Episode 62: 4 Tips to Improve Your Presence on Conference Calls

Episode 62: 4 Tips to Improve Your Presence on Conference Calls

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In the virtual working world we live in, being on conference calls with teams all over the country or world is becoming the norm. But without being in the same room with people, there are aspects of communication that may suffer. So in this episode of Beyond the Business Suit, I want to give you four tips to improve your presence on conference calls (listen to the episode for full details):

1. Work on your “phone voice”: Not what you're saying, but how you're saying it. Avoid “upspeak” or “uptalk” as well as vocal fry. Also make sure that you are aware of your pitch. If your voice is naturally high pitched, this can work against you if you're trying to establish authority over the phone.
2. Communicate confidently: Make sure you're not showing a lack of confidence in your responses. For instance, make sure you're not saying “I'm sorry” or apologizing for what you're about to say. If you're by yourself in the room you're in during the call, do the Wonder Woman “power pose” to help boost your confidence and decrease stress (especially if you're presenting).
3. Be aware of your surroundings: There's nothing more distracting than having someone on the call who is in a loud place. So use mute when you're not talking and make sure you're actually on mute.
4. Be present: Don't multitask while on conference calls.Also, remember that when you're on the phone you don't have visual cues like body language and facial expressions, so it's easy for things to be misunderstood or miscommunicated. So avoid dry humor or sarcasm where people may have to see you in order to know that you are kidding.

Do you have other tips to improving presence on conference calls? Leave a comment below!