Confidently Speak Your Mind & Gain Respect

Ep: 174

If you feel unhappy or powerless at work and in life, it all boils down to one reason.

It’s because you aren’t actively participating in creating what you want.

The power to change things starts with using your voice.

Today on The Bridge to Fulfillment, Blake helps you shed the fear of feeling disrespectful, rude,  or like you’re not a team player at the thought of speaking up at work and putting your thoughts and ideas out there.

In this episode, you’ll learn how to stop feeling afraid and start leveraging your voice to earn respect in your life and in your workplace. You’ll hear about the risks of not being seen, heard, and respected when you fail to speak up for yourself at work. You’ll also learn the 4 ways you can most effectively use your voice and how to prepare for these types of conversations.

If you’ve been trying to find the courage to speak up more in meetings or you just want to say something without seeming rude, then this episode is for you.

It’s time to speak up and stop diminishing the importance of your voice.

 

What You’ll Learn:

  • What people misunderstand about what we do on The Bridge to Fulfillment (1:59)
  • The real risks and costs of not speaking up (3:28)
  • 4 key tenants to master using your voice (5:21)
  • The most important thing to understand before starting the conversation (9:22)

 

Favorite Quotes:

  1. I see talented women getting physically sick because of the stress, anxiety and frustration they’re keeping trapped in their bodies.
  2. Helping women transition into new roles isn’t what I do, it’s a byproduct or a benefit of the work.
  3. If your life is led from a place of fear, instead of a place of opportunity, you will always be looking at sharing your perspective as “risky”, when in fact not sharing is actually the risk.
  4. Why do we end up unhappy in our lives or feel like we’re powerless to create what we want? Because we aren’t active participants in creating what we want.

Additional Resources: 

Rather than hoping the grass will be greener, identify what the RIGHT next step is. 

We can help you do just that.

Get clarity on where you are on your journey to career fulfillment, where you’re headed, optional paths to get there, and the right next step to take.

Start your complimentary, Personalized Career Fulfillment Plan by going to www.thebridgetofulfillment.com/plan

Want free resources to set your job search up for success? You can get them by going to: https://thebridgetofulfillment.com/mistakes

Transcript

Blake Schofield 0:05 Hi, I’m Blake Schofield, founder and CEO of The Bridge to Fulfillment, mom to three, USA Today top 10 professional coach, and former corporate executive who got tired of sacrificing my life for a comfortable paycheck. My mission is to expand women’s perspectives and empower them to achieve greater impact at home and work without sacrifice. This is The Bridge to Fulfillment. One of the biggest challenges I see for women at work is learning how to use their voice. Whether it is fear of being seen as disrespectful, not a team player, or just not understanding the importance of sharing your perspective. Consistently, I see women putting themselves in situations where they feel frustrated, undervalued. So if you’re lacking control over their work their day and ultimately their life, seeing talented women knowing that what is being suggested by others won’t actually work. But they go ahead and do it anyway. Because that’s what their boss or someone else thinks is right. And they end up having to do the work all over again, with a strategy that they knew wouldn’t work didn’t. I see talented women getting physically sick because of the stress, anxiety and frustration they’re keeping trapped in their bodies, and believing that if they could just find a less toxic boss or environment, or better life balance that they finally be happy?

Blake Schofield 1:38 You know, I had a conversation recently about how this podcast is so much more than just about changing jobs, and applicable to women in very different circumstances that have nothing to do with needing to change their job. And to be honest, I’m really glad that that resonated with her because what we do at the bridge to fulfillment is so much beyond that. You know, recently I began to feel like the title many people place on me that I help unfulfilled women transition into more fulfilling work without having to take a pay cut. That it’s really too limiting. Because the reality is that what I help women do is so much broader than that. Teaching them the frameworks to set their life up for success to truly understand who they are as people and value their unique skills, perspective, approach and value to easily and compellingly share with others the value they bring, and to not just ask for, but have the tools to create the life they want. As a result of that, they end up drastically reducing their stress move into roles where they’re making big pay increases and doing work that’s aligned with what they’re truly passionate about. And excited to get up to every morning. helping women transition into new roles isn’t what I do, it’s a byproduct or a benefit of the work. Know what also happens inside the bridge to fulfillment program. Within weeks, my clients lives improved drastically inside and outside of work. Because they’re given the tools and perspective to shift the frustrations and triggers in their life. You know that old saying from the Wizard of Oz, you always had the power, my dear, you just had to learn it for yourself. I find over and over again, this is true. And so what does it have to do with learning to speak up in a way that’s respectful and gain respect? Honestly, everything. Because if you don’t understand why and how your voice matters, if your life is led from a place of fear, instead of a place of opportunity, you will always be looking at sharing your perspective as quote unquote risky, when in fact not sharing is actually the risk. Follow me here? Why do we end up unhappy in our lives? Why do we feel we’re powerless to create what we want? Why do we hate working with certain people? Because we aren’t active participants in creating what we want, or we don’t believe that we have the power to change things. And so we began shutting down our own voice, no longer listening to what we know to be true. And just going along with things that as a result creates more stress, frustration and unhappiness. It makes getting up to go to work a chore and something we drag ourselves to. Now honestly, we can talk about this as being a work issue. But I see this all the time in women’s personal lives as well. Whether it’s with a parent, a sibling, or a long term friendship that maybe you’ve outgrown, but you don’t have the heart to move on from. So what can you do about it? Well, first of all, realize the cost of not sharing your perspective on your health, your happiness, and your time.

Blake Schofield 4:45 And also realize that disengaged employees, you know, those who aren’t really passionate about what they’re doing and they’re just going through the motions are actually the most at risk of performance plan or layoff. On the flip side, though, Those who feel their voice and perspective matter feel in control of creating what they want, and actually create the outcomes they want for their life. At this point, you might be thinking to yourself, Okay, Blake, yeah, I get it. But either one, I’ve had circumstances before where I did share my perspective, and I got burned, or two, I don’t really know how to speak up without offending somebody coming across as negative or hurting our relationship. And here’s what I’ll tell you. There’s an art and a science to how to do this well. But I’ll share with you four key tenants today. Number one, start looking at the situation from a more holistic place, not just your perspective, but the other person’s perspective as well. And realize that you are both on the same team. Let me give you an example. Right? If you were, you know, on a track team in a relay race, and you had run that race, and you knew there was a pothole on that track, would you just let your partner run directly towards it without a warning? Would you actually tell them what your experience had been? And what their perspective of the goal? Hey, I want to make you aware, something that I came aware of? Well, of course, you would tell them, but you know, how often, gosh, how often am I having conversations with women that say, I know what my boss is suggesting, I know what this person is suggesting, isn’t going to work. But you just allow them to continue to do that work, and you get in and do the work they asked you to do only to find out it didn’t work. And you go through a huge wasted cycle of energy, time, frustration, etc. Not only did that waste all your time and energy, but it made that person look bad. It didn’t stop them from making the mistake that was so evident to you. You know, one of the things I really learned about being successful in corporate and just really honestly successful in life, is how to help the people around me win. One of the greatest things you can do is help your leader win. And often I describe this as leading the leader, sometimes, well, all of the time, we all have blind spots, and we don’t see what they are. And when we aren’t helping the people on our team, recognize some of those blind spots, avoid those blind spots, and make sure we’re setting all of us up for success. Then ultimately, we’re failing in that process. Because people aren’t being hired to be yes, men and women, they’re being hired to contribute their strengths, skills, opinions, perspectives, to create the right outcome. Remember, you’re on the same team. Number two, choose your words and timing. Often the reason people aren’t successful in sharing their perspective or asking for what they want is one of two reasons. They’re either way too vague, and what I call a quote unquote, soft, they make it seem like what they’re saying is just a soft suggestion, versus a suggestion with conviction, data or knowledge. Or number two, they’re too harsh in their words or timing. So the end up putting the other person on defensive mode. And a lot of times this happens because we are emotionally trigger. And we don’t recognize that and then we’re presenting that trigger in the way we’re speaking to people, which then shuts them down and they become defensive. So if you’ve in the past not been successful, and you’ve been burned and sharing your perspective, likely one of those two things has happened, right? And if you don’t know how to speak up without offending somebody or coming across as negative, etc, think about right? Have you approached it from same team? Have you thought about how to present it in a way that’s not too hard and not too soft? The third tenant for success frame your suggestion in a way that benefits the other person, you may have heard this before, or framed as what’s in it for them. Because again, often if we’re approaching things of what we want, but we’re approaching it from how it benefits us, instead of how it benefits others, we will never be as successful. So look at how you can link it to how it would benefit them. And number four, make it easy. If you’re asking for something from somebody, or sharing your perspective about a way you want somebody to change or influence them to do what you see is the right outcome. Don’t expect the other person to solve the problem or connect the dots, come up with that solution, connect the dots yourself and step up and ask for what you want.

Blake Schofield 9:22 Now that said, right, the golden this process really comes from understanding the nuances. So often I see people think I can just get this cookie cutter approach and apply it. But often that’s why we’re unsuccessful. It’s why one of the first things I do when I start speaking to people about what the challenges are, what they’re trying to accomplish is really understand the context. What’s the pattern of things that have happened? What’s the context of the background of this circumstance, so that you can really be able to identify what are the reasons why it hasn’t worked in the past? What are the things that are going to be important to be able to connect the dots For that somebody, and then how do you look at that circumstance and build it as a win win? What’s in it for them that also then is a positive for you. And so today, I hope by opening up context or conversation about this topic, it’s helped maybe open your perspective to the fact that maybe not using your voice actually hasn’t kept you safe. But it’s actually the thing that’s making you unhappy. It’s actually the thing that’s causing you to feel undervalued or unheard, is actually the thing that’s creating stress and anxiety in your life. And that there is a better way, there is a way not only to be able to use your voice to advocate for what you want, but to be seen as a greater leader, as someone that people actually seek out for their opinion. And as somebody who truly then can use their voice to create the future that they truly want, as always, so greatly appreciate you listening, and being able to come and serve you, then I’d love to hear from you. Once you go to iTunes and share with me a rating and a review. Let me know what you’re enjoying in the podcast and what you would love to learn more about. I greatly appreciate each one of you. And I want to wish you a wonderful week ahead.

Blake Schofield 11:23 Thanks for joining me today. Rather than hope the grass will be greener identify what the right next step is. We can help you do just that. Get clarity on where you are in your journey to career fulfillment, where you’re headed, optimal paths to get there, and the right next step to take. Start your complimentary personalized career fulfillment plan at www.thebridgetofulfillment.com/plan  Again, you can get your personalized career fulfillment plan at www.thebridgetofulfillment.com/plan Thanks again for joining and have a great week ahead