Mark's a nice guy and has great advice, but I'm about to challenge this piece of advice:
"um", "like", "you know", etc. are *FINE* and *NATURAL* when giving talks.
You are better off spending your time practicing other aspects of public speaking than trying to eliminate these.
"um", "like", "you know", etc. are *FINE* and *NATURAL* when giving talks.
You are better off spending your time practicing other aspects of public speaking than trying to eliminate these.
There's a reason we tend to use these filler words - it's a natural partner of human speech. They appear in every natural language. The serve an important linguistic purpose.
The biggest is that in conversations they indicate that the current speaker isn't done with a thought, so that other people int he conversation don't interrupt. Of course, when on stage it's a one side conversation. But- this isn't the only purpose.
They can also be used to emphasize the next phrase that comes after- people tend to pay more attention after a filler word. It also lets the audience in on your emotions - like if you're about to approach a delicate topic.
They also give the audience time to process and catch up. While we can listen a lot faster than we can talk, we can't understand faster than we can talk. So these fillers tell your audience to process a bit before the next phrase.
It also humanizes you! I get super freaked out when people don't use filler words and don't blink and don't breathe during talks. Be human, be conversations, be affable.
There is research on all this and if you're curious the terms to search for are "filler words" and "disfluencies". Research seems to show that there is a "sweet spot" - too many fillers and you come off poorly, but there's a big threshold underneath that where people don't notice
and they even (subconsciously) appreciate it and understand more!
*part, give me an edit button, Twitter.
(oh btw if you're wondering why I'm qualified to talk about this - I've been doing public speaking for something like 12 years and I'm a staff-level devrel person)
