Finding Your Professional Voice: Confidence & Impact

Overview

Individuals have a great capacity for vocal expression but most people haven’t had the opportunity to explore and develop it. By the end of this course learners will have gained knowledge of how the voice works, had a chance to experiment with different ways of speaking, and increased their confidence in their vocal expression. This course is aimed at beginners but can serve as a useful ‘tune up’ for those that have some experience in this area or those that want to build upon prior learning. The only prerequisite is to be curious about voice in action and public speaking. Finding your Professional Voice takes the learner on a journey to discover how the voice works, how it can be optimised their use of it, and how vocal impact can be developed in professional settings. The content of the course is useful to all learners who have vocal capacity. Whilst a very few of the exercises would require full physical capacity, those learners physical impairment, or those who do not wish to undertake the movement exercises will still be able to gain useful skills provided by the MOOC content.

Syllabus

Be Aware: Understanding yourself and understanding how the voice works.

This first module is focused on awareness and knowledge of the voice. We'll begin by developing awareness - awareness underpins everything when it comes to learning and building new behaviours and skills. We have a discussion on what a ‘professional voice’ is and how we might begin to find it. You'll be introduced to the basic premise of how the voice is made in the body, and what can get in the way of it working at an optimal level. You'll be guided through several exercises designed to improve your self-awareness and will begin to recognise some of your current behaviours around speaking.

Be Physical: the role of the body in speaking

One of the key components of speaking with confidence and impact is to understand and utilise the body in relation to voice and presence. Looking at areas such as release of tension, alignment, breath and projection, you'll discover new options that will help you increase your confidence and impact.

Be Connected: understanding your audience and how to connect to them

This week will focus on considering your audience, thinking about your message and intention, and learning techniques to help your audience connect to your message. It will also look at how body language can help you increase connection.

Be Impactful: Using emphasis for impact

Building on the work introduced in the first three modules, this week will look at some specific prosody tools and techniques that can be used to create more impact. It will also bring together all strands of the course - being aware, being physical, being connected and being engaging.