Mel: [00:00:00] For some people, the thought of standing up on a stage and speaking in front of people is the epitome of a nightmare For others, even the thought of standing in front of a few colleagues to speak is enough to make them break out into cold sweat. And for others, again, it's all about how they sound in their own heads and the narrative they've told themselves about their own voice.

If any of these feelings resonate with you or you know someone with whom they might resonate, then this episode is for you because in today's episode, I'm interviewing the wonderful Sally Prosser. Sally is a voice and public speaking coach. TEDx speaker, author of Voiceprint and host of that Voice podcast.

Over the past 20 years, she's helped hundreds of professionals speak with more confidence. Had a career as a TV news reporter and has built a community of 300,000 or more people on TikTok. Sal lives in Brisbane, and her hobbies include jigsaw puzzles, Pilates, and gaming, the Frequent flyer program, A [00:01:00] Girl After My Own Heart.

Today I chat with Sal about all things, finding your voice, how to use your authentic voice to communicate clearly and leave the right impression with your audience. So enough of my voice. Here's Sally.

Sally Prosser, welcome to Less Chatter, More Matter.

Sally: Great to be here. Thanks for having me.

Mel: I am very excited to talk to you because I have been a long time fan girl on LinkedIn. But before we get to my questions, can you tell our audience a little bit about you? Who are you? What's your expertise? How did you come to find that space?

Sally: Absolutely. So I am all things voice. My mum tells me I was born microphone first. So whenever, since I was a young child, I asked for a microphone from Santa and the first thing I did was give a thank you speech to Santa for getting me that microphone.

So my whole background, public speaking, debating drama, I've really had this. Tendency to go into [00:02:00] communication and voice. And then at uni I did law and journalism. Went into journalism, worked in broadcast radio news, then television news. Then I went to the other side of the microphone and was the spokesperson for one of the largest water and sewerage companies in Australia.

So yes, I was the glamor girl for things you should and shouldn't flush. And that was about eight years ago now, which is when I left to begin this business, which is where I help people find their voice and speak with confidence, clearly communicate, but more than that, be able to get in touch with their voice as part of who they are.

Because I find with communication, it's often a block between what people think they should say and how they should say it, and what feels natural and good for them inside. So as a voice coach, I am bridging that. Gap and bringing people home to the voice they always had.

Mel: Oh, I love that. And it's such an important thing too.

I think it's a skill [00:03:00] that, uh, we will delve into more in this interview, but it's not something that we're often taught, is it in the school or, uh, even, you know, by our own families often to have that confidence in the voice. Right?

Sally: Absolutely. I'd, I wrote about this in my book about the family voice print.

And I think a lot of it is picked up by osmosis in our families. So I'm one of four children, so really we had to have a loud, confident voice just to get a word in edgewise at Christmas.

Mel: Yeah.

Sally: So I saw my mum just being able to talk to anybody, whether it was somebody at the department store or talking to somebody at school. And then my dad, he would always do speeches at our, you know, birthdays.

And he was always strong on the phone. I could really hear that voice. And he's been gone more than 10 years now, and I can still hear his voice clearly in my mind. And so I grew up with really strong voices and really strong examples of stepping forward and using your voice doesn't matter who it is.

That was something [00:04:00] that also I learned in my family. It doesn't matter if it's somebody who's delivering a letter or somebody who's. The Prime Minister. I remember once I was in Sydney and we were, I was doing a speech and drama exam and John Howard, the Prime Minister at the time, was on his morning walk in his tracksuit, and my dad was like, morning John, how you going?

And just struck up this big conversation. And John Howard was really great about it, but it was really one of those examples where we were taught that it's of course, respect everybody. And communicate clearly with everybody no matter who they are or where they're from. And we learned that in journalism as well.

You know, to be a good journalist, you've really gotta be able to develop rapport with a wide range of people.

Mel: Absolutely. And I really like that you talked about, you mentioned the word respect there, and I think that's. So important today, more than ever, you know, we're seeing a lot of people use their voices, but not very necessarily respectfully in that public discourse either.

Ooh, yes. Uh, and yeah, it's something [00:05:00] that, uh, maybe we'll chat a bit more about, but I want to get back to, you know, where your area of expertise really is. And can you share with us, when you are talking with your clients, what are some of the common anxieties or challenges people have with finding their voice with speaking publicly?

Sally: Mm. Number one is the what will people think.

Mel: Mm,

Sally: what it means and what will I say? What do I say and what will they think? And so a lot of my work is around breaking down that and saying, well, the message that wants to come out needs to be stronger than the fear to put it out. Hmm. So there are people in life who say to me, Sal, I don't know why you're on LinkedIn, why you're on social media.

I just wouldn't, wouldn't know what to say. I dunno. You know, I really admire the way you're always putting stuff out there, you know? But these are often people who are in roles where, I mean, maybe Meow would argue that everybody needs to be [00:06:00] starting to think about their personal brand in this mm-hmm.

World we live in. Uh, but there are people who can live their lives quite happily and. I have no interest in social media. So what I always say is, if you've got genuinely no interest, that's fine. You know?

Mel: Yeah.

Sally: But if it's a great channel to use to get your message across and you are feeling like you can't, then that's a different story and that's what we want to change.

Mel: And so I guess that leads me to the next question. What do you think are some of the myths or the common myths around speaking?

Sally: I'd say the biggest myth. And this one might be a little bit left field, is that public speaking is a noun. So people think, oh, public speaking is this thing almost like outside themselves.

And partly that's what creates fear around it. It's like this big monster that I need to go and to [00:07:00] confront. Whereas speaking is, it's a verb, it's just to speak. We are just using the channel of our voice to get our communication across. In that moment, you and I, both comms people, sometimes you really do need to put it in an email.

Like there are times when having it in writing and having it clearly and it being in a, a way that a lot of people can have it all there in black and white is the most effective way to get information across.

Mel: Yep.

Sally: Yeah, I, I'm a voice coach who uses a lot of writing in my communication. I mean, I just wrote a book, which was kind of challenging though because there was lots of parts of it that could only be done properly in the audio book, because I'm like, how do I demonstrate.. This speaking related thing in the book. And that's what it comes down to. So say I'm working with a professional and they're speaking in front of a meeting.

Mel: Mm-hmm.

Sally: And sometimes meetings could have been an email. Right. I hear that. But I'd say, okay, so it's not an email. You've got this opportunity to be in front of people. Your voice, the way [00:08:00] you're delivering it, the emotion they can hear, the resonance they can feel is what makes all the difference.

Mel: Mm.

Sally: And it's been shown time and time again that a well delivered lie is more believable than a poorly delivered truth. That's not a very nice fact

Mel: reality, but it's, yeah.

Sally: But it's just so important for people to be able to understand that it is not... just the what it really is, how you say it, people are picking up on the tone, the intonation, the gestures. They're wanting to hear and feel if it's all aligned, that the words match the voice, match the gestures, match the facial expression. And this is why it's such a superpower to have with the rise of AI.

We know at the moment, I dunno about you, but people are like, oh, is it AI generated? I don't know. You know, we don't wanna be tricked.

Mel: It's getting hard to tell.

Sally: It's getting hard to tell. It's, whereas if you're stepping up and you are 100% organic human voice with so much [00:09:00] alignment, there's no confusion and you can really connect with people.

Mel: Mm. It sounds like a couple of things there. One is, uh, like you said, the tone of the message matters as much as The message itself, there's a really interesting experiment, um, in the behavioural science world that they did, uh, involving people reading testimony in a fake sort of court case. And in both circumstances or, or the test subjects heard the same thing, but when somebody delivered in a really harsh, mean kind of tone versus somebody you know, in a friendly kind tone, they were more likely to find in favour of the person who delivered the testimony.

Who was kind and approachable, even though the words were exactly the same, the facts of the case were exactly the same. And it brings me to the second point, which I think you're alluding to here, is the inherent humanity of using your voice. You know, that's something you can't get really to that level out of writing or out of, um, the AI [00:10:00] work that we were talking about.

Sally: Yeah. And when it comes down to trust, like that's what communication really is. It's about having that trust. And when lawyers talk about a good witness, going back to that study, I hadn't heard of that. That's so fascinat that, that really sounds like something that would be useful for me to you.

Mel: I'll send a link to you.

Sally: Yeah. The, the good witness. It's not what they're saying, it's are they likable? Mm. It's the way that they speak and, and the way they sound. Is that going to make the jury or the judge. Like them,

Mel: believe me and like me. Yeah.

Sally: No, I'd say that's the first myth of people thinking, oh, it's this thing outside myself, rather than speaking, just being a particular vehicle that you choose as being the best way to get information across at the time. And the other biggest myth is that, Public speaking. It's, it's not really a myth, but it's something I hear all the time. Everyone doesn't like public speaking. Yeah. Like, no one likes public speaking.

These sweeping [00:11:00] statements. No one likes public speaking. Everybody hates the sound of their voice. You know, and this really, really work with that inner voice. Because if we make these sweeping statements about things, then, as I say in my book, if you say so, you are, you are creating the reality that you're going to experience.

Mel: It's the stories we tell ourself, right? It's that narrative of, well, I've never been good at speaking. I've never liked it. I've never, you know, I got told once my voice sounded like, you know, a 12-year-old naly girl. Uh, and I've noticed on LinkedIn lately, you've been sharing some videos around that concept as well, the sound of your own voice.

Can you talk to us a little bit more about that?

Sally: Yes. I'm just having a look here. I had it with the, the voice print confession phone.

Mel: Oh, just, yes, the phone.

Sally: It is just here. Yeah. So I run this project where I asked people, I had to pick up the phone and this was the idea of it being old school phone, no texting or anything like that.

Mm-hmm. And that it was a confession that no one was watching. You know, [00:12:00] forget dance, like no one's watching this was speak, like no one's listening. And uh, one of the questions was, has anyone said something mean about your voice? And there were, oh, it's too twangy, it's too Australian, it's too nasal, it's too this, it's too that.

A lot of the answers were, oh, the meanest things I've said about myself. It's interesting how we create this identity around the sound of our voice. I have been told on the same video in comments. I could listen to your voice all day.

Mel: Mm-hmm.

Sally: And you have the world's most annoying voice shut up like on the same video, you know?

And so then we have to really ask ourselves that nothing is the truth, it's just what we choose to believe.

And. The more, the younger generations aren't experiencing this as much because they're recording and hearing themselves back [00:13:00] a lot more.

Mel: Yeah, that's really true. Yeah.

Sally: Than previous generations. Um, there is a difference to it. When we hear ourselves speak, it's through bone conduction, which means we actually have built in shower voice.

When we hear ourselves back on a recording, it's through air conduction conduction. So our voice actually does sound different. Hearing it back, um, it's called voice confrontation. When we're like, oh my gosh. What does that sound like? And in in my book, I write a whole chapter called Operation Voice Cupid because if we don't learn to love our voice and we don't have this relationship with it, how can it have influence for other people?

It's like a pet. You've gotta nurture it, care for it. If you neglect it and treat it badly, it'll turn around and bite you and it won't be there for you.

Mel: I love that analogy. And actually, I do remember the first time I heard. My voice recorded, you know, outside of a, a, you know, 1989, uh, you know, camcorder recording.

Uh, I was, I also did journalism as an undergrad and majored in [00:14:00] radio. And the first time I heard my voice back after doing a radio piece, I was, I've just felt like I sound like a little girl like nobody else said that I said that. And yeah, it, it was quite, uh. I guess, you know, I still remember it to this day 'cause it was a little bit confronting.

I didn't think of myself as a little girl, but in my head I sound like a little girl and it did make me really rethink how I talk. Um, and, and that's something also I think, and I'm sure you've seen this too, it comes with practice as well. Not just the confidence, but the capability to be able to have a conversation without all the ums and the ahs and the, the second guessing and, and those sorts of things.

Sally: Definitely there's so much skill involved in it. And you mentioned like the little girl voice. I have got a radio background and have worked with lots of young journalists. And actually the first call of our year for my group program, soul speakers was how to speak with Resonance. Because a pattern that's happening is most people speak too much in their head and they just [00:15:00] use the head resonance and it's this nice voice, especially for women, it's the, you know, I don't wanna be a bitch pitch.

It's, you know, everything's fine and we stay up here. It can get so high, it goes into a pitch that only dogs and small children can hear. So one of the biggest things that I'm doing as a voice coach is returning the voice to the body. Like the voice runs from the soles of your feet to the crown of your head, and where most, you know.

Executives, leaders, everyone's letting themselves down, is that they're not accessing the voice in the heart to be able to really get that genuine feeling. They're not able to go down to the solar plexus, which is the great motivator, which is where action lives. So if someone's going, oh, can you send me that email?

It's gonna sound like a good idea because the head is where ideas live. The solar plexus is where action lives. So it's literally where in the body you are producing your voice, which will connect with your message. Yeah, really important in high stakes because in high stakes, your body's squeezing up like a tube of toothpaste.

You're getting a lot of tension, and then the voice pops up [00:16:00] high and you lose that power of it being right throughout your body. So of course, as a voice coach, a lot of the work I do is around how you feel about your voice and that relationship, but that comes with actually learning how to use it. Most people are walking around with this beautiful 88 key piano and just banging on one note again and again and again.

And wondering why they're not getting different results when we've got this beautiful set of keys and once you can learn how to play and how to express, whoa, the difference is absolutely incredible. Especially, well, I shouldn't say especially in so many situations, but speaking to the media, you'll have a spokesperson who will say all the right things.

Oh, like if I saw the transcript, I'd be like, yep, key message bridging. Boom. Like, love it. But because they haven't produced it from their heart, they're gonna sound like they're lying because their airflow hasn't been good. They're gonna sound like they're lying. Yeah, because it's in their head, they're gonna sound like they're not confident and credible, you know?

This is why this is so [00:17:00] important, because you can have the best letter, but if you can't deliver it and no one receives it, then what's the point of writing it in the first place?

Mel: Yeah. And I think, yeah, if we speak the language of the corporate world, which you know, you and I have both been in, it is a reputational risk, isn't it, at that personal brand level to not invest in.

Uh, I guess upskilling your voice in that way and, and not putting the time into thinking it's more, it's important. Yeah. I think a lot of, uh, the work I do and I have done over the last 25 years is everyone's so focused on that media statement. They're so focused on what word we're going to use here instead of here.

And then when it comes to the crunch and the CEO has actually front up in front of media or shareholders or employees, it doesn't matter what words you had in that statement that everybody argued over for weeks beforehand or hours beforehand. It's how it's delivered. That makes all the difference.

Sally: There's an amazing voice coach called Dr. Louise [00:18:00] Marla. She's on LinkedIn as well, and she did this amazing post the other day as a voice coach. We work in the land of air. You, your voice is powered by air. Almost everything comes back to the breath. And she said that leadership is all about air management.

And I was like, boom. That's what it is. Because if they're in front of those shareholders or in front of that microphone and they're not managing their airflow, not being able to regulate their nervous system and give their voice the fuel required. Game over

Mel: Bam. Brilliant. So I really like that. Yeah.

And look, we've been talking a bit about the preparation that we have in terms of, you know, those bigger events. But a lot of what we do in a workplace is spontaneous speaking. It's, you know, I'm need to pipe up in a meeting, or I've met somebody on the stairwell or in the lift so that I, you know, it's an opportunity to have a conversation.

How could we use our voice to make these spontaneous moments? More powerful, less worrying for us.

Sally: Yeah. So the way I work [00:19:00] is we prepare in the masculine, deliver in the feminine, prepare in the yang, deliver in the yin. And what that basically means is we prepare the frameworks, we prepare the, the loose structure, and then when we deliver, we want to go into that feminine flow.

Adaptability, being able to read the room. To give you an idea, a lot of people preparing the masculine, I need to know everything I'm saying. I need to work out every single word. Every single one of my slides has has written notes of what I'm going to say, and then when I deliver it, I do it exactly like that.

And I think it went really well because I didn't say anything that I didn't plan to say when actually it was real disaster because they didn't have rapport, they didn't connect, they couldn't read the room. It was, you know, good Alternatively. Which is what I find with on the spot speaking is people are totally in the feminine.

Oh, I'll just feel into it at the moment. Oh, it'll be fine. I'll just think of the right thing. It comes along. Oh, and then it's usually a mess. So one example is here is using the framework of what I call the Baton handover. So for any [00:20:00] extemporaneous speaking or speaking on the fly, you can use this structure and the first structure is one line.

Taking it from the person before, which could be like, thanks, Mel. Great point, Tom. Just, that's it. The next thing you say is a line that involves the number one, two, or three. There's one story I'd like to share. There's two options we could take with this. There's three main things we need to be looking at.

If you go over three, it's too many to remember, but you say one line that includes one, two, or three, and then you obey those rules. You give your one story, your two options, your three points. This is really good for not getting interrupted as well, because often people will interrupt because they don't know where you're going or what you're gonna say.

But if you've told us that you've got three points, then we are right. Okay, we've gotta wait for these three points. You say the three points, and then you do not add onto that. And then the last line is handing back. Is that handing to the audience? Is that handing to the chair? Is that handing to the next person?

That is so much control because if you don't [00:21:00] know how to take the baton, set the rules, obey the rules, and hand the baton back, like that's full masterful communication, then someone will interrupt. Then you won't know when to stop speaking and you run into trouble. So. See how, even though it might feel like it's on the spot talking, it never is.

If, if you've got your frameworks that you can put in there.

Mel: I love that. And it does echo what, uh, Matt Abrahams from, uh, I think he's at Stanford University. Uh, he talks about in his book, uh, yeah, having, like preparing for the spontaneous, essentially. And, uh, I, but I love the baton reference. I feel like that's a really great analogy for people to get their head around and go, yeah, like it's not just about me actually, like it is, but you control that situation, which is.

I feel like that's where a lot of our nerves often come from is just this feeling of lack of control.

Sally: Yeah, you're right. We teach people how to listen to us

Mel: a hundred percent.

Sally: We teach people through the clarity and what we say through [00:22:00] our pausing, and I write this in my book as well.

I say's, easy to wing it when you've been preparing your whole life.

Mel: Mm-hmm. Yep. Love that.

Sally: You know, so it's really about people not comparing where they are with someone else, without knowing all of the things that they've done to get there.

Mel: Yeah, a hundred percent. I, I get, uh, comments every now and then after I've spoken at an event going, oh, you're just such a, you know, good speaker and natural speaker, and, well, a, I know my stuff inside out, you know, this isn't new material for me.

So it. Something that I'm deeply familiar with. I've written two books about this sort of thing, but also, as you say, it's not my first rodeo and it's taken a long time to build that up as well and to refine and practice and change things and get feedback and change again. Uh, what seems effortless often is very rarely effortless, I think in many ways.

Sally: Yeah, there's a lot of effort that goes into being effortless. [00:23:00]

Mel: There you go. Put that on a t-shirt. Uh, okay, next question. What are some of your three to five tips? If somebody wants to start now, they want to improve their confidence with their voice, what are some of the top tips you'd give them to get started?

Sally: Upskill yourself. We are more, as you say, when you know your material inside out, you feel more confident.

Mel: Mm-hmm.

Sally: I have people that feel more confident speaking before their first session. They just feel more confident because they've made the decision to book it in. And often speaking gigs come in between that time because it's the energetic

Mel: Yeah.

Sally: Uh, thing that's been put out there. So I would say there's so many great podcasts. There's great free resources. I would say, uh, make a transaction. Because if you're just playing around the free content, that's not really a commitment to yourself to do it. So I would say do some training. The second thing is, is start [00:24:00] breathing.

So every day, just take five conscious breaths, breath in, breath out, breath in, breath out. Because normally a voice that struggles is because breath is struggling. The breath is not deep. It's very hard to speak from the solar plexus like I mentioned earlier, if the breath's not getting there, so breathing.

And then the next thing I would say, humming as well is a good practice, but we need one that involves doing it in front of other people. So I would say a volunteer to speak at the meeting. If you haven't got the opportunities to put yourself into that little area of discomfort, then pick up your phone. And do an Instagram story.

Do a LinkedIn video. You know, it's interesting as well, when I have some people go, oh, I really wanna speak on stage. I'm like, well, why haven't you posted videos on social media? Oh, I couldn't possibly. I'm like, well, let's just take this in some steps. Right? The more confident you are on camera, the more confident you'll be posting online, like radio.

For me, [00:25:00] going from radio to TV was a step up. But then going from TV now to posting on social media, it feels. Much easier than live on national tv.

Mel: A little less stressful.

Sally: Yeah, sometimes. Sometimes, yeah. But you're absolutely right. Uh, and so I'd say put yourself into those uh, situations, not the fear zone.

Don't go from. Zero to hero. Like don't go from, oh, I'm not saying anything to now. I'm gonna speak in front of a thousand people because I've seen professionals, uh, do that and often it's because their management has set them up for failure and that's not good. They've just put them, um, too far and then you'll retreat.

So you've gotta identify where is your, like growth zone, what's something that just feels a little bit uncomfortable? And go for it and do it.

Mel: I love it. Baby steps, right? It's like with anything, we, we never, we weren't born knowing how to walk. We weren't born knowing [00:26:00] how to drink out of a cup. We had to learn everything.

So, you know, this is no different. It's little baby steps that we build up over time and, and nobody's gonna deliver confidence to your door. That's something I say to some of our clients is it's not just gonna come overnight, and here it is in a package. You're gonna get little bits of it in the mail and it's gonna build up to something.

It doesn't happen overnight.

Sally: Absolutely. Confidence is a feeling. I like describing confidence like a garden, like I feel like I have quite a lot of confidence now because I am tending to a pretty mature garden, but it started small. It's every day. What are you doing to build confidence to water those plants?

And I mean, you can DM me and you'd be like, you sound, I'm a crazy person, but I do a lot of mirror work. And even naked mirror work. So if you can stand naked in front of your mirror in the morning and be like, I'm so glad I'm you, you and me babe, are gonna slay the day. You know, because every day we get to choose our allies and our enemies, and they live inside our [00:27:00] head.

It really is you, against you. And so what, what are your practices that make you feel invincible? You know, this is why I, I, I do things like 10 day silent retreats and climbing mountains. Snow covered in my underwear and this when was underwear in like, you know, active wear, cold exposure. And then, uh, this September I'm walking the Camino de Santiago, which is an 800 kilometer.

I know, maybe I shouldn't talk about this until it's done.

Mel: No, it's accountability now. Now you have to do it.

Sally: Well,

Mel: it's booked.

Sally: It's booked when I'm going. And I guess I'm sharing that because we become confident when we do things that we didn't think that we could do. And when we keep promises to ourselves, so if you say you're gonna do something, whether it be post a video or speak to a person or send an email, or whatever it is, keep the promise to yourself.

Because if we set up this series of, of letting ourselves down, then it creates this [00:28:00] narrative that, oh, well we, we failed, we, we didn't do it. Yeah.

Mel: Love that. Now I want to ask about the book because it is brand spanking new and it's out there right now and we've talked a little bit about it, but tell us, where did the book come from?

What, what's the thing that you're hoping will be left behind with readers after they have a look through it?

Sally: Oh, Mel, I love that you chose the words left behind because that's why it's called voice print. You know, so much of the power of our communication and our speaking is not while we are doing it, it's actually the mark that we leave behind.

Mel: Mm-hmm.

Sally: You know, some people will talk with what I describe as no consequence. They'll say something and people will leave, and they won't even remember that that person was there, what they said, how they said it. That's, that's the reality. A lot of people are speaking to be forgotten, but if you are speaking to be remembered and leaving that voice print, that invisible mark, you leave on the world when you speak [00:29:00] where the words you say and the way you say them echo in people's minds.

I mentioned earlier about my dad, how I can still hear his voice now, and we all have those people, don't we? Mm-hmm. But we go, well, I remember when that person said that we remember the strong voices. And so that was the. Feeling behind voice print. Also, my approach is voice from the inside out. And what I mean by that is every voice is different.

It's your unique voice print. And I found in my experience that sometimes I have shared some frameworks and there are definitely frameworks and things that everybody can use, but if we're so tied to there being one right way of doing things, it can stifle the most important thing we have, which is our authenticity, our individuality with our voice.

Mel: So if I am going to, uh, go pick up the book today and I flick through it, what are some of the, apart from, you know, the, the imprint that we just talked about, what are some [00:30:00] of the key things that I'll find in that book? What are some of the little magic sparkles that are in the book?

Sally: Oh, it's full of magic sparkles.

So especially the whole middle part, the V-O-I-C-E formula is. What you can actually do. The vibrations, openness, I is for intonation. C is for clarity, E is for expression. It's all with exercises as well. There's lots of pullout exercises for you to, uh, to do and exercise your voice. It's just like a muscle that you need to and.

The book also invites you to think about voice in a completely different way. So there's a whole chapter on how you can use your voice to manifest things in your life. There's a whole chapter about voice care, leaving your voice print behind, and not just voice health, like caring for it, which is so important.

There's a big difference in the way people's voices sound in their seventies and eighties and nineties.

Mel: Mm.

Sally: That's very true. And it's an exact reflection of how they've looked after it and how [00:31:00] they've exercised it, and, you know. If the rest of your body's breaking down as you age, you want to have a really strong voice.

I've had clients, I share the story in the book who came to me because she couldn't talk to her grandkids on FaceTime. They wouldn't talk to her because they couldn't hear her 'cause her voice was so weak. Yeah. So we go deeper than that and say, well, what is the voice print legacy? Can you break the speaking cycle?

I spoke at the start of this about my parents. We had quite a strong voice print in our family, but other people. We don't talk about that in this house. Sweep it under the rug. Don't embarrass the family. Oh no, we couldn't possibly speak loudly. That's obnoxious. Be polite. And so if you've got these kind of voice print stories in the family, you can change that and you can break the speaking cycle.

And that gives you a bit of an insight into how this book, it's a business book, but, and it's a personal development book [00:32:00] and. As Dr. Catherine Ball, who's an amazing LinkedIn creator. In her testimonial, she said it's the modern manifesto you didn't know you needed.

Mel: Ooh, I love that. Well, if that doesn't get our listeners wanting to rush out and buy a copy right now, I dunno, what does, uh, where can they find it?

Sally: Voice Print by Sally Prosser. It's available online. It's in Dymocks. It's in many, many stores. And as long as you're saying Sally Prosser and see the red too. Red to be pink, too pink to be red, just look out for that colour. And if not, just message me on social media at Sally Prosser voice and I'll point you in the right direction.

Mel: Amazing. Thank you. Now we have three questions we ask every guest on the podcast. Are you ready for those?

Sally: I'm ready.

Mel: Let's do it. The first one is, what's the best communication lesson you ever learned and how did it change the way you communicate?

Sally: So it's from my former boss. Her name is Michelle Cull. She works in [00:33:00] communications at Logan City Council at the moment. And she would always say, define or be defined. Define or be defined. And it's a, it's a way that whenever we feel like, oh no, we won't say anything, we're gonna stay quiet. Pipe down, bad strategy. Because if you don't write your story, someone else will.

Mel: Mm-hmm. Hundred percent. Especially in a crisis. Right.

Sally: Especially in a crisis. Absolutely. Uh, so very, very relevant for corporate communication. Also relevant for personal communication. Like if you're worried, oh my gosh, people are gonna judge me, look, they're judging you anyway. Yeah. So you might as well have them judging you on you out there using your own authentic voice.

Mel: That's exactly right. And there's also, it's called the spotlight effect, where we think more people are paying attention to us than they actually are too a lot of the time. So walking around like everybody's looking at me, darling. I promise you. Nobody's looking at you. They're all too much in their own heads.

Sally: When someone says, oh, I'm afraid I'm gonna get canceled. I'm like, that would be my dream. Yeah. If I look up to a headline, Sally Prosser canceled, people would actually have to know who I was. [00:34:00] Yeah. So I'm like, look, let's cross that amazing bridge when we come to it.

Mel: Love it.

Okay, next question. What is one thing you wish people would do more of or less of when communicating?

Sally: I wish people would do less words. Jim Rohn says, we make up in words what we lack in confidence, and I wish people used the pause more.

Mel: Yes. I'm with you on that one. It's actually a lesson I learned more through group fitness than anything else because I've been teaching group fitness classes for over a decade, and you've gotta learn to shut up.

Just sometimes you just gotta shut up because too many words makes it really hard for people to follow the instructions, to understand you. Uh, and it's something I think I also learned in sort of journalism 1 0 1. You know, sometimes you, if you're. If you pause and you're quiet, it's amazing what the [00:35:00] talent will say that they will just keep talking to fill the silence.

And that's sometimes where most of the gold is.

Sally: Yeah. And podcasting is great because we can pause and likely no one will switch off. It's a bit harder on social media because you've gotta keep the attention. So often I'm cutting out my pauses to keep the video moving along. That's why I like long form and I like being in front of audiences because being able to be in silence.

And hold the energy with the your body and your facial expression and everyone's going, oh my gosh, this is almost getting awkward. And then you come back in like, it's just the best way to be able to engage an audience.

Mel: Love it. And our last question, who do you look to for communication advice?

Sally: Well, I would have to say Taylor Swift, like she's just amazing. And in her documentary you see her talking to her team. The words that she's choosing, the way she's saying, the way she's communicating with her whole body, speaking from the heart. And I think a [00:36:00] lot of people can learn a lot from that. And for somebody who is more on LinkedIn, 'cause I don't think Taylor's got a LinkedIn account Dr. sade Rai is okay. Uh, really brilliant. She's been on my podcast. Many years ago, she's just released a book called Big Trust and she share shares lots of brilliant, uh, communication tips all backed up by research. Funny you mentioned earlier about the, um, and Rs, her latest video is all about how your credibility is shot to pieces if you are using too many filler words.

So. On note.

Mel: Love it. I love it. We should all watch more of that, I think. So on that note, Sally, if people want to get in touch with you, find out more about you, where's the best place for them to do that?

Sally: LinkedIn, Sally Prosser, Instagram TikTok at Sally Prosser Voice and my website is sally prosser.com au.

Don't forget the au Brilliant. Oh, and my podcast. That voice [00:37:00] podcast.

Mel: Yes, we should absolutely hop over there now that you've listened to this episode, everybody, and go check out Sally's podcast. Well, Sally, thank you so much for your time on Less Chatter, More Matter today.

Sally: Thanks for having me.