Part 1- Transcript

Hello This Is Chris and my article was Your Blank Word Here by Stuart Elliott. umm To summarize the article uh author Stuart was umm talking about umm how the new trend in advertising is to adopt more slang slash swear words. Stuart believes this is the trend to catch more of the younger generation y side of the community sense they are the biggest growing part of the population. Ummm This is mostly found in umm advertisement for vodka campaigns or for umm womens hygenies campaigns things like that. A big example of this is Three Olives did a campaign that was bold in the sense that umm basicially that it said if you drink are vodka you will be the blank best person in the room. Um Author Stuart goes on to say that there is a fine line to run between the two, umm between slear swar swear and slang if you have too much your are seen as overdone and a terrible company for it, if you have one or two cheesy words, you are seen as a not too great of an advertising campaign compared to normal advertising. Another big thing that he related to is that it is starting to become the social norm and that the swearing and slang words in normal advertising shows that is becoming part of the normal culture wear companies need to now respect using slang and swear words in order to lowwwer the communication barrier that is a formality between them and there customers. A big proponent of this is Microsoft that recently sent out a umm memo to all of its employees that handle uhh customer service to modify how it does umm modify its customer service to start using those swear and slang words in your customer service correspondence with customers to help build customer service with your customers. So umm in a quick wrapup article was about swearing and slang and how its the biggest trend currently

happening in advertising and how it will be here to stay as it becomes a social norm as it is brought on by the generation of the world, so yeah umm thank you very much.

Part 2- Overall Reflection

In reflection of my how I summarized the article, I would say that there is a vast list of things I need to improve in my oral speaking skills to be a better communicator.

First and most glaring is the overuse of the sound umm when I speaking to either begin a new idea or because I was thinking of the correct words to say for that moment. This would be a great hindrance in the work environment because it would give the aura that I either dont know what Im talking about or I lack the confidence to assert my stance on the matter. The use of umm in my speaking also gives the sense that this conversation is an informal conversation and should reflect formal policy leaving the listener to believe this is a conversation does not apply to the business setting. Finally the constant use of umm causes noise breaks within a conservation similar to a cell phone ringing or a bell tower causing the listener to lose valuable information as they become distracted by the random noise.

Second my use of tempo with the audio recording was highly varying. I began the paper with a tempo that was a slow meandering pace and if heard for the first time by a random listener, they would have probably have checked out and stopped listening. Later on in my paper I settled on a tempo that provided a pace to the audio that is inviting to listen to. This tempo is a tempo that would be excellent in a business presentation setting in that it provides

enough speed to keep the informed entertained and slow enough to provide people learning about the material for the first time a chance to grasp all the key concepts as they listen. Finally in the last 30 seconds of the paper my tempo gradually increased to a pace that is difficult to grasp were one word ends and another begins. This would be terrible for a work environment with constant over the phone customer interaction were the pacing of your words helps the customer clearly understand the steps.

Third my word choice in the audio recording is not the best possible choice for a business or formal setting. My selection of words if built for my audience of fellow Communication 286 students was poor and lacking. I tended to repeat and overuse common phrases such as between this and that, in summary and a big example is. These phrases add nothing to the context of the paper and just as busy words when you are attempting to listen to the audio file. This choice of many busy phrases would come across in a board meeting in that the fellow board room members would lose interest and only remember the busy phrases but not what the details of the speech was about.

Part 3- Improvement of a Bad Speaking Habit

The bad speaking habit that I have noticed carries in most conversations is the overuse of umm and speeding up when I begin talking for more than 40 seconds. Both of these habits would be harmful to any future career I plan on having as I will more than likely need to give a formal presentation relating to funding for a project or to future investors. To correct these bad speaking habits I decided that it would be in my best interest to enlist the help of my

evening study group. In this study group to work on the use of umm in general conversations I armed my study group this last weekend with Nerf Guns and orders to shoot me when I said umm. This proved quite effective as I slowly decreased from 15 umms on Friday to around 4 umms on Sunday. The idea of getting shot by a Nerf Gun was created to show that the use of umms in my everyday life would be met with a poisonous working climate in the real world. On the nature of speeding up as I speak, I had the same study group all weekend at random times hand me a note card and require me to give a speech about each topic as a steady pace. By the third speech I began to notice a decrease in the varying pace I used during the speech. All the members of my evening study group provided additional feedback about posture and body language following each impromptu speech.

I would have to say upon reflection that it was much easier to control the pace of my speaking compared to reducing umms from everyday conversation.

The implications of improving these two bad speaking habits is that it has improved my ability to command control of a meeting whether in a board room with the student organization Im a member of or within the impromptu banter of my peers. This will directly translate into my future career in the form of being able to provide a communication style as an employee that informs my boss or manager that I am prepared to lead and take can be responsible to deliver a message to my peers about the new prototype or changes in the budget for the factory.