I recently took a class on public speaking. It's not something that I thought I needed, but it turns out that I'm a terrible public speaker. Most people are, but I always thought of myself as relatively eloquent. Turns out, it's not so much what you say, but how you say it.

The woman who was teaching our class is a voice artist with over 50 years of experience. The first thing that she taught us actually took pretty much the entire class to learn, and will probably take even longer to master. But it's so simple and important, that I felt it needed to be shared.

Own your name

Our teacher told us that when she is in charge of hiring other voice artists based on video resumes, she only has to hear the first line of their introduction to know whether or not she can work with them. This might seem harsh, but it's her methodology, so I'm not going to argue with its validity.

Anyway, she asked us all to introduce ourselves and tell the rest of the class what we did for a living.

"Hi," I said. "I'm Andrea Dickson, and I'm a writer-"

"Stop right there," intoned our instructor. "Why are you asking a question?"

"Huh?"

"When you told us your name. You said, 'My name is Andrea Dickson? and I'm a writer...'."

"That's just basic inflection. People talk that way when we have more to say."

Think about it. When you're telling a story, your voice will tilt upwards at the end of a phrase, indicating that the story is continuing (unless you're Canadian, in which case, every sentence is a question, eh?).

This is fine for much of our normal conversation. But as our instructor pointed out, we use upward inflection only when talking about things that aren't as important as the climax of the story. When we introduce ourselves as "Andrea Dickson?", we are putting less emphasis on our names than we should.

When you are introducing yourself to another person, one-on-one, you will say your name with downward inflection, like a statement. "I'm Andrea. Good to meet you." But when you introduce yourself in front of an audience, you start with your name and move on to something else.

In those contexts, it's important to make sure that you introduce yourself as though your name is a statement. Your first name should inflect upwards, and your last name should inflect downwards. So it should so more like "My name is Andrea? Dickson." Follow with a slight pause, then continue with the rest of your introduction. Actually, don't use my name, unless you want to be mobbed by thousands of screaming fans.

Try it by yourself a few dozen times, and then try it out next time you have to give a talk or introduce yourself to a group. You'll be pleasantly surprised at what a difference it makes in the overall tone of your introduction.

(Photo by filipe ferreira.)