Being more assertive. Practical experiments to expand executive presence.

How do you be more assertive, when just thinking about it makes you squirm? Let me give you a different way to look at it.

Assertiveness as a leadership quality

Assertiveness is a leadership quality my coaching clients often have as a focus. Especially around executive presence and preparing for the next level.

I see and hear the resistance to "being more assertive" in my clients every time they bring it up. The fact that it is a focus in their development suggests it's not a natural form for them.

There's an unconscious, tacit reaction, a sense of dissonance, to the idea of assertiveness.

It's completely natural. Because it's so much more than one word. More than one idea.

The word is a label. A box full of related 'stuff' that's in tension with core values.

Your job is not to seek out assertiveness. Rather to identify all the barriers you create against it.

Assertiveness is a great many things to a great many people. And this is how you can start to work with it.

So let's not talk about 'doing' and 'being' this thing that you have programmed resistance to. Instead, let's frame it differently. Let's look at behavioral synonyms for 'assertive'.

It's not about being assertive

Play with me for a minute here.

It's not about being assertive. It's about disrupting your usual patterns.

Here then, is the new frame.

1. Think of a time when you observed someone who displayed 'assertiveness' (whatever that means to you).
2. Name 3 behaviors or qualities that you observe of them. What is it that they do, be, or say, specifically, that had you label it as assertive?
3. Go again
4. List 100 behavioral synonyms for being assertive.

Get specific. Go for the details.

Sounds like a lot right? Have at it. You'll surprise yourself.

Get creative. We're brainstorming possibilities here. Places to play and to experiment.

Laser focus on specific behaviors

We're changing the conversation. We are no longer having you be assertive. We're having you laser in on specific behaviors or capabilities.

It's not about being assertive. It's about a specific skill to practice or capability to expand.

When you get stuck, enroll 3 trusted colleagues or friends. Have this conversation with them. Ask them to think about interactions or conversations where they've perceived assertiveness in others.

What specific behaviors and qualities do they see? Add them to your list.

And when they think about themselves, and the times when they've felt assertive, what did they do differently?

Irrespective of whether you get 100 or not, you now have a list of very specific behaviors.

Now ask your manager.

Begin before you are ready

Pick just one.

Pick one item from your list that you know you can play with over an entire week. Go run the experiment. Tell people you're running it. Enroll trusted advisers and ask them for feedback on the impact of your experiment.

You're not working on assertiveness at all.

You're practicing very specific behaviors. Running experiments to see what impact you can create differently.

What do you notice about that initial resistance now?

An assertiveness laboratory

I mind-mapped this for myself and created 124 potential experiments. Here's an extract by way of a sample.

Body Language

• take up more space
• stand up if you usually sit
• open body position (shoulders back, hands loosely linked)
• stillness, reduced body movement/pacing
• more hand gestures (if you usually don't)

Fake it till ya make it.

Beyonce performs as Sasha Fierce. It's how she accesses the qualities she needs in the moment of a performance.

I embody a specific colleague as a way of connecting to my own innate cockiness, self-assurance, and sense of confidence.

Pick someone who embodies the qualities you want to bring, and try being them. You'll only ever be your version of those things. There's nothing inauthentic here.

Faking it is a way of giving yourself permission to access those qualities you have, and are uncomfortable being by default, for the sake of creating the impact you want.

Speech

Play with...

• volume
• pace (slow it down)
• use the fewest necessary words
• drop fillers ('um', 'ah', 'like')
• Stop discounting, qualifying, explaining, justifying. eg, "I was just going to ask a question...". Ask the question! Stop wasting everyone's time. You're all here to get good work done together.

Get curious and ask more questions. Asking more open-ended questions shows your interest and engagement.

When your questions are avoided or not answered, practice naming that and ask your question again.

Embrace silence. Let it sit. Ask one question, shut the hell up, and be with the silence that follows. Don't soften it, discount it, or fill the space where you want others to do the work.

Time the silences and see how long your comfortable silence is. Aim to quadruple it.

Advocacy

Broker conversation for others. "It looks like CJ has an idea. I'd like to hear it"

Show your workings and assumptions. "Here's the data I accessed in reaching this conclusion"

Articulate what's going on...

...with agenda or structure — "It feels like we're going off-topic here. What do you think?"

...with behavior — "CJ, you spoke over Sam and cut them off"

Inquiry

Help others surface their mental models by asking 'what' and 'how' questions.

"What assumptions have you made here?"

Connection

• Focus on maintaining eye contact in a 1:1.
• With an audience, meet 1 person's eyes and hold them for 1 idea. Then move to another person for 1 idea.
• Tell more stories as a means of delivering your message
• Share your vision of a better future.

Disruption

• Sit at the back of the room, so when you speak people have to turn around to look at you.
• Stand facing inward when you get into an elevator.

Rinse and repeat

As you play with this, make a list of other direct synonyms that come up for you, and go to town with behavioral experiments on these words.

Assertiveness >> Strength >> Convition >> Self belief >> Assurance >> Protector >> Advocate >> Champion >> Visionary >> Purpose >> Mission >> Community >> Confident >> Bold >> Decisive