The company is a microcosm made up of postures and communication, demanding in terms of interpersonal skills. Directors, managers, employees... we all need to master the way we speak in order to establish our legitimacy and win the trust of our employees as well as their loyalty.if we.
Knowing how to speak and assert your ideas while remaining open is quite an art. Lectures, presentations, interviews, sales... all verbal exchanges require a mastery of this skill. Complex and often subtle, speaking is the ultimate asset for calm and constructive professional relationships.
But don't worry: it's not innate, it can be learned and worked on!
Somewhere between naturalness, strategy and improvisation, it requires both know-how and interpersonal skills, all of which are necessary to ensure that you have a certain legitimacy, and even authority, with your colleagues. Grégoire Tournon, communications expert, reveals the essential points to bear in mind if you want to speak assertively and successfully.
Speaking: a question of conviction
A good speaker is one who is convinced of what he is saying or announcing. The first principle to apply if you want to make a success of your speech is to be firm about your convictions while being flexible about the form you take. There can be no question of imposing an opinion, but rather of sharing ideas. You have to be convinced yourself to be convincing. If you don't believe in your message, it's likely to show!
Being assertive
Speaking is never one-sided. Even in the context of a speech, contrary to what you might think. On the one hand, because any speech requires the audience to be taken into account. Secondly, because the audience has a right of reply. So the aim is to express your point of view while respecting others. You must also take the audience into consideration: it is they who must be "transformed" after your speech.
And that's what assertiveness is all about: be clear in your message, firm in your positions, while remembering that the audience has its place. Through their posture, body language, etc. the speaker shows that they are open and willing to listen, ready to understand the point of view of others, even if they are challenging. The aim is not to impose a point of view, but to find a common solution and reassure.
Training: Assertiveness and assertiveness training
A few key principles
So, for assertive speech, you need to bear in mind a few simple practices:
- Distribute your gaze to the whole audience or the people you are speaking to
- Pay attention to paraverbal and non-verbal communication (gestures, voice, position, etc.).
- Practise active listening
- Separate facts from opinions
Beforehand, don't hesitate to rehearse and film yourself.
As a general rule, assertive speaking goes well if you show empathy for your audience and if you don't ignore the possibility that someone in the audience might intervene. The most important thing to avoid is losing the thread of your message. You should therefore respond briefly straight away or take note of the comment and come back to it when the time is right. To sum up: you listen, you understand, you take note, but you carry on.
But the best thing to do is to state the rules at the beginning of your speech: "If you have any questions, I'll answer them at the end".
Structuring your speech
You now have the keys to adopting a legitimate public speaking stance. To preserve this legitimacy, don't let yourself be destabilised.
The more you have practised your speaking, the less you will be disrupted by interventions, objections and other hazards. It is therefore essential to structure your message as much as your speaking time so as to distribute the roles (who speaks and when) and get your audience on board.
The steps :
- A hook to capture the audience's interest
- A reminder of the reasons for speaking up
- A summary of the different parts of your speech
- A few examples of objections to forestall and temper those of the less convinced
- Arguments that support your message
- Examples that resonate with your audience
- A reformulation to clarify
- A conclusion to make an impression
The place of the audience
You need the audience to speak in order to advance your ideas or to make them adhere to your message. Nevertheless, you must remain the leader of your speech: it is up to you to indicate the times for discussion. Either the audience can intervene as you go along (this requires you to be very well prepared), or at the end. The second solution has several advantages:
- No destabilisation during your speech
- You remain in control throughout the exercise
- You can incorporate certain responses to common objections when you speak
Training: Making an effective presentation
Speaking: understanding the environment to master the game
Speaking that works is speaking that leaves room for interaction. That's why it's called improvisation. And to master improvisation, you need to work on two elements over which you have no control: spontaneous interventions and the environment.
Taking your audience into consideration means more than just looking at them or talking to them. The audience is the whole environment in which you speak and what makes it what it is.
- What interests him?
- Why are the participants here? What do they want to learn?
- What is the setting for the event?
- Where do people speak?
Armed with these elements, you can then modulate your message and avoid the monologue. The stories and asides that you incorporate depending on the audience are like a game that makes your speech more spontaneous. This gives your speech more authenticity and therefore more legitimacy.
Interventions: controlled improvisation
You have distributed the roles and speaking times: you are the master of the game. However, you are not a mind-reader and you cannot control everything that is said. The important thing is to interact while keeping your message straight.
Two principles to bear in mind:
1/ Never deny others
Take the speaker into account and respond. For example: "I understand what you're saying, but I don't agree. Can we talk about it later?" or simply "We'll come back to it later". In other words, never close the door on discussion, and especially not in the event of contradiction.
2/ Do not experience objections as personal attacks
In addition, you need to be aware of the emotions generated by the intervention without overreacting.
With a few simple reflexes, it's always possible to keep control of what you say, despite objections (whether anticipated or not).
Examples:
- Take a deep breath and take your time before answering.
- Let the other person get to the end of their objection without interrupting them
- To look at it
- Respond with repartee (humour, counter-attack, irony, derision...)
- Answer "I'll look into it" rather than "I don't know".
Responding to objections
Preparing to speak also means preparing counter-arguments to the objections you expect. In other words, the most frequently encountered points of view and other irritating questions. This is a special case of intervention because, although the objection may be made in good faith, it can also be a pure attempt to destabilise. And since we must never allow ourselves to be destabilised or to ignore an objection, we need to deconstruct it.
Deconstructing an objection in three steps:
1/ Ask for details
This is useful for unmasking imposture or malice, or even for testing the objector's bad faith: "What do you mean?", "Why is this a problem?
2/ Rephrase to make sure you understand correctly
"If I've understood correctly...", "To sum up...".
3/ Look for confirmation
"Are we in agreement?"
It is imperative that you stop this objection process or you risk losing the thread. However, objections, like simple questions, must be emphasised. So, either you answer straight away if you have the answer, or you put an end to it diplomatically ("it's noted, but I don't agree") and move on to something else. This way, there's no time or space for debate.
Training: Public speaking and success
In other words, mastering your speech means knowing how to adapt to your environment. To gain or maintain legitimacy, juggle with the mechanisms of improvisation and repartee, as well as gathering information about the environment in which you are speaking. Legitimacy is the first step towards getting others to support your ideas!
