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When to Pause During a Presentation (and When Not To)
I’ve written before about the power of the pause in public speaking — pausing before you start in order to build suspense, pausing at key moments to let your point land, pausing to control the pace of your talk. Pausing also shows respect to your listeners by indicating that you care what their responses might be when you ask them a question. All of these (and a few others) are good moments to pause. But recent research has revealed that there is one time when pausing doesn’t work so well, and in fact can undercut the impression you are trying to make as a sincere, trustworthy speaker.
What is this exception that proves the rule?
Pausing for a long time after you’ve been asked a question makes you seem less sincere and trustworthy than if you answer immediately. Exceptions to that include answering a question that takes a lot of mental effort and talking about socially undesirable things. Presumably, then, it’s OK to pause while you recall all the reasons why you’ve done time, or something like that.
The lessons for public speakers are relatively simple.
If you’re asked a question, and it stumps you, start talking right away, paraphrase the question back, ask for clarification — say anything, even if it means uttering a few filler words to buy yourself time. It’s the one…
