Accent Neutralization - The first reaction of all professionals

ACCENT NEUTRALIZATION

OBJECTIVE

The first reaction of all professionals whenever I used to mention the importance of Accent Neutralization was one of sarcasm and smirk

When I interacted with these professionals at length, I found one point in common. They were technically very sound in their function. Moreover they were proven performers. But somewhere down the line, the growth stopped. They probably never realized this or probably did not sit down and introspect where they should have been and where they are right now.
As we are all aware, the English Language has become the lingua franca linking businesses across the globe. So it becomes all the more imperative to be fluent in our speech. Fluency is a combination of many factors put together.
Fluency includes your pronunciation, intonation, and use of the right words, flow of language and the rate of speech.
Drawing from my experience of working with multinational organizations, I have without exception, seen professionals at all levels, having a very limited vocabulary. Moreover the use of colloquial expressions and slang is on the higher side, which makes them look totally unprofessional

Effective Communication is very simple to define. The target listener should understand the message, in the way you want him to comprehend. If there is a mismatch here, the very purpose of communication gets lost

Professionals, who rise up the hierarchy very fast, are without exception excellent communicators

Indians have a very strong regional influence while speaking. In professional parlance it is called as the Mother Tongue Influence (MTI)

When people speak with a very heavy regional accent, people get distracted because the pronunciation is not clear and the class aspect is lost. The net result is your image gets spoilt. I have seen umpteen cases, where professionals have a good vocabulary, but unfortunately their heavily accented English coupled with the rate of speech creates a huge barrier in the communication process, and their reputation also taking a beating

Neutral Accent is nothing but globally understandable and comprehensible English Language. This means that a person from any part of the world should be able to understand what you are speaking without having to strain him or interrupt you

People have this wrong notion that they need to imitate a certain accent, as in, American Accent or British Accent. There is absolutely no need to imitate any accent. Your English should be devoid of regional influence

When professionals speak, using the right word, with excellent pronunciation, intonation and the ideal rate of speech, people perceive you as a classy person and you command lot of respect. Likewise, a very heavy accented pronunciation, puts off the listener, and thereby the very purpose of communication is lost

Business today is very fast paced, and in order to survive and excel in this cutthroat competition, it is of utmost importance to articulate in diction, and, be globally understood

Comprehensibility is therefore the ultimate focus

Now I come to the most critical part. All MBA \ PGDM programs talk about lot of skill sets being developed over a period of two years, but no one talks about the importance of Neutral Accent. Moreover during the selection process, Neutral Accent becomes a very critical skill which is assessed, irrespective of the industry. Lot of people have the misconception that Neutral Accent is confined only to the BPO industry, which is totally wrong. Neutral Accent is not industry specific. It is an essential requirement across all industries and more importantly one of the most critical skills if you want to move up the hierarchy Your voice is the means by which you convey your inner thoughts and feelings to the outside world. It is the outward expression of your inner self

The English language, its structure and the accent or dialect changes from country to country. Hence, it is very critical to speak in a globally comprehensible English dialect

I will list down the common problems with Indian speakers in general:

Indian speakers of English are known to speak much faster than people in the West. This means that in many cases Indian speakers of English will make business communication difficult. We need to ensure that we understand and are understood
Indians do not speak with their mouth fully open. As a result, the speech muscles get tight over a period of time, and the pronunciation gets severely affected. In other words we are not able to articulate properly

Indians have a very fast rate of speech. The ideal speaking rate is between one hundred forty and one hundred sixty words per minute. Indians speak at anywhere between one hundred eighty to two hundred forty words per minute. At this speed, the listener is bound to lose the message. Take any article from a newspaper or magazine and work on your speed by reading it regularly. Read it for one minute. Keep a count of the number of words you read in one minute. Over a period of time you will automatically come to the right pace

In the English Language, the vowels give the sound and therefore the stress has to be on the vowel sound, taking the syllable into consideration. Indians stress on the consonants because of which the word gets horribly mispronounced and this creates a huge communication barrier

The consonant B is pronounced as P and vice versa
The consonant D is pronounced as T and vice versa
The consonant L is pronounced strongly
There is no distinction made between V and W sounds
The vowel U is pronounced without opening the mouth
There is no distinction made between the words, their, there and they while pronouncing it
The ‘th’ sound is not clear
The consonant T is not pronounced sharply

STEPS TO BE TAKEN TO COME TO A NEUTRAL ACCENT

To learn a new accent you need to listen to English again and again. It is not what you say, but how you say it, therefore, get familiar with the feel, tone and delivery of the accent. That adds a lot more meaning to what you say, rather that just the actual words

Learning a new accent is making your subconscious mind conscious. The critical thing to remember is to relax and speak in a flow, instead of speaking each word separately, to sound clear. Pronunciation is governed by two factors, syllable stress and the vowel sound articulation. Vowels and consonants come together and form syllables. Syllables give the word its pronunciation. Each syllable has a vowel sound and can have one or more consonants

Let us take an example:

Chair – This word is pronounced in one breath of air. It has only one syllable

Moment – This word cannot be pronounced in one breath of air. We take a pause while pronouncing the word. The place where we pause is exactly where the first syllable ends. It is broken down into parts.
Mo \ ment (2 syllables)
We can see that the first syllable has the vowel ‘O’ and the second syllable has the vowel ‘E’

Deliver – This word is broken down in three parts
De \ li \ ver (3 syllables)
In this word, the first syllable has the vowel ‘E’ the second syllable has the vowel ‘I’ and the third syllable has the vowel ‘E’

As a rule of thumb, if a word has two syllables, stress on the first syllable. Likewise if a word has three syllables, stress on the second syllable

Received Pronunciation is the most widely understood pronunciation. It is also referred to as Queen’s English or Oxford English

The English Language uses over 45 basic sounds but has only 26 letters in the alphabet to represent them. This means that a word is not pronounced in the way it is written, unlike our mother tongue. The International Phonetic Association (IPA) has laid down the pronunciation for each word. Special phonetic symbols are used to represent sounds. There are several accepted pronunciations for each word

The Oxford Dictionary is very useful. The pronunciation is clearly mentioned for each word. Take the help of a professional who speaks the language well and practice your pronunciation

Most poor pronunciations happen due to the omission of a sound altogether or swallowing of the last one or two alphabets.

Just to cite an example, if we take the word , chair, the ‘ch’ sound is strong whereas if we take the word, champagne, it is pronounced as ‘sh’ not ‘ch’

The ‘k’ is silent in the words, knight, knife and know

The letters ‘gh’ are silent in the words, height, might and right

The letter ‘l’ is silent in the words, should, could and would

Kindly note that the words mentioned above have been given purely for the purpose of understanding. Apart from the above words, there are lots of other words also where the ‘k’ is silent. The same applies to all the other examples also.
We need to breathe correctly for good modulation and rate of speech

If we do not breathe properly, we cannot speak long sentences. An effective voice is possible only with an effective breath. Indians on the whole have a very poor breathing pattern which needs to be worked on

BREATHING EXERCISES

Sit up straight
Relax your shoulders and arms
Drop your neck down with your chin touching the chest
Open the mouth and let the breath go in and out gently without exercising any kind of pressure
Do not make any noise while pulling in the breath
Take a quicker breath and then release it slowly
Repeat this exercise at least ten times

OTHER EXERCISES

Take a deep breath. Pronounce each alphabet from A till Z by throwing the air out. Initially you will feel lot of pressure on the chest. Do not give up. Keep on practicing this exercise

With the tip of your tongue touch the back side of each tooth

Hum any song which you like. Over a period of time you will notice a perceptible change in the quality of your voice

As I have mentioned earlier, our goal should be to come as near as possible to the British Accent. In our country English is the second language. It is very critical to interact or listen to native speakers of English. The best channel is BBC News. Observe very carefully how the news readers pronounce the words, as in, the movement of the lip and the tongue

Record your voice regularly which will help you to understand how far you have progressed and where you are going wrong

To conclude, a poor speaker is often considered to be inept in all other areas also. People judge you not only by what you say, but how you say it

HAPPY SPEAKING