What a wonderfully interactive audience yesterday at the presentation I did about webinar presentation delivery.  What follows is one of the Qs I didn’t get to during this well-attended event.  To be fair to readers, a number of these answers assume you were there, so you might check out the recording. 

One of the questions posed live to me during the presentation by Branwell, the moderator came from Omar.  In summary, the question was about using accents.

Steve S.’s comment was dead-on with my response when he said, “My thought – don’t try and change your accent – just be you!!! People can see through it usually”

I couldn’t agree more, Steve!

Allison O. and Debora H. among many joyfully quipped, “Please do it!” and “Do try!” when I commented that while I might tack on a southern drawl here in the states for some local audiences, that I wasn’t going to tackle an English accent. 🙂

Confession:  as a huge fan of Monty Python and The Beatles as English exports to the U.S., I’ve spent my share of moments trying English accents.

But my point was summed up with Paul K.’s comment, “I don’t think he is suggesting to mimic people.”

Exactly, Paul.

Real people connect with real people, and we’re all part of a shrinking globe from a communications perspective.  I don’t mind someone in my town making a genuine attempt at communication, and I don’t care if their accent is perfect to my locale.  I assume this to be true when I speak to other locales (Europe, India, and Australia regularly).  I trust that my heart to serve and educate will trump my accent.