Timestamps

00:00:00: Introduction
00:02:20: Why it's important to be assertive in your careers
00:04:54: Assertiveness defined and finding balance
00:08:45: Find your "even better if…"
00:11:20: When assertiveness becomes aggression
00:13:44: Examples of helpful assertiveness
00:21:12: Coach-yourself questions
00:22:14: Ideas for action… 1: adapting your communication
00:28:24: … 2: being prepared to react using "if… then"
00:36:33: … 3: preparing and sharing your points of view
00:42:03: Final thoughts

Interview Transcription

Sarah Ellis: Hi, I'm Sarah.

Helen Tupper: And I'm Helen.

Sarah Ellis: And this is a Squiggly Careers podcast, where every week we talk about a different topic to do with work, which we hope will help you to have a bit more confidence, clarity and control in your Squiggly Career.  There are now more than 270 episodes of the podcast.  Who knew?

Helen Tupper: 276, Sarah, to be precise.

Sarah Ellis: To be exact!  And that sounds overwhelming, I think, rather than a good thing!  I feel like we're trying to say that as a good thing, all those amazing episodes, but it just sounds like a lot.

Helen Tupper: There are that many issues with careers that you need that many episodes of a podcast to help you!

Sarah Ellis: But if you are trying to look for some free resources, if you go onto amazingif.com, and you look for our Toolkit, we do have our top ten episodes, and we have PodSheets for each of those episodes, which summarises things like the ideas for action and the coach-yourself questions.  We also have a podcast page on our website where, again, you can search by some keywords, and we've tried to put some podcasts together just to help you get started, or if you've got a particular need or a question in mind and you want to see if you can find a podcast to help you with it.

Helen Tupper: And if you can't find the links to that stuff, we'll put it all in the show notes for you as well, and you can always email us.  We're just helen&sarah@squigglycareers.com.  And also, Sarah, welcome back, because you weren't here last week, where we you?  You weren't with me talking about Squiggly Careers, you were…?

Sarah Ellis: No, I was on holiday with my partner and my 5-year-old on the beach finding crabs.  That was the main activity for the holiday.

Helen Tupper: What Easter fun!  Well actually, it was quite sunny.

Sarah Ellis: It was, it was nice.

Helen Tupper: Crabs, sunshine and family, it's not bad.  But yes, I was here with Pritesh and if you haven't listened to that episode, we were talking about the role of community in careers.  And at the end of that podcast, Pritesh shared his poem all about Squiggly Careers, which he had shared with us previously.  We were like, "How do we get this out into the world?" so we put it out on the podcast.  So, if you've not listened to that, actually you can follow us on LinkedIn, because we shared it on LinkedIn, the video, or you can listen to the podcast from last week.

So today, we're talking about assertiveness, and the reason we wanted to talk about assertiveness was, we were actually quite surprised we haven't covered it before as a topic in careers, because it definitely comes up in the feedback people get about, "It would be helpful if you were more assertive".  But actually, it feels that as a skill in careers, it's becoming more important than ever, so let's talk about why that is.

The first thing is the context for careers, which is that they are Squiggly, so they are full of change, but also there is lots of opportunity to personalise your progression.  One of the biggest benefits of Squiggly Careers is that success and squiggliness is as individual as we are.  But having the confidence to have the conversations that you need to have about you and your development, so that you can benefit from that individuality, means that you do need to be assertive about what's important to you and why, so that you can get the things that you need.

Also, we were thinking a bit about the way that people are working now, so work is, for a lot of people, becoming increasingly hybrid, so you've got a bit more choice about how your working week might work for you, how many days you're in the office, where you're working perhaps.  But if you want to use this opportunity to design the work that works for you, again you need to be quite assertive about this in the conversations that you're having, or you could just default into what someone else thinks you should do, or into what might be working well for them. 

But I do think this is a really interesting moment in time for you to think about, "How do I craft my role or my career around what works best for me?"

Sarah Ellis: So, what we're going to talk about is, what assertiveness is and what it isn't, and we're going to share a few examples of where being assertive has helped us, and hindered us when we've not got it right in our careers, just to share a few stories.  We'll do that quite briefly, because we really want to focus on the ideas for action in terms of increasing your assertiveness.

One of the things that we both noticed, and we've done quite a lot of reading around assertiveness, read quite a lot of articles, as we always try to do to prepare for these podcasts, is there are lots of descriptions about assertiveness, what it is and what it looks like, but not that many practical ideas for action at how to get better at that skill.  And I think it is a skill, so it is something that we can practise and improve. 

But most of the focus is more just talking about assertiveness, and I was almost getting a bit frustrated as I was doing some of the research and going, okay, well there's lots of common themes around assertiveness, but if you've had that feedback, I think you can end up feeling quite frustrated, because it can feel like one of those areas, a bit like gravitas is a similar one, gravitas or assertiveness, where you want some help with, "Well, what could I do, what action could I take, that would help to increase my assertiveness?"  So, we've got three ideas for action that we'll share, but we're just going to start quickly by talking a bit about what it is and what it isn't, and just some examples to bring it to life.

So, the definition that we found that we connected with the most, and felt quite simple and straightforward is that, assertiveness is the ability to stand up for what you believe, while being calm and positive, and also respecting the rights of others.  And I think that "and" is really important.  So, it is about being clear about what you believe in, what you want to stand for, and doing that in a way where you have confidence and clarity; but that doesn't mean that you don't listen to other people, and that you're not prepared to change your mind or to change your opinion if you think, "Oh, that's really valid".  That doesn't stop you being assertive, you don't lose your assertiveness when you listen to other people, or when you're open to other people's perspectives.

Helen Tupper: This idea of balance, balancing what you might want, but also being open to hearing what the impact of that might be on other people, this idea of balance actually is part of a model that we really like by Thomas Anthony Harris, and we'll put this on the PodSheet as well.  It's called the "I'm OK - You're OK" model, which is an interesting one, but it takes this idea of balance and it says, assertiveness is about I'm okay and you're okay.  So, we are not trying to compete, I'm not trying to be better than you, I'm listening to what's important to you, I'm holding on to what's important to me, so I'm okay, you're okay.  That idea of balance is assertive. 

Whereas, when I'm okay, so I'm getting what I want, but ultimately you're not okay, because I'm not listening to you, I'm not trying to adapt or understand where you're coming from, the risk there is it's imbalanced and it's also becoming quite aggressive.  So, if I just say to Sarah, "Well, the thing that I want, Sarah, is to work from home, Monday to Friday, and that's what I want to do", and Sarah's trying to go, "Well actually, it would be great if we could spend one day a week together, because that's where our ideas happen", and I'm basically just not listening, in no way am I letting Sarah's perspective into the conversation, then that isn't balanced and it is much more of an aggressive way of working.  I'm likely to make Sarah quite defensive or demotivated, or just not particularly want to work with me.  So, that's an imbalanced response.

The other one is where Sarah's okay, so Sarah's getting everything that Sarah wants, but I'm not okay.  So, maybe I'm compromising the things that are important to me, because I'm just doing what Sarah thinks that we should do.  The risk there is you get quite passive.  So, I'm just going, "Okay, well I'll just do it your way, okay", or I just want to make Sarah happy, I care about Sarah, and I'm putting her priorities before my own.  So that again is imbalanced and I'm becoming quite passive.

The other one is when you're both not okay.  So, Sarah's not okay, I'm not working in a way that works for Sarah; and I'm not okay, I'm not working in a way that works for me.  The risk here, the imbalance here, is it becomes passive-aggressive.  So, in the moment I go, "Well, we'll just find a way through, won't we?  We'll just find a way through", and out of the moment I'm going, "Oh, Sarah makes this so difficult all the time, because we haven't really got to an outcome, I'm not particularly happy", I'm potentially having side conversations with other people about things that I should have talked about in the moment with Sarah.

So, this idea of balance is really important, and what we're trying to get to is a place where you're okay, you know what's important to you, and you're able to have that conversation; but you're also able to hear and recognise and respond to what's important to other people too.

Sarah Ellis: And I think it's helpful to make that model useful for you, to think about first of all, where do you already do a good job of being assertive, because there will be certain situations, examples, some of the work that you do, where you feel like you do a good job of being assertive and you don't stay in one box all of the time, if that makes sense?  So, you will spend time in different places probably, depending on the situation or what's happening.

So first of all, notice where you already do this well and what helps you to do that; and then, think about what's your "even better if…", so either what's a situation where you'd like to increase your assertiveness, or generally where do you feel like your assertiveness moves to either being passive or aggressive or passive-aggressive, are there some examples where you think, "It's often when… that I feel like I lose my assertiveness, and that gets replaced with a more unhelpful behaviour that probably isn't supporting me to do a good job".

So I was thinking, for me for example, I think my "even better if…" would be when I find people intimidating just generally, when I find people intimidating for whatever reason, maybe because they're good at something that I'm not, or maybe they just have a very different style to me, I lose my assertiveness and become more passive.  So, that's generally what happens in that situation.  What would your "even better if…" be, Helen?

Helen Tupper: Mine would be seniority specifically, so intimidating, but mine is more specifically about senior people when I think, "Maybe I'll just go along with what they want".  In that situation, I can see that in that corporate life when I've been in those situations.  But I think also sometimes, I become less assertive when I'm a bit bored, because then I just kind of go --

Sarah Ellis: So, I'll notice that, I'll just be like, "Oh, that's feedback, she's obviously a bit bored"!

Helen Tupper: So, let's say I'm in a meeting and I might start off with quite a lot of energy.  And then, if I feel like a conversation's going round and round in circles, I think I can sometimes fall a bit into fixed mindset and go, "Oh my gosh, we've been here before", and then I go, "I can't be bothered to be assertive", because I think it does take energy to be assertive, to have that clarity about what's important to you and then communicate it with confidence.  That takes energy; being passive's a lot easier.

So, I think if I'm in a situation that has taken quite a lot of my energy away, then I think I can become a bit passive and like, "Fine, we'll just do it your way", anything to end this moment.

Sarah Ellis: Actually, do you know what, I can really recognise that now you've described it!  I'm like, "Yeah, she does do that when she's clearly had enough of it", and you've sort of lost interest.  Because you love doing and you like things with pace, momentum and speed, I think sometimes you're like, "That's it, I'm out".

Helen Tupper: Anything to get this done, please!  That's how you can beat me into submission, just bore me!

Sarah Ellis: Just keep going, keep on talking!  And I was thinking actually, when I'm nervous -- so, I was trying to think, "Do I ever get aggressive?" and as somebody who's introverted and often gets quieter under pressure, it's interesting to think, "Do you ever go into aggression behaviour?"  I think I can sometimes be aggressive, not as frequently as passive; I'd be more likely to go into passive.  But if I am nervous, I think sometimes my assertiveness actually can be borderline aggressive, because that's my nerves almost taking over.

I can think of examples where we've done things together where I'm so nervous, and perhaps because I really care or I think something's really important, maybe not aggressive, but I perhaps dominate a conversation, which is perhaps surprising for someone who is an introvert.  But I think that's my coping mechanism.  And I know that we've talked about this before.  Sometimes, I think you just watch me going, "She's clearly tense and obviously quite nervous", and it maybe wouldn't necessarily be seen as aggressive, but certainly dominating and probably not the right side of assertiveness, I think.

Helen Tupper: "Aggressive" is quite a funny word, isn't it?

Sarah Ellis: Yeah, it feels quite uncomfortable to say, doesn't it?

Helen Tupper: Yeah, it does, doesn't it?  Because I go, "Am I aggressive?"  I don't think I am aggressive, however do I see your dominance in certain situations?  Yes.  And have we had really useful conversations about that since?  Yes.  And if I think about, "Are there times when I'm okay, but other people aren't okay?"  So, I think that's there's definitely -- I wouldn't say I'm being aggressive, but I can see situations where I'm like, "I just want to get it done", and I can almost -- there's that saying, isn't there, "You ride over other people"; I can almost see where I'm so determined to get it done, because I'm okay about this, that I almost dismiss, I don't take the time to understand other people's perspectives.

I think that, to me, is a form of this, "I'm okay, you're not okay", which was arguably in the area of aggression, but I'm not shouting, I'm not being nasty, but it's not balanced.

Sarah Ellis: Yeah, which is where sometimes those words and those labels can actually be unhelpful.  Because actually, you describing when are the times where you might be okay, but other people are not okay, has given you more useful insights there than just going, "But aggression", probably because we automatically default aggression equals shouting and that kind of behaviour.  So, I think that's a really helpful question just to ask yourself and to keep noticing. 

Can you think of some examples, or perhaps an example of where being assertive has helped you in your Squiggly Career, just to bring this to life for everybody?

Helen Tupper: Yes, I do, I can think of some.  But I think actually, quite regularly, you and me have trust between us, I think we're quite assertive with each, because we have this clarity.  I do!  You're like, "I disagree, you're very aggressive"!  But I think because we have a clarity of the work that we are doing is about making careers better for everybody, I think that we are able to give each other feedback, or defend a point of view, because it's connected.

For example, a podcast topic, you and me can quite quickly say, "I don't think that's the right thing for us to do this week [or] I think we need to discuss that further"; that's quite an assertive statement to make, particularly when it's over WhatsApp, but it's because it's in service of us being okay.  Because we are connected to this thing of making careers better for everyone, it's part of that.  So, I think we perhaps do it quite regularly.

But I also think that I have been quite assertive about my career choices.  So, there have been times in my career, and particularly I remember in Virgin, when I was thinking about leaving Virgin, and there was quite a lot of talk about me staying and other people creating roles for me to stay in, and various different things.  And I think in those conversations, I could have been a bit passive, I could have been like, "Okay, that sounds good, I'll give it a go", that sort of passive thing, but that probably would have been better for them than it was for me. 

But I think I was really clear about what I wanted, which was I knew what they wanted and I knew what I needed, which was I wanted to manage a bigger team than I could have done in that role.  That was what was okay for me, because I wanted to become a better manager.  Part of me being a better manager meant managing a bigger team, and there wasn't something they could give me that could help that. 

I think I was quite assertive about that point, and I took time to listen to what they wanted and why they wanted it, and I completely understood it; but I also held on to what was important to me, because I had the clarity because I had the confidence, and I made better decisions because of that.  So, I can see those career decisions where my assertiveness has really helped me to personalise my Squiggly Career.  What about you?

Sarah Ellis: Well, I think my examples, I can think of some bigger examples as you've described across my career, but I was trying to think of some more day-to-day examples of the work that we do, and where I haven't been as assertive as I would have liked to, and where I've tried to actively make that change.  So, I've got one that really stood out where, it must have been about six or nine months ago, I was going to be on holiday and I was a bit passive when someone really wanted to talk to me while I was on holiday, and they knew I was on holiday, but weren't taking no for an answer.

Helen Tupper: Is this me?

Sarah Ellis: No, no!

Helen Tupper: "And this person…!"

Sarah Ellis: No!  So, somebody was really adamant, almost borderline aggressive that they wanted to do this meeting while I was on holiday, and I sort of got -- I think because they'd gone a bit aggressive and I think they were completely okay, I got very passive and said, you know the saying yes when you want to say no?

Helen Tupper: Yeah.

Sarah Ellis: So, I did say yes when I wanted to say no, which I don't do very often, but I think I felt steamrollered into it, almost as though I'd got no option or choice.  And I remember that it was really difficult and quite stressful and it caused me a lot of stress to do it.  And then interestingly, my reflection on that was, "That was nowhere near an urgent thing to do, nowhere near", in hindsight, even further away from being urgent than lots of other things that I could have done. 

I think that recognition in that moment made me remember actually when I was on holiday last week to say no to things while I was on holiday, and it's really easy to work on holiday, because you've probably got your tech with you.  I hadn't got as much tech with me last week actually, which made it harder to work, which was a good thing, but I very consciously said no to a couple of things right at the last minute, where I would have had to do it on holiday, because I remember that feeling of thinking, "Don't be passive.  You want to protect your boundaries, it's really useful to have a break, it is okay to say no to things while you're on holiday", which sounds like something which should be simple, but I think there are times where it can feel hard to be assertive in that moment.  So, that was one for me.

Then, one where I was more proactively assertive, where I was proud of myself and then I was like, "I can talk about it on the podcast!" is that we were running a programme for one of our partners, and I had spotted that I thought we should do some things differently quite quickly, in the moment, almost mid-programme.  And to your point about, sometimes it's easier to not be assertive, it wasn't like there were big problems, or things that I needed to fix; I could have easily done nothing.  To do nothing would have been easy, and that would have been fine, which would have been passive.  But I was assertive in recommending that we made those changes, making them happen, and I know that if I hadn't been assertive, nothing would have changed.   

I felt proud of myself there for doing that, because you know you think, "Oh, is it a bit of a nice-to-do?" but I knew it would make the programme better, I'd got loads of other things to do and lots of other priorities, but that proactive assertiveness I felt was both good for me, because I believed in it; back to that definition of "stand up for what you believe", I believed in wanting to make our programmes better and I wanted to hear what the people we were working with thought as well, so I didn't go, "We are doing this and we are doing this my way or no way", but I was assertive about recommending what I thought was the right thing to do, and then respecting, listening to the company that we were working with to say, "What do you think, and have you got a point of view or perspective?" and then really quickly, we got to a conclusion that will be better.

So, I thought that's a good example of just spotting opportunities to do this in a proactive way, because I think often we think about those difficult moments where we want to be assertive, because things are hard, or it's a difficult conversation; whereas, that was much more of a positive thing, where I was taking initiative and using my assertiveness for positive impact, I guess.

Helen Tupper: The interesting thing for me as well is the feeling of pride it creates.  Because you said, "A moment I'm proud of", and I actually do think that when you are intentionally assertive and you find that balance, it is a moment for you to feel proud; you're like, "I did it, and it's better because I did it".

Sarah Ellis: It's true actually.  All my other examples, which I'm not going to talk about, because I actually did list quite a few examples when I was writing down some thoughts for today; when I was listening them, all the examples that I had been assertive in my career that I could about, more generally and then more specifically over the past few months, I did feel really good about all of those moments, because even if you hadn't got to the outcome that you were hoping for, they didn't quite work out in the way that you'd imagined, I still think you feel good about the thing that you control, how you choose to behave. 

So, you chose to behave in an assertive way, to stand up for what you believed in, with that calmness and that clarity, and I think that always feels good, which is useful to remember when it's feeling hard to do.

Helen Tupper: When you're like, "So, next time you get bored, Helen, in a meeting and you become passive, think about how proud you'll be if you stay positive!"

Sarah Ellis: Yeah, that's what I'm going to say to you; you know that's what I'm going to say to you!

Helen Tupper: Thanks, can't wait for you to coach myself in the moment!  So, what we've got for you now are three coach-yourself questions, so that you can understand and assess your assertiveness; and then we've got three ideas for action to increase your assertiveness.  So, I'll do the three questions first, and then we'll get into that first idea for action.

So, coach-yourself questions: (1) how frequently do you say yes when you'd like to say no?  (2) when do you find it hard to protect your boundaries?  (3) what stops you from speaking up and sharing what you think?  If you can just take a bit of time to reflect on those coach-yourself questions, you'll get to some really interesting insights about when you are or aren't assertive now, and why that might be.  So, what are some of the issues that you might need to overcome, and the ideas for action that might be most relevant for you to take first.

Sarah Ellis: So, our first idea for action is about communicating in an assertive way, because often, I do think communication and assertiveness go hand-in-hand, and we're talking about those two things when we're thinking about, "What does it look like?  What would be observing and noticing if someone was increasing their assertiveness?"

I found this 3C model, which actually I think was being used by nurses in the NHS, that I thought was interesting, and they describe this 3C model to help you just to think about what you're trying to achieve, and then we'll talk specifically about how you do this.  But these three Cs are: clear, so is the message clear and easy to understand; confident, do you feel confident that you can handle a situation, so that feeling of confidence; and controlled, which is communicating in that calm way that we talked about with the definition.  So, clear, confident, controlled. 

It might just be worth thinking about, which one of those do you naturally do well, which one do you find hardest and therefore, what might you need to do, or what might you do differently.  And the thing that we really want to think about here is, how do we avoid words that cloud clarity, make excuses and how do we instead increase the amount of I-ness, which I appreciate is not a real word, but how do we increase the amount of I-ness in what we are saying?

So, to bring this to life, we've done some from and to statements, which are hopefully broadly realistic.  We've taken it quite far to really make the point, but hopefully as well, they'll just help bring to life what we're talking about here.  So, for example, you might say something like, "Do you think we should perhaps revisit option B as part of this project, as it might be useful?"  So, just some of the things there, "do you think?" is asking someone else, rather than really owning something; "we should" and "perhaps", in-between words, words that cloud clarity; "it might be useful", so lots of lack of definitive statements there. 

Instead, what you could try is something that would sound a bit more like, "I'd recommend we revisit option B at this point, as I believe it will give us some useful information".  So there, you've got the I, "I'd recommend", you're going, "I believe that"; "we revisit option B" is the action; and you're saying again, "I believe it will give us some useful information", so you're standing behind the recommendation, the idea, the action that you're trying to talk about.

Helen Tupper: So, another example for you would be this one.  So, "Sorry for the potentially stupid question, but I just wondered if we might maybe need to get James involved in this project?"  So, we're starting with an apology, we're undermining ourselves, "I'm being potentially stupid"; "might maybe", clouding our clarity there; and sort of ending with this question, "what do you think?" 

Instead, taking some of those principles that Sarah talked about, it would be much more clear to say, "I'm going to ask James to get involved in the project at this point.  Is there anyone else we can also ask for their perspective?"  What I like about that one is it's my opinion, "I'm going to ask James to get involved", and it's clear, but it's also quite open, "is there anyone else we can ask for their perspective?" so it's not just going, "I'm going to do it, because I think it's right".  It's got that balance within it as well.

Sarah Ellis: And then the last one, we tried to write one that we felt was more passive-aggressive, because we thought we all probably see that in ourselves sometimes, probably see it in other people.  A passive-aggressive statement might sound like, "I'm not 100% sure about this, but I'm happy to go along with your idea".  So you've gone, "I don't agree, but I'm just going to go with it".  It's classic passive-aggressive behaviour, and I do think we probably have all done this at some point, probably when you are losing the motivation, as Helen talked about, in a meeting where you're like, "Okay, fine".  I can almost feel those moments where you just think, "I probably have got a different point of view", but do you have the energy, as Helen described, to be assertive?

Helen Tupper: Or you might go, "Look, I'm not 100% sure about it, but if you want to take it forward, then that's okay", because you've gone --

Sarah Ellis: I feel like you say that to me quite a lot!

Helen Tupper: I think you say it to me!  But I think that's like, "Well, if you believe in it, then fine", but it's almost like, "but I don't and I'm letting you know that it's on you", is the implied.

Sarah Ellis: It's quite fun though, isn't it, I think, to be a little bit passive-aggressive sometimes.  But instead, perhaps if you're going to be more grownup and a bit more adult to adult and I'm okay and you're okay, it would sound --

Helen Tupper: Are we okay?

Sarah Ellis: Are we okay?  Who knows?

Helen Tupper: We are!

Sarah Ellis: It would sound a bit more like, "I've got some concerns about the idea.  I'd appreciate the opportunity to talk it through further before we make progress".  So, you're clearly stating, "I've got some concerns about the idea", and you're saying, "I'd like to talk it through a bit more before we keep going", so you have had that confidence and that calmness to say what you think, and to also say you don't feel comfortable about just going along with it for the sake of it, and you're not going to go off and have that corridor conversation, or undermine the idea afterwards, or get frustrated afterwards.

So, it's hard, I think, to be assertive all of the time.  And one of the things that I did read, that I found really helpful, was this idea of adaptive assertiveness, so noticing there will be different levels of assertiveness that you will need in different meetings, different projects, different work that you do, so it's not like we have to try and -- imagine trying to do this before every meeting?  By the time I'd thought about the sentence I was meant to say, the meeting would have finished.

But I do think you can probably pinpoint certain situations where you think, "Okay, I'm going to need to dial up my assertiveness in this moment, [or] I've got a choice about how assertive I'm going to be", and these kinds of statements, in terms of getting rid of the in-between words, the excuses, increasing the I-ness, will just help you to communicate with more assertiveness, as and when you feel like you need to.

Helen Tupper: And perhaps this being adaptively assertive is also part of the second idea for action, which is about using "if… then" as a technique to improve your assertiveness.  So if, for example, you see yourself getting aggressive, and remember let's maybe reframe that word, so this is a situation where you're okay, but maybe you're not helping someone else to be okay in that situation as well.  So, if that's you, if you can see that in the ways that sometimes you work and sometimes that you might come across as aggressive to other people, then a really good reaction to that would be to slow down your approach, rather than speeding up a conversation.

I see this in myself.  I'd be, "Let's just get it done, I know how to do this, I could move it forward fast"; my natural approach would be to speed it up.  But actually, the better thing to do might be to slow it down.  And one really good way to do that is to ask a question to find out more.  If you can prioritise your curiosity over giving someone the answers and moving it forward fast, then you can often slow down a discussion, and you can hear somebody else's perspective.

So, I might say to Sarah, for example, "I do believe this is something important for us to do, but I'd like to understand more about your concerns with this", and just asking in that situation has suddenly slowed it down, and I've also brought Sarah back in, and I've got more balance, I'm behaving much more assertively rather than aggressively.

Sarah Ellis: If you find yourself getting passive, so maybe this is, as Helen described earlier, with senior people, or as I talked about, with people who you find intimidating in some way, then a really useful thing to do is to write down, before a meeting, or just have somewhere handy that you can keep referring back to, three key points which summarise what your opinions are.  What do you think and what are you trying to stand for?  What do you want to communicate?  So, when you're under pressure, you've got a handy, useful reminder.

I often feel really clear and calm, you know if you're maybe even rehearsing, or you're even saying these things out loud --

Helen Tupper: What, on your own?

Sarah Ellis: Yeah, when you're by yourself!  I'm like, "This is perfect, I feel really assertive".  And then, you know when you get in the meeting and it feels like everything goes out the window, because somebody asks a question you've not anticipated, or perhaps like you say, you find them intimidating, I just remember, and I have been in quite a lot of meetings where I think this where I'm like, "What do I think again?  I thought I was really clear and now I feel a bit stuck, or in my head I've gone round in circles".  This is where I'd definitely get quieter and stop speaking, because I think I'm quite easily influenced some of the time.

Then afterwards, you feel really frustrated, because you're like, "I think something different and I didn't say it", because I've missed the moment.  And there's nothing more frustrating than missing the moment.  And that's where I feel like you can lack the assertiveness that you need and you've not communicated in a way that you'd feel proud about.  So, just making sure you've bullet-pointed or summarised whatever is useful for you, write them down, say them out loud so that if you do find yourself losing your way, you've got a chance, I think, of coming back into the conversation of continuing to be assertive and not just going with the flow for the sake of it.

Helen Tupper: I totally get what you mean.  I've definitely been in situations where what someone's saying sounds so good, because they're so clear and they're so confident, and you're like, "Yes, maybe that is what I think".  Then, you come away from it and you go, "No, actually I've reflected now and it isn't".

Sarah Ellis: That's not what I think.

Helen Tupper: That isn't what I think.  You were just really, really good at selling your message; that's what you were really good at!  So, the third one is all about if you can see that passive-aggressive behaviour in the way that you might be responding to a person or a situation.  Maybe it's because you're like me and you're getting bored, or maybe it's because you don't disagree, but you don't really want that conflict in that moment.  What we need you to do is --

Sarah Ellis: 100%

Helen Tupper: That's the difference between us.  Sarah's like, "I do not want to have it out with you today", and I'm a bit like, "I just want this to go away"!

Sarah Ellis: That sort of rhymes, that is your poetry for the day.  But that is exactly our personalities to a tee.

Helen Tupper: It is, definitely.  So, if you see that in yourself also, what we need to do is find the motivation to do something different, because Sarah doesn't want to do conflict, and I do want this situation to end more quickly.  If you can attach yourself to some kind of motivation to do something differently, it will make it easier to have a different approach and response to that situation.

So for example, the things that motivate me in a situation is, if I take a step back, if I zoom out from, "This is a boring meeting [or] this conversation's gone on for way too long", if I zoom out of that and think, "But what is the bigger thing that I'm trying to achieve?" I'm always trying to increase impact, I'm always trying to make our work go further.  And if I can stay engaged in a situation, keep being curious, because I can think, "But your reason to engage, Helen, your reason to get curious is because you're trying to increase the impact of your work", then that helps me to ask that open question, to get someone else's perspective, to not just try and go, "Yeah, fine, let's just move on and get it done.

Find the bigger meaning behind the moment that you're in, and then it will help you to stay engaged and not fall into that passive, "I'll go along with it", but outside of the conversation, you're probably moaning about it to somebody else.

Sarah Ellis: I wonder if there is a bit of a link here to values, because when I thought about this question, the only way of feeling that I can stay engaged in moments of conflict and to be assertive in moments of conflict, is I attach those moments to learning, and that's because learning is one of my values.  So I think, "I am really motivated to learn and to improve", and also want to grow and get better.  I've got an insatiable need, I think, to always want to be better than the day before or the year before.  So my response has been, in moments of conflict, ask curious questions.

So, the very practical thing I do is ask curious questions, but I think I could have had that practical idea and not done anything about it, if I hadn't attached it to a value that I have.  So now, I don't want to say I look forward to moments of conflict, because I don't think it will ever be true, but my relationship with conflict is so dramatically different in that previously, I would have been so passive in those conversations, found it so difficult to have any level of assertiveness where people were disagreeing with each other, because I found it so difficult; I now just spot those moments of thinking, "I can practise". 

I just think I just see it as practising something that I know I find hard and I'm not that good at, and I just think, "The way to practise that is, I never try to win the debate, because that's never going to be me, but I can ask some really good questions".  And I always remind myself that if people disagree with me, it doesn't mean they don't like me, and I have that little statement pinging around my brain at the same time. 

So, I think anything you can do to figure out what's your motivation to behave differently, whether that's about being aggressive, passive, or passive-aggressive, you've got to want to do this, because like we've described today, I think it's always way easier not to.  So I think, why should you bother?  What's the "so what" for you?  Is it going to help you to achieve your objectives; is it going to help you to have more influence and impact as Helen described; is it going to help you to learn more?  What's the thing that would be most likely to make you do something different?

Helen Tupper: I also think about my identity.  When I think about being passive-aggressive, that isn't how I want to be perceived.  I might do it by default sometimes in a situation, but if I actually thought about that default becoming my identity, I think that's not what I want people to see when they work with me.  So, that is also potentially a bit of a motivator.

Sarah Ellis: Well, you lose that pride that we've talked about, I guess, don't you?

Helen Tupper: Yes, it's true.

Sarah Ellis: So, the final idea, idea for action three, is really about this proactive assertiveness that we have talked about that I mentioned earlier, because in some ways, the "if… then" is much more about reacting, how you react in a situation; whereas, this is about thinking, "How can I generally be more assertive?" and I really like this idea.  Helen and I talked about this.  We've actually sort of done a pre-podcast for this podcast, because we got quite into the prep for this and then ran out of time, so this is our second go at recording it.  And we're calling this idea for action, Preparing and Sharing your Points of View.

One of the things, I think, that helps you to be assertive is to know what you think about areas of opportunity or obstacles that exist in your industry, in your team, in your organisation, having a point of view.  And I was describing to Helen that I think probably for quite a significant chunk of my career, I don't think I felt like I had a point of view on things.  I almost don't feel like I had the permission to have a point of view.  I think I was quite passive in terms of going, "Well, I'll do what I'm told to do", versus going, "What do you think about this trend [or] this theme [or] this obstacle; what's your perspective?"  I think it took me a while to almost have that critical thinking and that initiative to go genuinely, "What do I think?  What is my point of view and what is my perspective?"

Spot some of those difficult questions that you don't know how to answer.  I think there are really areas of opportunity, obstacles and difficult questions that are really good territories to start with to figure out, "Which are the areas that I need to have a point of view on?  What are the interesting themes that I should spend some time thinking about?"

Helen Tupper: So, to bring that to life with a couple of examples, I think the easiest one for us is Squiggly Careers, because that's what we spend so much of our time thinking about and talking about, that we have developed a very strong perspective about what we think careers should look like, and the support that people need to succeed in those careers.  So, we have a point of view that development should be democratised, for example, and that the ladder holds more people back than it helps them move forward.  And, because we have that perspective, we can communicate it quite assertively.  It doesn't mean that we don't listen to other people about their perspective, but we've got that clarity.

Now obviously, that's our current world of work.  But for example, let's imagine you work in marketing.  In terms of areas of opportunity or areas for development in your field at the moment, it might be all about the metaverse, whatever it means; somebody could email us and let us know!  But actually, you should probably know, you should probably have a perspective on it.  That's a big area of growth, definitely an area of noise at the moment in marketing.  So, is that something that you think is helpful noise?  Do you think it's a distraction from the actual day job of marketing?  What is your perspective?

If you work in corporate social responsibility, for example, thinking about B Corps could be really interesting.  Is that the future of corporate social responsibility?  Should all organisations adopt the principles of B Corps, or actually is that just specific to some types of businesses?  Spending a bit of time exploring the issues around your area of work and thinking about, "What is my perspective on this?" can help you to be much more proactively assertive when you're talking to other people.

Sarah Ellis: I had a brilliant example of this in a workshop a couple of weeks ago.  I was doing a workshop on growth mindset, and separately two people asked me the same question, which I found really interesting; it was not like they'd overheard it.  They were talking to me about the dangers of growth for growth's sake, so essentially relentless growth without really thinking about, "Is growth always good for us?" so challenging the nature of growth.

I found that a really brilliant observation.  They were listening to what I'd got to say and what they had done is, in that moment, they had formed a point of view and a perspective.  But when they both, actually separately, shared it with me, they were so interested in what I'd got to say.  So for me, it was less about me, it was more, I just saw two examples that day of two people being assertive in sharing what they had thought about what they'd heard from me.  But then being very open to, what did I think.  And they were also both really open to changing their mind, they wanted to hear my perspective, and I just thought that was a perfect example of assertive communication. 

I didn't feel like they were aggressively challenging me, and they weren't being passive in terms of saying nothing and not contributing; they were both doing that critical thinking that I described that I think I missed for at least the first part of my career, and then doing something about it in that moment, so that we had a really meaningful conversation.

Helen Tupper: So, just to summarise those three ideas for action then, the first one was all about adapting how you're communicating, so that you can do it in an assertive way, those "from" and "to" approaches that we talked through; the second idea for action was all about reacting, so potentially if you're being aggressive, what could you do differently?  If you see yourself being passive, how could you become more assertive?  And the third idea for action was all about being proactive, so preparing and sharing your points of view.

What we will do is we'll summarise those three ideas for action on the PodSheet.  So, hopefully you've been listening and maybe been going, "That's me, I know I'm doing that!" and then, if you want to neatly get those ideas for action, so you can go and do something different, it will all be in the PodSheet for you.

Sarah Ellis: And we'd always love to hear your ideas.  So, if you've spotted other things that you think are really helpful to increase assertiveness, please do share those, please get in touch with them.  Also, if you've got other topics that you'd like us to cover, we always want to hear those too.  And if you do have one minute to rate, review, subscribe, share the podcast, it's a really easy way that you can support us and the work that we're doing with Squiggly Careers.  We know it will never be top of your to-do list and we completely understand that; but if you can find five minutes to do us, what we describe, a five-minute favour, it gives us that lovely moment in a week where we read every single review and it helps us to know where we're being useful and what we're doing is useful.  But also, it does help us to spread the Squiggly word, so we do really appreciate it if you get a chance to do that.

Helen Tupper: So, thank you so much for listening today, and we're back with you very soon.

Sarah Ellis: Thanks everyone, speak to you again soon.