Change is everywhere!
For starters, we've now entered Daylight Savings Time — waking up in darkness isn't great but there's a glorious extra hour of daylight after dinner. Did you remember to “spring forward” Saturday night? (Quick PSA: Now is a good time to check your smoke detectors too!)
Another change many of you have acknowledged through LinkedIn recently is that Vocal Impact Productions just hit its 8-year anniversary. I had been running a slightly different consultancy up to that point, but shifted gears (the word “pivoted” is SOOOO overused nowadays!) because I was hearing one challenge and need over and over: Women were frustrated that their voices were not heard – both literally and figuratively – in the workplace.
As a linguist and speech-cognition expert, I thought, “Well I can certainly do something about that!” And with that, I rebranded and launched my first flagship program, “Vocal Empowerment for Women in Leadership” back in March of 2013. Now, in honor of Women's History Month, I thank all of the amazing women out there who inspired this leap of faith for me, took the leap with me, and have been with me ever since!
Of course, I now work with as many men as women, and we've all shared one massive challenge for the last year: the pandemic-inspired shift to nearly all video, all the time.
Yet, despite the fact that by now we're all effectively equipped to video conference from home and are used to it (if not in love with it,) there's one persistent mistake most people still make on video, and it is an extremely expensive mistake, leaving power and influence on the table with every virtual engagement.
Simply put, the problem is your microphone (yes, YOURS), and while it might cost you a few dollars to upgrade it, the cost of NOT upgrading it grows exponentially greater with each passing conversation.
That's why in this week's episode of Speaking to Influence, I'm taking a little detour from my normal interview, and giving you a short, down-and-dirty demonstration of how using your computer's internal microphone is the most expensive mistake you can make.
(Note: If you're thinking to yourself “I think mine's probably good enough,” this message is for YOU.)
Check out this short episode to experience for yourself the difference that microphone quality makes on:
- Branding – Your personal and professional image and reputation
- Cognition – what the listener processes and understands
- Emotion – how much the listener likes listening to you and wants to continue listening to you
- Behavior – the likelihood that the listener focuses on what you're saying… or decides to “multitask” when you talk and more!
And now I'm also asking YOU to help ME make another big change.
To date, I've interviewed nearly 50 incredible leaders from global corporations to local non-profits on the show, and last week I asked for your feedback as we get closer to our first anniversary. To all those who have already offered your thoughts, THANK YOU! Your perspective is worth its weight in gold to me.
For anyone else who would be willing to share some feedback, I would still greatly appreciate your insight. You can reply to this email or take 60 seconds to complete this super-short survey now.
Looking forward to the next eight years and beyond!
Here's to your success,
Laura
