 Want to articulate yourself better? I'm sharing eight powerful ways to be more articulate. And before we dive in, I'm going to quickly cover what does it mean to be more articulate? Being articulate is being better at, firstly, what you say, you know, the words, the sentences, the stories and the structure used to get your ideas, feelings, thoughts and viewpoints across to other people, whether on a one-to-one basis or to large groups. And secondly, it's how you communicate what you say and using the pitch and speed of your voice, where you place the emphasis, how you create anticipation, how you use silence and pauses and how you use your body language with what you say. When you are articulate, you find it easier to keep the other person's attention and to make it easier for the other person to understand and follow what you're saying. Articulate yourself better and you'll feel more confidence and more valued. I'm covering, firstly, six benefits of being more articulate and then second, eight powerful ways to be more articulate. I share practical tips for each so you can learn the skills to clearly articulate your thoughts. My name is Jess Coles and if you're new here, Enhance.training shares people management expertise, resources and courses teaching you how to build higher performing teams. I've included links to additional videos and resources in the description below as well as the video timestamps, so do take a look at these. If you liked this video, please give it a thumbs up and subscribe. I was shy at school and I hated speaking in front of small groups. I wasn't confident in how I spoke and watching their eyes glaze over and their attention wander reinforced my belief that I wasn't good at articulating my thoughts and speaking to groups. My mindset was a big part of the problem. Many years later and with a lot more practice at articulating myself better, I know the benefits of being more articulate and how that helps you at work and as a manager. Here are six benefits of being more articulate. Firstly, being more articulate saves you and others a lot of time. Being able to articulate your thoughts clearly results in quicker understanding in others, a lot less confusion in team members and colleagues and a lot less misunderstandings. Articulate yourself better and you only say things once rather than repeat them three or four times. You save a lot of time. Second, being more articulate builds your confidence in communicating. Whether speaking on one-on-one to colleagues or presenting to a group, having people clearly maintaining eye contact, showing attentive body language and asking relevant questions to learn more all help to reinforce and build your confidence in how you are communicating. Third, articulate yourself better and enjoy increased professional success. You'll be more articulate and communicate better and you improve teamwork and your influence and impact at work which leads to more professional success. Fourth, you build stronger relationships. Articulate yourself well and be confident communicating your ideas, your feelings and your thoughts and you show more of yourself to others. By being more authentic, you increase others' trust in you. Higher trust levels means stronger relationships. Fifth, being more articulate leads to bigger professional networks. As you progress your career, your network within a company and external to your company becomes more and more important for personal support and for career advancement. The bigger and better your network, the better you do. Then sixth, improve public speaking skills. Yet being articulate and confident when speaking to groups is seen as an important prerequisite for promotion into leadership and management positions. So let's talk about how to become more articulate. I am sharing eight powerful ways to be more articulate. Knowing what to do will not, on its own, make you more articulate. You need to practice each of these techniques to get the benefits. Being articulate is a skill and I share tips on how to practice each of these eight ways to be more articulate. Firstly, avoid using filler words. Filler words are the mmm, er, yeah and other noises people use to bridge the period when they are thinking about what to say next. Swap these filler words for silence. Whenever you are speaking to others, pay attention to what you say. Every time you are about to use a mmm, try to swap it for a pause without any sound being made. It won't be long before you don't use filler words at all when articulating your thoughts and feelings. Lots of filler words are distracting. Second, to be more articulate, increase your vocabulary. Learning vocabulary is not about using bigger, more complex words. There is a lot of benefit in using simpler words as more people understand them. Focus instead on learning more descriptive words so you are able to describe your thoughts, ideas and feelings more accurately with more colour, with more life. Use a dictionary to find more adjectives, adverbs and participle and incorporate them into your everyday communication. Consciously practice using more descriptive words until you incorporate them naturally into what you say every day. Third, to be more articulate, pronounce your words clearly. This is obvious, yet of all the people you know how would you rank yourself in terms of how clearly you speak? Are you top of your list? For many people, speaking more slowly and consciously focusing on finishing each word spoken makes what they say a lot clearer. Avoid running one word into the next or missing endings to words. And for those that speak slowly, work on speeding up the words you say. Use the body language feedback from others to judge how effective using different speaking speeds are for you and how well you are at pronouncing your words. Fourth, for how to be more articulate, improve the structure of what you say. You're rambling, introducing different ideas or too many ideas not providing context and not being clear on the points that you are making lead to the other person getting bored, losing the thread of what you're saying or being confused. A key way to better articulate your thoughts is to communicate the context, present your key arguments or points and then ask for an action, a decision or provide a summary. Creating a structure that logically leads the person from one step to the next will keep their attention and increase their understanding. A good way to practice structuring your arguments is to write them down and review them. The better you get at structuring your writing, the better you'll be at structuring what you say. Keep what you write short and start with 150 to 200 words and then maybe expand them to 500 words when you get better. Fifth, be more articulate by knowing your audience. Are you speaking to analytical professionals, time poor managers or to your local builders? What language and speaking style are they using? Are they serious in their outlook or cracking lots of jokes? Adapt how you articulate your thoughts and feelings and mirror their language and styles. Pay attention to the feedback your audience provides via their body language and adapt to articulate yourself better. For example, change your style from a more formal style to a more relaxed conversational style or vice versa. Change the length of the sentence you use to simpler or more complex. Include more examples in detail or elevate what you articulate to a more bigger picture. Adapt how you articulate your thoughts and feelings to your audience. Sixth, be more articulate by varying your style and tone. People take in information, thoughts and ideas in different ways. To articulate yourself well, be mindful of four different ways people take in information and adapt how you articulate your thoughts to cover all of them if you can. The first is those that like the big picture, the high level view so they can understand the context and how everything fits together easily. Create diagrams, speak to the context and ask questions to get them thinking about the big picture. Second are those that focus on the group, on others and are altruistic. Talk about the wider benefits, the contribution to the group or the local community. Link what you are communicating into how your audience can help benefit others. Third are those that like stories are more relaxed and want a more friendly conversational style and approach. Create relevant stories, ask more questions and get more back and forth going in the conversation. And fourth are those that love data and are more analytical. So include charts, graphs, facts and figures in how you articulate yourself to cater for people who are much more analytical. By trying to balance how you articulate yourself to the different ways people take in information you'll get more attention and understanding from your audience. Seventh be more articulate by practicing speaking in private. As mentioned earlier, communicating is a skill and improving how you articulate yourself requires practice. Speaking in front of a mirror is a good way to work on your facial expressions and how you use your arms and hands to emphasise points being made. Your tone and body language and the emphasis you put on what you say will change the meaning of the words being said. When I started creating videos and podcasts I practised by filming myself and reviewing how I looked and sounded. Videoing yourself is really easy to do with your mobile. Play around with different approaches, styles, talking speeds and arm gestures. Compare what you remember yourself doing and saying versus how it comes across in the recording. This is a good way to build up your self-awareness when speaking. Eight be more articulate by practising with a group. Speaking to a group is about getting comfortable speaking to bigger audiences and managing all your emotions and fears while doing so. Seek out opportunities to speak to groups at work. Present in your team meetings. Ask to speak in company meetings, project meetings or before bigger groups. There are also lots of ways to get practice speaking to groups outside of work too. Four ideas include firstly joining Toastmasters or similar speaking groups. Second could be taking a public speaking course where you're going to get lots of practice in the course. Third you could join a stand-up comedy course. Or fourth you could take acting classes. All of these will give you plenty of opportunity to speak in front of different sized groups and give you practice to better articulate your thoughts and feelings. So in summary, put some effort in and you'll articulate yourself better. I've shared eight powerful ways to be more articulate and now it's up to you to put these techniques into practice. There is a lot to be gained by being more articulate at work and outside of work and we've been through six big benefits of doing so. Please put just a bit of work into improving how you articulate yourself and see the difference it makes to your confidence and how you are perceived by others. Then put in more practice and get more of the benefits of being more articulate. If you have any questions on articulate yourself better, eight powerful ways to be more articulate, please leave them in the comment section below and I'll get back to you. Thanks very much for watching and I look forward to speaking to you again soon.