Writing
On speaking clearly.
Practical notes on filler words, pacing, and holding a room, from the people building Cadence.
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October 19, 2026
Filler words in speech: the full list, and a fix for each
Hesitation sounds, hedges, discourse markers, and verbal tics. What triggers each group, and the fix that works on it.
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October 14, 2026
Speaking too fast? Diagnose the cause before you fix it
Nerves, ADHD, habit, or fear of losing your turn. Three self-tests to find yours, and the pacing fix that matches it.
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October 13, 2026
The best app to stop saying um
An app will not stop you saying um. It can do the counting. Five things to look for, and how Cadence, Orai, and Yoodli compare.
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October 13, 2026
How to practice speaking before an interview
Silent prep skips the part that fails under pressure. A story bank, answer-first openings, and a five-day plan for practicing out loud.
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September 23, 2026
How to speak more clearly
Unclear speech is three unrelated problems: mumbled word endings, sentences that run out of air, and points that arrive last. Diagnose yours first.
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September 23, 2026
How to stop saying like
Like is four different words wearing one coat, and only the hedge is costing you. Eight hundred years of evidence says the rest is just English.
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September 23, 2026
How to stop saying um
Um is a planning signal, not a bad habit. How to measure your rate, trade the filler for a pause, and hold it when presenting or interviewing.
Common questions
Why do I say um so much?
Um is a planning signal. Herbert Clark and Jean Fox Tree's 2002 study of spontaneous speech found that speakers use uh and um to announce a coming delay while the next part of the sentence is assembled. You say um when your mouth arrives somewhere your planning has not reached yet, so the fix is closing the planning gap or filling it with silence, not resolving to stop making the sound.
Is saying um actually bad?
Saying um is not bad on its own. Listeners use uh and um to follow a speaker, and a talk with a handful of fillers spread through it sounds natural. What reads as unpolished is density and position: three fillers inside one sentence, or an um in front of every answer. A talk scrubbed to zero fillers by sheer tension sounds stiff, and the tension costs more than the fillers did.
How many filler words per minute is normal?
No official threshold exists, and any filler-per-minute figure quoted as a universal standard is invented. Filler rate changes with how spontaneous the speech is, how technical the topic is, and how much pressure the speaker is under. Record two minutes, count every um, uh, like and you know, divide by the minutes, and compare that baseline with your own count a month later.
Does speaking more slowly stop filler words?
Speaking more slowly helps, but only because it buys planning time. Slowing your mouth without giving your planning any room produces slower speech with the same fillers in it. Pair a slower opening with shorter sentences, so the planning gaps land at natural sentence boundaries where a silent pause sounds deliberate.
How long does it take to stop saying um?
Awareness of your fillers arrives within a few days of listening back to recordings. Changed delivery under pressure takes weeks of short, frequent practice. Expect your counted filler rate to look worse at first: your ear is improving and catching fillers that used to slide past unheard. Watch the trend across weeks, not any single session.
Why do I say like in every sentence?
Usually one use of like has become automatic. Like is four different words: the quotative ("she was like, no"), the approximator ("like twenty minutes"), the hedge ("it's like, the best option") and the focus marker. Most heavy users lean on the hedge, softening claims before anyone has challenged them. Record two minutes, sort every like by type, and spend a week on the tallest column.
Is saying like unprofessional?
The judgment against like is real, and it is unevenly applied. Linguist Alexandra D'Arcy traced like through eight hundred years of English and found regular grammar rather than sloppiness, and Jennifer Dailey-O'Cain found that people believe young women say like most when men and women use it about equally. In an interview or a board update, hedged claims still land softer than committed ones, so drop the hedge where the stakes are high and keep the rest.
Why do I mumble when I talk?
Mumbling is rarely a voice problem. Final consonants get dropped, the jaw stays nearly closed, and the sentence loses energy before it ends. Reading a paragraph aloud while landing every final t, d, k and s harder than feels natural resets your calibration faster than trying to speak louder. If people ask you to repeat single words, the problem is articulation; if they ask you to repeat whole sentences, it is volume or pace.
From How to speak more clearly
How do I speak more clearly and concisely?
Lead with the conclusion, then support it: "We should delay the launch. Two reasons." Naming how many points are coming commits you to a structure and tells the listener when to expect the end, and one idea per sentence keeps it easy to follow. Most rambling is thinking out loud while searching for the point, and structure has a side benefit: less planning load means fewer ums.