Julian Treasure: How to speak so that people want to listen

A reflection by Patrick Kong

I’ve just finished watching this Ted-talk sharing by Julian Treasure and I find it very meaningful and worth to share. Here is my reflection after watching it.

In the beginning, Julian talked about the 7 deadly sins of speaking. And below is the list of it:

- Gossip

- Judging

- Negativity

- Complaining

- Excuses

- Lying

- Dogmatism

I totally agree with him about this as I would like to talk to someone who behaves like these. But when I think more about it, isn’t that sometimes I also do the same thing? So, here, it’s really good reminder for myself not to behave like these. 

He then introduced us an acronym called HAIL, where it stands for Honesty, Authenticity, Integrity and Love. Honesty means that you need to clear and straight when you speak, while Authenticity means you need to be yourself. Integrity is about be your word, which means you’re doing what you’re saying, but we all know sometimes it is very tough to do so because speaking is always easier than doing. The final thing, Love, is what I find most interesting, it is not about romantic love here, but instead, it is about wishing them well. Julian used an interesting example here, it gets hard for you to judge someone when you wish him/her well. Isn’t it?

Next, he talked about the toolbox. In the toolbox, you got Register, Timbre, Prosody, Pace, Pitch and Volume. Most of us have all these “weapons” but it can only be a good weapon when we utilize it. For instance, the Pace, we normally don’t like the silence moment, but sometimes when you’re talking about something very serious or touching or motivating, you can use a short silence or pause to even emphasize your speech. Besides that, for Timbre, which is the way your voice feels. People normally prefer voices which are rich, smooth and warm. If that’s not you, you can always go and get a voice coach and join the training. So, basically you need to know your toolbox, enhance it by practicing and utilize it whenever you need.

All of these are the things that I find very interesting and meaningful to share. If you would like to know more about it, click here to watch the whole video. Thank you.