Welcome to the new manager podcast.
I'm your host, Kim nickel. Hello, and welcome.
I'm glad you're here. And I hope you're doing well
before we get started. Today, I have three short notes
for you and then we're going to dive into our big topic.
The first is, if you are not yet following me on LinkedIn, I want
to invite you to come on over. I have been posting more videos
lately and I think you'll enjoy them when I have an idea that I
want to teach on or speak to. I've been putting those in video
form and uploading them to LinkedIn as a bonus.
You'll also get to see my home office space and you'll learn
very quickly that I like plants. I never used to be a plant
person. I am now, but you can take a
look and see me working in my home office space.
If you join me on LinkedIn, I'll put a link into the show notes
so you can very easily find it and then we can connect over
there too. So that's the first thing the
second and Wanted to share was, I had a listener who wrote in to
me? I'm just going to call her M and
M asked, if I would do an episode specifically on being a
younger manager who is managing people who are older than you.
And I know I've spoken to this a little bit in some of my past
episodes because that was also my experience.
I manage people who are my parents age and some of that
age. It was a little bit awkward in
the beginning. I think for all of us but I'm
going to spend some more time going specifically into that
topic in a future episode. So thank you M for writing in
and requesting that topic and for all of you listening, if you
want me to address a particular topic, you can always ask you
can go right to my website and find the contact page and send
me a note. And let me know what you would
like me to cover here on the podcast.
Cast. And then the third thing, I want
to talk about briefly is the process that I use with all of
my clients and in a sense, it kind of connects with, you know,
what, we were just talking about, which is, you know, when
we are growing as people when we are in a new role.
When we are stepping into a higher level of leadership and
responsibility and learning how to manage people, there are sort
of two parts to that. And one is, there are some very
specific skills. That you need to learn most
simply around communication. How do you communicate?
How do you give feedback? How do you speak up?
You know, how do you make decisions and then communicate
them in a way that will motivate and inspire people?
Communication is all a whole set of skills and then the other
piece that you're learning is, there's an internal mindset
shift, an internal sense of identity shift so far.
Ample thinking of yourself as the one who is able to speak up
or make a decision or delegate or give hard feedback or have a
tough conversation that sense of.
Oh, I'm not just the individual contributor.
I'm not, you know, what kind of like have this internalised
little kid mind where we think. Oh, you know, who am I to, to do
those things or to say those things?
I'm just, I'm just me. But when we step into this role,
Well, where we now have more responsibility for the people in
our organization and for the outcomes that our team or that
our, you know, colleagues that we are creating.
We want to shift our mindset so that we can be very effective in
that leadership role when other people are looking to us.
And so, we always are developing these two parts.
The internal awareness part, right?
Like the mindset, and how you're thinking and feeling, And then
there's specific skills that you will need like the behaviors.
The actions, the things that you do.
So another way to think of it is there's the being part who are
you being and then there's the doing part, what are you doing?
And we want to address both of those things.
And so the process that I use with my clients in order to
create sustainable, change is really simple.
There are three steps number one, we Get present.
And when we're present that means that we're able to start
to understand what's happening now.
Right, rather than being too future-focused or two past
focused and that's also what creates a lot of the anxiety,
right? So when you're in a new rule and
it you feel uncertain or you feel a little bit nervous about
what's going to happen. And if you're doing a good job
or not, it's because you're, you know, in judgment and you're
comparing yourself to a Share a past like you're not as much in
the present as you are thinking about and having opinions, about
kind of what it all means. And we can get very future or
very past focused. And that also is what creates
the overwhelm and the stress. So the first step is to just get
present with what's going on now and who are you now?
And let's just take a look at what's going on in the moment.
Number one, and the second step is we want to bring a lot of
curiosity. T.
So, we want to be curious about you specifically, right?
Like what are some of the, you know, the reasons and the
stories and the the factors that have contributed to what you're
experiencing now, and how you're thinking.
And the decisions you're making, like, let's get really curious
about that. And then, the last part is, we
want to be kind in the process. So changes, often uncomfortable
uncertainty is off. And uncomfortable when you have
both of these things going on at the same time.
The last thing we need is to put judgment and pressure on
ourselves like oh I should already know how to do this or
why do I not know how to do this yet?
Or why is this hard for me? Or you don't actually grow more?
When we put all that pressure in judgment on ourselves and we
might make some missteps along the way.
So we need that kindness towards self as you're going through
this process of change and growth, that is what makes it
sustainable. That's what makes it really
stick, which is, you know, kind of the difference between, you
know, trying to either over-consume and change.
Things abruptly like that takes a lot of effort, right?
But when we take small micro steps, we make small micro
adjustments, we're able to make Continuous, gentle, sustainable
change and that is what I get excited about.
So I wanted to share that process with you because I don't
think that I've talked about it too much here, and it really is
kind of, you know, what makes the link between a concept and
then that really lasting implementation is when we have
that process to make the concept or the The content really sync
up with who you are as a person, and your particular personality
traits and just who you are. So those are my three things
that I wanted to share before we got started.
And our main topic today is how to be assertive.
This is feedback that a lot of new managers get when they are.
You know when you're moving into this higher-level role of
responsibility And Leadership is they will say now that you are a
manager we would like you to be more assertive and that can
sometimes feel like weird feedback like what does that
mean? And is it, you know, is it have
I been doing something wrong this whole time, you know, I
never got that feedback before. What's going on that?
Now I'm supposed to be assertive like what does that mean?
And so you know number one I just want to frame this.
This is not a criticism. If someone says you need to be
more assertive, I want you. You to think of it like an
invitation to take up more space.
Like what if that was all that? It meant that being assertive is
simply an invitation to take up more space.
And what I find is that when we receive that specific feedback
to be more assertive, it is often coming from, you know, a
manager or from from someone in a higher position of power, who
believes that you have more. Our that you can offer, but that
you are holding yourself back. It's almost like a signal
saying, hey, it seems like you're making yourself smaller
than you need to be. And I really interested because
I value your perspective and what you would like to say about
things. And so we would like to see
become more assertive. Like can you bring more of
yourself into the space? There's no reason.
To make yourself so small or to hold back.
And I think one of the reasons this can feel uncomfortable when
we are asking, you know, okay. Like so how do I be more
assertive as more assertive, is because we've become successful
through keeping ourselves smaller.
Like, I've had, you know, one of my clients that specifically
told me, hey, Kim, the reason I've become so successful in my
career is because I keep a low profile, I like to fly.
Beneath the radar don't like to call a lot of attention to
myself, right? So it can be a strategy that has
helped us in a lot of different ways.
And now you're in a place where, okay you're going to need to
update your strategy for the new situation that you're in.
This can also show up if you're a person who leans towards
people pleasing or over giving, if you are a person, Person who
tends to stay quiet because you kind of judge yourself.
Well, actually, either two directions.
You either judge yourself. Like, I don't know if I have
anything of value to say, or you judge the room you're in.
You judge the person you're with and you think I don't think they
would listen to me. Anyways, I don't want to push
into this conversation because I think this pertinent of the
person that I'm talking with or the That I'm in.
I don't really believe that they will listen to and value what I
have to say. So when we start to examine, you
know, how to be assertive, there are a couple of things we want
to get curious. About one, is we want to
understand what is your current behavior that is registering.
As not assertive, is it around a particular relationship?
Is it around a particular context, getting a little more
information in a little More clarity about what that means
and what that looks like can be really helpful.
It's also possible that being assertive might have something
to do with boundaries, like, boundaries being an agreement.
You create with yourself and then communicating that to
others and then making decisions based on that agreement and that
requires being clear. It requires speaking up, it also
requires being aware of What you need and sometimes, especially
if we're very oriented into people-pleasing and kind of high
service orientation. The tendency is to prioritize
others over our self and so that, you know, the skill and
the mindset of being assertive, can call us to look at our
boundaries practice, it can call us to become more clear and
aware of what our needs are, what?
What are Agreements are because you know, when we're thinking
about being assertive, it's like well what is it that I want to
assert, right? What is it?
That I want to put forward, what is the perspective or the
request? Or the idea?
I want to contribute into this space.
And I think one of the reasons to I've seen folks, who struggle
with this feedback of, being more assertive is because If you
are, someone who has successfully operated by holding
back and staying quiet and putting everyone else's needs
ahead of your own, then actually putting forward your ideas or
your needs or your perspectives can feel a little
confrontational. It can feel a little bit like
conflict. T' and you might worry that it
will come across as being rude. And so it's kind of like we we
need to recalibrate, that internal sense because being
assertive is not the same as being aggressive or dominating a
conversation. Being assertive is not the same
as being argumentative. It is not being combative.
Right? It really is simply 0.
Like, here's a perspective. I want to put forward into the
room and I want to do that clearly.
And I'm doing it because I understand that it's valuable.
And I want to specifically highlight that being a value
does not mean being right or having perfect information that
I'm thinking, two of my listener who wrote to me about being a
younger manager, and I'll talk about this more in a different
episode. But Sometimes we hold back
because we think I'm the youngest.
I don't have the same background as everybody here.
I don't know as much as everybody here.
So I will just hold back and what we miss when we're thinking
like that, is that we miss that. Our perspective is valuable
because it is our perspective and it will add something to the
conversation that would not otherwise wise be there.
So the value is not in your, your education.
Your value is not about, you know, how old you are.
Your value is not about, you know, the years of experience
you have or don't have in comparison to other people.
The value. You offer is a perspective that
you carry because of who you are and because of the, you know,
experience that you've had whatever It is and sometimes
being the youngest person or the newest person, the value, you're
adding is that perspective of the newest person or the
youngest person and on the flip side, it's also true.
Sometimes the value you add is being the person who has had the
most number of years on the planet or the value you add is
because you came into this industry from a different
industry. So you look at things a little
bit differently. The value you add is your
perspective, it's not about out the volume of information or
being right about something. It's just hot.
I have a perspective, I'd like to add and by doing that by
asserting that by placing that perspective into the room, you
are offering value to everyone in that conversation and you are
helping to uplift that conversation and all of the
ideas that are happening there. And in order to do that, we need
to be willing To go through the discomfort of being seen of
being heard of trusting. I'm going to put this forward
and I'm going to trust that people will receive it.
I'm going to trust that. Even if someone doesn't, it's
okay, not a problem, right? Like we're just kind of building
that muscle of. Let me be seen, let me be heard.
Let me take up a little Bit more space.
Let me put my perspective forward and so that's why often,
you know, the conversation around being assertive, goes
hand in hand, with being confident, it goes hand in hand
with feeling self assured that sense that, you know, I can
still share my thoughts and share my ideas and I don't have
to be right and I'm not trying to prove anything but I have
something that might be interesting.
So I'm going to put this here. And people can use it and you
know, do with it, what they like, right when we get into the
skill of advocacy, that's a little even, you know, more than
assertive assertive. I think of as here's a
perspective I want to put forward into the room and an
advocacy is actually when you're speaking up on behalf of like
you have a perspective that you would like to put forward on
behalf of someone. And so you often have, you know,
kind of the the Reasons why and you're thinking through like
this is what I recommend that we do and here's why so they often
go together, one story I want to share with you I was talking
with a client and one of the things we've been working on was
boundaries and the pattern that we discovered was the pattern of
first being very people-pleasing, very over
accommodating and not speaking up and saying what her needs
were saying. It her perspective was but she
would be very over accommodating and just hope that someone would
see and understand what she needed.
Then what happened was that if her needs were not seen, if they
were overlooked, if it didn't go, the way she wanted, she
would go from over accommodating to becoming resentful, and she
would become passive aggressive. She said, I didn't even mean to
be, but it would just kind of leak out, like, I would become
snarky. I would Do you know D prioritize
their messages? I started to notice, I became
just very passive aggressive because I was feeling very
resentful and then after the resentment kind of built up,
what would happen is she then would try to be assertive.
But what actually happened was she became very defensive and
she became combative and she was kind of armoring against, you
know, this person and she would feel like everything was a
fight, like it was really uncomfortable.
And when You learned actually about boundaries.
So she would check in first with herself with what she needed.
She learned to be more comfortable communicating
clearly and simply and she learned how to become assertive
the sense of it's okay to take up more space, it's okay to
Simply put forward, an idea, a request, a perspective, a
boundary and to do that without without needing to control the
other person. Without needing, you know,
something specific to happen in order for her to feel safe.
It was like this, just this weight lifted off of her and she
thought, oh, I think I get it now, right.
It's not about being confrontational, being
assertive, is just kind of being right sized.
It's, it's just being invited to be more fully.
Engaged and present in the room and it was something she had to
learn because, you know, a lot of her background was about
needing to make herself smaller in order to succeed in a very
difficult environment, right? Flying below the radar.
In order to avoid people behaving very unkindly towards
her, like it was a very effective success strategy at
the time and for the context she was in.
So kind of the higher a lesson for all of us is that we learn
strategies for communication and for relating to people, that
will help us to succeed in that environment.
But we don't want to become attached to that one way of
being and that one way of doing things.
So if you are receiving the feedback, you know, I'd love to
see you be more assertive. Consider that a sign.
To take up a bit more space to come more fully into the
conversation. People are actually curious and
interested in your perspective and what you have to say and
what you have to share and part of that will be uncomfortable if
you're not used to doing that. But that's okay little
discomfort is okay. You will survive it.
I can help you. And just see this actually as a
really positive sign. Like this is a sign of growth.
It is super normal especially as you're growing into higher
levels of visibility responsibility and Leadership.
So that's what I had to share with you today.
Thank you so much for listening and I am taking new clients.
If you want to work with me one-on-one, sign up for a
consultation, so we can talk about it.
I'll put a link to my calendar in the show notes below so you
can easily find a time and I'll see you next time.
Bye. Hey, before you go, if you like
this podcast, please leave a review.
Tell me why you listen and what has helped you?
Thanks so much. I'll see you next time.