Thursday, January 21, 2010

Getting rid of fillers

Are you someone who resorts to 'ummmmmm', 'aaaaaaaaaaaaa' and such other sounds between sentences? Its easy to find out. Record yourself giving a speech for 5 mins (use a mounted handycam for best results, but you can choose other devices as well). Once recorded, observe your speech patterns. And count the number of times you use fillers while talking.

As a corrective action, you can request a friend or someone to remind you everytime you use a filler. Other tips which can help are - plan in your mind the speech that you'll be giving so you do not do a lot of thinking and unconsciously use these fillers. Another approach which seems to have worked is speaking slowly and deliberately. Enunciate when you're talking and take appropriate pauses.

These strategies and tips, over time, will help you in reducing and eliminating these fillers. To see the difference, re-record a speech again after a month of practice and count the number of Fillers again. If its less, practice more. If it's more than the last time, then buy my forthcoming book.

Friday, January 8, 2010

Action oriented CVs

To make the most of your CVs, use action words to describe what you DID - roles and responsibilities, achievements, etc.

So, instead of:
- I was Leading a team of 6

write -
- Led a Team of 6

Some common action words - Managed, Developed, Reported, Handled, etc.