Voice your leadership !

Human voice is a powerful tool of persuasion and leadership. Its impact on the hearer is immediate.

The « vocal image » we project to the outside world is as important as the visual image. Scientists have identified significant relations between acoustic features of the speaker’s voice and her credibility and persuasiveness. Yet, the assessment of vocal competences has so far been subjective, intuitive, and lacking scientific basis. The questions therefore are:

• Can we scientifically assess our vocal skills?
• Which vocal features are related to charismatic leadership?
• How can we improve our persuasiveness ?

This interactive workshop will lead you through many subtleties of the human voice as a powerful tool for leadership and persuasion. You will discover the strategic use of voice in speech communication and ways of creating impact by the tone of your voice. Demonstration of acoustical analysis of voices and speaking styles will be provided to guide you and you will have the opportunity to practice several vocal exercices (chunking, emphasis, intonation) that will help you improve your vocal style in speech communication.

See: https://www.vox-institute.ch/top-stories/EPFL-Zei-Body-Eloquence2.pdf

Time has come to voice your leadership !

Branka Zei-Pollermann PhD – CWF member

Branka is founder and director of Vox-Institute-Geneva. She works in leadership development with special emphasis on social and emotional skills applied to speech communication. Her work is grounded in the most recent scientific discoveries in social psychology and speech communication.

Branka has been personally involved in Geneva University scientific research since 1980. She is author of numerous publications. In parallel to her work at Vox-Institute, she held part-time teaching and research positions at: Faculty of Psychology (Geneva University), Geneva University Hospitals, CERN, and Zagreb University (Institute of Phonetics).

Her professional profile is multi-disciplinary and her academic credentials include: a doctorate in psychology and three MA degrees (general linguistics, cognitive psychology, English and Italian literature).

Her postgraduate studies include: phonetics, linguistics, philosophy and sociology.

Branka Zei-Pollermann has been a very loyal member of the Career Women’s Forum almost since its creation, supporting women’s leadership in society.