This week in the world’s #1 newsletter on leadership communication:

• The Secret to a Voice that Holds Attention ​
• On the Show: 7 Signs You're a Weak Speaker (And How to Fix It) ​
• Book recommendation: Think Inside the Box

*** Final chance to work with me this year: The waitlist for the Fall Cohort of the Speak Like a CEO Academy is open. 10 seats, 9 weeks. ***

The Secret to a Voice that Holds Attention

You get judged by what you say AND by how you speak.

When your voice and pacing are rushed, flat, or filled with verbal clutter, even strong ideas lose impact.

Think of someone who speaks in a monotonous voice, and how difficult it is to listen to that person for just a minute.

That’s what we want to avoid: a monotonous monologue where every sentence sounds the same.

We're aiming for the opposite. We’re aiming for vocal variety.

(It tends to be one of the first things I tackle with my CEO coaching clients, because it’s relatively easy to change and has a big impact.)

Here’s how you make the shift without years of voice coaching:

Your voice is a beautiful instrument that exists in five dimensions – what I call the 5Ps.

1/ PACE

That’s the speed at which you speak. Speak faster to inject energy or to cover points that are easy to understand.

Slow down to make the key point. It tells your audience: “This is important.”

2/ PITCH

The highness or lowness of your voice.

Use it to add emphasis, express excitement, and signal importance.

3/ POWER

Aka volume aka how loud you speak.

Use it to grab attention, show confidence and create a dramatic effect.

4/ PAUSE

Taking a beat to make your message more impactful.

Use the power of the pause to signal transitions, control pacing, aid comprehension – and to replace filler words and filler sounds.

5/ PROSODY

Aka melody or intonation.

Use it to make your message memorable like a song, to convey emotions and to add emphasis.

Remember: Great communicators have range. They vary on all of these five dimensions.

They speed up to inject energy. They may speak louder to get attention, but they can also speak quietly to get people to lean in. And often slow down and even pause before they make the key point.

To find out how you come across, record, review, repeat. And here's what's important: only change one thing at a time.

For instance, if you speak too fast and come across as rushed, just focus on that. Once your pacing is on point, you move on to the next thing.

I know – recording yourself is hard on the ego. All I can say is: Get over it. It’s the most effective way to improve your delivery, and your delivery determines whether your ideas get heard.

ON THE SHOW

7 Signs You're a Weak Speaker (And How to Fix It)

▶️ Episode 333 on YouTube, Spotify or Apple.

Do you know how good a speaker you really are? Fortunately, there is a quick way to find out.

This week on Speak Like a CEO, I'm sharing with you the 7 signs that tell you if you are a weak speaker – and how to fix those weaknesses quickly.

This matters because communication is the number one skill in business, according to LinkedIn. In fact, I’m convinced your personal communication skills may be the only skills that survive the AI revolution.

Yet most leaders are ineffective communicators – often without realizing it.

Number 4 on the list may surprise you: people don't take notes. If your audience isn't taking notes or screenshots or asks “can we get the slides?”, you have a problem. Because they are either bored or looking at their phones (probably both).

Here is a simple fix: First, get people's attention with a killer opening and then re-engage your audience every two minutes.

Create surprise moments, ask the audience, tell a story, share a surprising fact, show a prop, humour, a meme – just make sure that you don’t lose them so that they actually hear your message.

Check out the other 6 signs that you are a weak speaker and how to fix them here:

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Think Inside the Box

We have a historically unprecedented number of options regarding what to do, who to be, and how to spend our time. The problem is, this doesn't necessarily lead to better outcomes. Choice is wonderful, but is also overwhelming.

David Epstein's new book Inside the Box is already one of my top picks of 2026. His previous bestseller, Range, introduced us to the idea that generalists tend to win over specialists, and that the people we regard as absolute experts in their field started out on a generalist path.

In Inside the Box, he tells the story of General Magic, a company that basically invented the iPhone ten years before Apple did – or rather they had the idea for the iPhone, but they couldn't make it happen despite unlimited resources and talent.

That's because leadership and investors put no constraints on the geniuses working for General Magic. They saw the future, but they couldn't invent it.

I use constraints in my coachings all the time. I challenge leaders to:

1/ Keep it short

They come with a long presentation. I challenge them to tell their story in one minute. The final version may be longer, but the one-minute version forces them to sharpen their message.

2/ Focus on ONE big idea

If you have three ideas in your talk, you have none. You can only ever hope to get one idea across on one occasion.

3/ Use structure

If I build my presentation with a client around a simple three-act structure like Excite-Disturb-Assure, I'm putting in a constraint. That structure does the heavy lifting so that we can focus on the message.

In a world of unlimited choices, constraints lead to better outcomes and a happier life.

Have an inspired weekend,

Oliver

PS: Whenever you are ready, there are 3 ways I can help you: private coaching; my 10-person cohorts; transforming your organization’s communication.

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Uhlandstraße 32, 10719 Berlin

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