Why great communicators listen to the music of “The Five Ps”

We adjust and corrupt our voices for a variety of reasons as we move through life. So, if you don’t like your voice, never fear! It’s not your real voice anyway.

I don’t say that to sound glib but rather to create a little space in your consciousness to be nicer to yourself as you examine expanding the way in which you speak. You can get a hint of this even by considering the title of one of the most legendary vocal training books of the last century, Freeing the Natural Voice, by Kristin Linkletter. Note that the title isn’t “Taming the Natural Voice” or “Strengthening the Natural Voice.”

So instead of fixating on how bad you think you sound on video or in a voicemail or in your voicemail greeting, instead think about how different your voice sometimes sounds:

• after you’ve had a good cry
• upon waking from a long, relaxing nap
• after a couple of glasses of wine
• on a late-night phone call with a long-distance romantic partner

The sound of your voice can change—and change dramatically. In fact, it does change, and it changes organically and instinctually when you are solely focused on reaching the other person.

How specifically does it change? It’s what I call vocal variety. That term might be new to you, but the topic isn’t, because people talk about it all the time, just in different terms. If you have heard people speak about “tone of voice,” “monotone,” “shrill,” or any number of other descriptions or critiques of voices, they’re talking about vocal variety.

In working with speakers for fifteen years, I have developed an alliterative system of Five Ps to help clients understand, remember, and eventually unlock greater vocal variety. The Five Ps are as follows:

• Pace (fast and slow)
• Pitch (high and low)
• Pause (musical rest)
• Power (loud and soft)
• Placement (where the sound amplifies in the body)

Looking at those five, you probably intuitively recognize the categories and glimpse the interconnectedness. The only one you may have a bit of confusion about is placement. If you know a friend who has a very nasal voice, technically what’s happening is the sound of their voice is amplifying primarily in the nasal cavities of their head and face rather than throughout the rest of their body. That’s called placement—the sound is “placed” in the nasal “mask” area of the face.

For musicians, these five dynamics will be instantly recognizable—they’re what they know well as dynamics in musical composition. Power (volume) in musical scoring is indicated, of course, by the term pianoforte (loud) and pianissimo (soft). The other Ps all map neatly as well. Pitch is as it sounds—the musical note high or low on the scale. Pace is tempo and rhythm. Pause is the frequency, pattern, and length of the various rests. And when a performer puts a mute in their trumpet or closes the lid on the harp of their piano, they have altered placement, when the manipulation of the instrument’s architecture affects where the sound amplifies.

Just learning about this system can be a revelation for people who struggle with vocal variety—musicians and non-musicians alike. Consider those who have been told they have a monotone voice (or even more reductively, “you’re monotone”—as though monotone were a nationality or race). These people have often endured decades of being told “you sound bored,” “ just speak with more passion,” and “you don’t seem enthusiastic,” or (worst of all) of being deprived of speaking opportunities because—as one of my clients was told—“you put the audience to sleep.” When they learn this system of Five Ps, people who are tremendous achievers but who have never been able to communicate about those achievements with energy and enthusiasm realize that there are specific measurements to evaluate against and then improve.

But as powerful as that revelation is, it’s nothing compared to the aha moment they experience when they actually learn how to unleash the Ps. Working with other academics around the country—social scientists and management professors at Ivy League institutions and large research universities—we used this framework of Five Ps to examine politicians’ speeches. This analysis enabled us to offer some key findings in distilled form to political figures, the names of whom you would recognize. I give you that slightly obnoxious, anonymized, name-dropping context for an important reason: the most seasoned, powerful political communicators in the world need this kind of help too. If you know that you could use more vocal variety and/or convey more enthusiasm, drama, or passion, it’s not that something is wrong with you. Many people have room for improvement, just like those brand-name politicians.