New Website! New Blog Location!

Please check out the blog's new home at the new website:

silvermanexecutiveconsulting

(or cut and paste: https://silvermanexecutive.coachsecrets/ )

Extra! Extra!

I'm happy to be featured in today's At Work article, "Here's how to talk your way to the top at work"

(click image below to read)

Proud to be interviewed for Esquire's quarterly publication Big Black Book Spring/Summer 2015

How to Give a Presentation:

Interviewed in January 2015 Issue of Marie Claire Magazine

Watch Your Mouth Article: Click HERE or on the images above to read.

That's a Great Question!

As a regular Freakonomics Radio Podcast listener, I was very happy to hear a recent installment dealing with the overuse and dubious motivations for the response, "That's a Great Question." 

We've all employed this device - and sometimes probably in earnest. This podcast shines a light on why we may want to rethink how and how often we use it. 

You Do NOT Want Fry With That

A reporter from Marie Claire recently interviewed me on the subject of a University of Miami study published this past May. The study addressed the phenomenon known as "Vocal Fry" among young women seeking professional success. While you may not be familiar with the term, Vocal Fry, you have likely heard the sound. Here is an example:

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Vocal Fry is a subconscious behavior typically exhibited by young women who artificially lower the register of their voice and "fry" out, or make a growling sound, often at the end of thoughts. If you really want to geek out on this, here is the full study.

NBC's take on the phenomenon:

And an example of how it has begun to infiltrate commercial media:

While the use of this particular speaking style was anything but accidental in the auto commercial above, for  most young women, the behavior is completely subconscious. In fact, many of my younger female clients seek out my support in part because they feel they are not being taken seriously at work, or are being overlooked for advancement - but don't know why. They are told that they lack confidence, seem low-energy, careless, or appear to posses insufficient experience to justify promotion. In most cases, none of these assumptions is true (although a person's confidence certainly dips upon hearing this feedback). What often turns out to be true is that they are unwitting perpetrators of vocal fry, sometimes as a generous side to a main course of "uptalk."

By "uptalk," I mean this:

When it comes to getting ahead and demonstrating leadership qualities, fry and uptalk make for a brutal combination.

Sociologists and behavioral scientists differ in their explanation of how this type of vocal pattern occurs and spreads within a society. They look at whether Kim Kardashian and Brittany Spears are to blame or if they simply echo and amplify the trend. Frankly, I don't really care which came first. I think most clients (and their senior managers and HR leaders) agree that, regardless of its origins, this speech pattern is unnecessarily limiting and needs to go. But how?

"Mastery is the process of going from unconscious incompetence, to conscious incompetence, to conscious competence, to unconscious competence." The origin of this quote is disputable, but the truth of it is not. I like this saying so much it's featured on the front page of my website. This truth is sort of the diet-and-exercise of behavior change. It isn't glamorous, but it's the approach that works best. What we start with is behavior that doesn't work for our purposes. What we want is behavior that will support our goals. The first step is recognizing the behavior. Luckily, as the above quote indicates, this whole process has four steps, not 12!

The second step, conscious incompetence, tends to be the most difficult - we know what we're doing and notice the behavior we want to change just after we've done it. Luckily, it gets easier from there - especially with some good techniques, coaching and self-reflection.

Is it fair that people may be judged and even dismissed based on mannerisms such as vocal inflection and tone when they are otherwise competent and capable? Probably not. Does it matter if it's fair? Definitely not. The judgment of senior management is usually as subconscious as the behaviors they judge. Only we have an advantage: we have the ability to change and positively impact this impression! As a speech coach it is my mission to help those who are ready and willing to make those changes and thus remove obstacles to good, confident communication.

How Acting Training Helps Speakers

If you read my biography over there ->, you'll find out that, prior to my career as an executive coach, I was a professionally trained actor. In fact, I took it all the way to Rutgers University and a terminal degree - Masters of Fine Arts (MFA). The three year MFA conservatory program was dedicated to the study of the Sanford Meisner Technique under the tutelage of the country's most lauded master teachers Maggie Flanigan and William Esper. Only 8 women and 11 men were accepted into the program for my year. I felt very fortunate to be selected to be a part of that exclusive program and to have the opportunity to master a technique that is one of the world's most respected.

So much of what I have learned in my acting classes, scene studies, voice and speech training, and performances on stage and screen, informs the way I coach my clients in their communication. Below is a short video in which Charlie Sandlan, one of Maggie's primary teachers at The Maggie Flanigan Studio, talks about emotion, behavior, and process. These concepts - which I translate into useful techniques, tools and strategies for speaking - are key in the success of my clients.

Most important to both the acting and public speaking process is what Charlie says about emotion as a side-effect or symptom of good crafting and preparation. The emotion in acting of which he speaks is much like the dynamism, credibility and energy most people seek to project in their spoken communication.

Great article on slide decks!

I was just working in Dallas last week facilitating some workshops with a keen focus on slide decks. We were discussing the intention of the deck and how so many don't do much to support that intention. In many cases, the slides act as more of an obstacle to good communication as opposed to the support for that communication. I returned to New York City to find this well written and clear post on that very subject, so I thought I'd share it with all of you.

Read it here: Article

Let me know what you think!

Interesting illustration of stage fright (and how to cope with it!)