you are remembering to breathe in high-stress situations, is it kind of the same rules applied, I mean, no need to count, just do it?

Lisa Wentz
Yup, just relax the belly, and make sure your ribs are moving, take things slow, and slow down not just your breathing but your thoughts as well.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And is there a particular nugget you share that really seems to connect and resonate with your clients and your readers and you hear quoting it back to you again and again?

Lisa Wentz
Perhaps the piece that I tend to say, which is that not to compare yourself with others as a speaker, that you are meant to sound like you not like someone else. And it’s authenticity that audiences crave anyway, so it’s really about taking what you have and developing it further, not trying to mimic someone else or become like that other person you admire.

Pete Mockaitis
And if folks want to learn more or get in touch, where would you point them?

Lisa Wentz
My website LisaWentz.com I think is probably the best.

Pete Mockaitis
And do you have a final challenge or call to action for folks seeing to be awesome at their jobs?

Lisa Wentz
I do but it’s twofold. So, one is if you are a person who is maybe very extroverted or just tends to speak up a lot at meetings, try taking a step back as a challenge, try listening more just to see how that works and how it affects you, and listen to understand not to interrupt, which is a different type of listening. And for people who are not, who might be more introverted or say less at meetings or hold themselves back, just start challenging themselves to speak up.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Well, Lisa, this has been a lot of fun. I wish you lots of luck in all your clients and books and speeches and adventures.

Lisa Wentz
Thank you. Thanks.