The call remain eleven minutes. The people wey dey inside never meet you face to face and dem probably no go ever meet you, so the only version of you wey dem go ever get na small rectangle for laptop with audio wey don compress small. That one na smaller channel pass real room, but na channel wey you fit truly sabi.
Plenty advice about this one na about equipment. Buy ring light, raise the camera, arrange the shelf behind you. All of dem dey help small but none of dem na where certainty dey come from. Certainty for camera dey built from wetin your voice dey do for the end of sentence, where your eyes dey go for the first ten seconds, and how you fit relax leave silence. Those ones free, dem dey work for any laptop, and once you get dem you fit enter video meeting the same way you go enter room, wey be real advantage for decade where most of the important meetings na rectangle.
Why you dey sound less certain for camera pass how you dey sound face to face?
Because the channel dey remove most of the range wey your voice normally dey carry, then people go judge the result like say na you. Room no fit separate speaker wey hard to hear from speaker wey no convince, so your audio quietly dey become part of your argument.
Direct evidence dey for that one. Researchers Eryn Newman and Norbert Schwarz play the same talks and the same radio interviews for high and low audio quality and ask people make dem evaluate both the research and the researcher. With the content exactly the same, bad audio make listeners rate the talk as worse, the speaker as less intelligent and less likeable, and the research itself as less important. The effect dey pass through processing ease: when something hard to take in, people no dey trust am, and dem no even notice say na the sound dem dey grade, no be the substance.
That one worth ten minutes of setup, once. Bring the microphone closer pass the laptop lid, comot hard surfaces and fan noise for the way, and stop to dey compete with room wey get anything wey dey run inside. The National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders talk the same point from the other side: to try shout above noise na one of the sure ways to strain your voice. To remove the noise easy pass to shout pass am, and e dey sound better for the other end.
Wetin your voice suppose do for the first ten seconds?
Land your last three words downward and slow the whole thing by like one quarter. Sentence wey dey lift for the end dey ask question, and if your first sentence dey ask question about itself, everything after am go dey judged against that.
The downward landing na the one habit for this article wey you fit carry anywhere. Talk your name, your role and the one line about why you dey there, and let each of those three end flat instead of dey rise. Compression dey flatten voice, so the small drop wey you for use inside room need be small bigger here so e go survive the journey.
Then bring the rate down. No be to crawl o, just enough make the words get edges. For call you dey also fight fraction of one second of transmission delay, and slower rate dey give everybody else ear time to catch up instead of make dem dey struggle. Slow na wetin people dey hear as certain. Fast na wetin people dey hear as nervous, even when na just excitement.
You go look the lens abi the faces?
Lens for your first sentence and your last one, faces for between. Those two moments na when eye contact dey do him work, and to hold the lens for the whole call na wetin dey turn person into newsreader.
The mechanic behind am simple. To look the lens na the only way to look like say you dey look somebody, and the two places wey e matter na the opening, where the room dey decide how to receive you, and the closing, where decision usually dey sit. For between you really need to see people, because to read face na how you go know whether to slow down, go deeper or stop.
Put the window wey get the faces directly under the camera so that the shift go small. And if you dey share your screen, talk the last line of every section to the lens instead of to the deck. Your slides no need convincing.
Why everybody dey talk on top each other for call?
Because human conversation dey hand over inside fraction of one second, and any delay for the channel dey land inside that window. The overlap na property of the connection, no be say your judgment or anybody own bad.
The timing tight pass wetin most people go guess. One worldwide sample of ten languages, wey dem examine for Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, show say turn-taking dey surprisingly consistent, with every language average gap between one speaker finishing and the next one starting falling within about one quarter of one second of the cross-language average. Every one of those handovers dey assume say both people hear the end of sentence for the same instant. For call, dem no dey.
So build the gap in on purpose. Finish, then leave full one second of silence before you assume say dem don finish answer you. When both of una start at once, make the two of una no retreat: "Go ahead" and then actually stop dey faster pass two rounds of sorry sorry. And for call wey you dey run, call the name of the person wey you want next, because the natural handover wey the room for do for you na exactly the thing wey the channel spoil.
How you go avoid to look stiff while you dey do all this?
Move on purpose instead of to hold still. Stiffness dey come from freezing, wey be wetin dey happen when person dey monitor himself, so give your body two or three movements wey you allow and stop to dey police the rest.
Keep your hands inside frame and let dem work. Hands wey you hide dey read like say you dey hide something, and the small gestures wey you for use across table dey survive the compression better pass facial expression. Sit far back enough so that your shoulders dey inside the picture. Face wey full the whole frame no dey give viewer anything to read except pores.
The bigger fix na to stop to dey watch yourself. Hide the self-view once the call start. Nobody don ever perform well while e dey do continuous assessment of him own eyebrows, and the version of you wey dey talk to people instead of to mirror na the one wey dey read as certain.
The sixty seconds before you unmute
You no need routine. You need one exhale, one sentence and one check.
Breathe out finish before your first word, because lungs wey full dey push voice up. Decide the one sentence wey you come talk, so that if the call turn to status update you go still land am. Then check say light dey your face and say the microphone dey closer pass the lid. Na the whole thing be that, e dey take one minute, and na the difference between to be rectangle wey people just dey nod for and to be the person for the call whose opinion dem dey ask for. Do am before every call wey matter, for the next ten years, and the compounding go take care of itself.
Sources
- USC Today, The quality of audio influences whether you believe what you hear
- Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Universals and cultural variation in turn-taking in conversation
- National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders, Taking Care of Your Voice