As AI enters the chat, how you speak has never been more important

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We need a revolution in how we speak. We need to reward original language and celebrate people who get straight to the point. Because the alternative is being completely forgotten. 

When was the last time you attended a panel at an industry conference and at least one person talked about “unleashing the power of real-time insights from a peer-to-peer perspective in an ever-changing agile ecosystem, moving at the speed of culture”? 

My guess is last week.

Or what about watching a session on DEI and hearing a panellist say “from an inclusion perspective, it’s important to provide inclusive experiences for employees to be their best, most authentic selves, moving at the speed of culture”? 

It’s what we call “word salad”. Wallpaper language. Jargon. 

Now, I’m not entirely convinced that any human or brand has genuinely moved at the speed of culture. But I’d imagine if you asked our buddy ChatGPT to provide a quote that demonstrates how relevant your business is, that’s the phrase it would land on. 

Why? Because it sounds lovely. Also — because everyone says it.

And with AI becoming ubiquitous, the things that everybody says are being said even more, because as much as our AI pal likes to pretend its conversations with us are completely unique, they’re not.

So if you think jargon and industry clichés are a problem now, wait until we’re outsourcing all of our words to a robot. 

The Von Restorff effect

Language matters — and so does its evolution. The joy of communication is the vast nature of our vocabularies and how we play with language; the familiarity of slang and the emotional surge of combination of words that hits.

But if you’re relying on AI to tell you what to say, no-one will remember it. 

In 1933, German psychologist Hedwig von Restorff accurately described a timeless phenomenon in which, when presented with a bunch of similar stuff — shoes, people, brands — the one everyone remembers is the one that stands out. That’s the Von Restorff effect.

It is almost impossible to be remembered unless you’re different in some way. In their extensive study of human memory in 1959, Lloyd and Margaret Peterson conducted tests to see how long human beings could retain information.

We’re more likely to remember a sentence, for example, if we “rehearse” it — ie. we play it over and over in our heads. On average, unless we’re prompted to rehearse something, the information will stay in our memories for 18 seconds — before being consigned to the useless nooks and crannies of our unused memory banks.

So, unless you use words that are unique enough and interesting enough for someone to think again about your speech, or your answer on a panel, or that paragraph you wrote for an industry mag, it will be forgotten forever. 

A speaking revolution

At Good Shout, we train people in how to communicate better.

Increasingly, people come to our courses with a socially approved script they’ve been reading from; not incorrect, but littered with jargon and sounding like it was spewed out by a machine.

We were worried about robots taking over our jobs. Turns out we are the robots! 

What troubles me is that, all of a sudden, being passable is considered more important than being original and sounding clever is more desirable than standing out. Just get it done versus doing it well. This is catastrophic for human communication.

So, in tandem with the AI revolution (which I am reluctantly accepting), we need a revolution in how we speak.

We need to reward original language and celebrate people who get straight to the point. We need to allow colleagues time to riff their ideas out loud without getting it perfect the first time. We need to give each other the space to get it wrong, occasionally, so that they can eventually get to a collection of words that feels right. 

This is important at conferences, but it’s also crucial in meetings, when talking to clients, when CEOs address their employees at a town hall, when presenting in pitches and even on your website.

Letting AI choose your words for you is fine — it’s not wrong — but you’ll never stick in people’s heads. And that’s tricky, because don’t we all want to be remembered? Especially when the alternative is being completely forgettable. 

Good Shout’s How to be a Good Panellist course gives you everything you need to find your unique voice and use it to create memorable influence and raise your profile through speaking.  

Submit this form and you will be contacted with registration instructions and a discount code for 10% off per registrant.

Amy Kean is CEO and creative director at Good Shout