A lot of clubs have someone throw a bean into a jar whenever someone says “um” or “ah.” Or they’ll click on a little clicker or do something else obnoxious in order to remind someone that they’ve goofed the very moment it happened.

I don’t like this one bit.

My biggest objection to this is that this will freak out and intimidate new speakers. It certainly would’ve demotivated me when I was starting out worrying about it, and I really have never had uhm or ah problems. This is when proponents of the bean tossing say, “Oh no, John, we only do this to someone after they’ve given at least X speeches.” The problem is that the person throwing the bean into the jar, at least every time I’ve seen a club do this, has to apologize to the person who has given < X speeches that they threw beans for because they didn’t realize where the person was.

The next objection is that this can freak out and intimidate experienced speakers. When I’ve had this done to me, not only does the initial bean throw off my thoughts but I have a secondary distraction when the audience smiles or winces or whatever when they hear the bean going around. I can deal with people entering and leaving and even straight out not paying attention, but the bean is pushing it.

Next, why do we interrupt only on uhms & ahs? Why not if someone has lousy eye contact? Maybe the grammarian should make a big production of covering his eyes the second that happens. Or how about if they mess up on grammar, we should start stomping on the floor?

Finally, the bean toss doesn’t simulate reality. No one in your speech to your boss is going to be throwing things if you “uhm” or “ah” unless you’re in front of a very hard audience.

A club I helped found a few years ago of course did not do the bean jar at first. An experienced member from another club where they do this introduced it to the club, and then suggested a clicker. I let the other members know that there was no rule for doing the bean counter/clicker and they got to decide whether the club used it or not. It was voted down overwhelmingly.

I’m not against someone asking for immediate feedback on messing up on uhms and ahs, bad eye contact, or whatever and having a club member make a noise to let them know. In fact, it’s a very powerful training technique that the speaking coaches I’ve worked with used on me on areas that I needed work. But it needs to be voluntary and on the area that I need work on.