Three Steps to Asserting Yourself

You are asked to join a committee that meets over lunch every Friday. You promised yourself you would refrain from any additional committee work. This also means you need to tell Jane you can no longer join her for power walks. "We need you to finish the outline for the project team. John was supposed to finish it but he says he is too busy. Have it done by tomorrow, ok?" Do you feel as though people seem to single you out for extra work? Do you often feel like a dumping ground? Do you feel resentful, wondering why you seem to find yourself in these situations - overwhelmed and overextended?
You have more power here than you realize. People don't know what's on your plate. And while it may be flattering that they think you'll be good for the task, that doesn't make it fit into your schedule any easier.
Just because people ask doesn't mean you have to comply. It's not what other people do or ask of you but rather how you respond that causes your angst and happiness.
Why are you being 'nice'?
What does it mean to be 'nice'? Usually, when we think about someone who is 'nice', we describe him as thoughtful, kind, considerate, warm, and welcoming. He is genuine, perhaps compassionate. A 'nice' person possesses certain qualities that make him someone we regard in a positive way.
But, is being 'nice' always positive? Can your focus on being 'nice' get in the way of your success?
'Nice' is one of those catch-all words that means a lot of different things. If you focus on being 'nice', you might find that you are not achieving the results you want, that people aren't treating you with the respect you want. You seem to get passed over for the promotions. People just don't seem to take you seriously.
Being 'nice' is not the best way for a leader to lead. 'Nice' has to do with the delivery, not the essence of what you say or do. 'Nice' describes how you do what you do. Leaders lead by doing the right thing and they do it in a 'nice' way.
When you focus on being nice, you often say "yes" to things you don't want to do, saying "no" to yourself and dismissing your own values and responsibilities. Perhaps you simply don't know how to say "no" or you may be habituated to answer "yes".
Perhaps you simply don't want people to feel bad, so you say "yes" whenever possible. You want to be liked. It scares you to consider that someone may not think fondly of you.
It takes a lot of energy to concern yourself with what other people think about you. Meanwhile, you become a dumping ground. This has the opposite effect to the happiness and respect you want.
As you say "yes" to everything and everyone, you have more and more to do, become more and more stressed, have less time to focus on your own work and responsibilities, and become more and more resentful and angry. Your evaluations may even suffer because you have less time to focus on your own stuff and are more focused on looking good for others.
However, resentment is more about you than others; resentment is anger at yourself for not asserting yourself and for not taking care of yourself. There is always a toll when you put other people before your own well-being.
What do you value?
Consider this: What is it costing you to not honor yourself and your values? What do you lose by spending your time, energy, and effort on pleasing others by being 'nice'? How are your relationships suffering? Your health? Your work?
The reality is that our lives are a reflection of the expression of our values. Whatever you do is what you value most in this moment.
If you are busy doing things for other people and not asking yourself the hard questions about what you want and learning to turn down requests that are incongruent with your values, then you are not living true to yourself and you are hurting - even if you don't know it!
So how do you recover from being 'nice'? Here are three steps to doing the right thing:
1. Stop to consider what you gain by being 'nice'
What is your motive for saying "yes" to this request? How will it serve you? Is there fear here? What are you afraid of? Is your fear taking away your power to choose?
So what if the person doesn't like you? It's more important for YOU to like you. YOU are the most important person in your life because at the end of the day you have no one else to answer to but YOU. YOU are responsible for the quality of your life.
2. Define 'nice' for yourself in other terms
Come up with meaningful words that better express how you want people to feel about you. 'Nice' is not a power word. 'Compassionate', 'thoughtful', 'genuine' - these are more powerful and appropriate words to describe how you want to be experienced by others.
3. Learn to say "no" to things that are not in you best interest
This can be very challenging for people; however, in order for you to bring more happiness and joy into your life, you must become willing to turn down those things that are not of value to you and that are not the best use of your time.
It can be challenging to shift your focus away from being 'nice'. Focus on simply doing what is RIGHT. Is it the right thing to do right now? Is it the best use of your time? Are you the best person for this job or task? What do you want to do?
This comes up in your home life as well as your work life. Sometimes it can be difficult to say "no" to family or friends when they ask for your company or your assistance. When you learn to put yourself first and check in with your Inner Self to see what you want, then you can respond with what works best for you and do so in a way that is respectful and considerate.
If you want to go to the party and cook all of the hors d'oeuvres, that's fine. But if you are already have commitments and you don't want to get up at four in the morning to cook, then you need to say "no" without guilt, without feeling bad. It is the right thing to do - for you.
You cannot be everything to everybody. Focus on being your best and on making yourself happy. When you honor yourself, you find that others learn to respect you and honor you.
And when you assert yourself appropriately, you will be respectful of others.

Why Everyone is a Salesperson

When we succeed as communicators we have the ability to influence, persuade and hopefully help others. This means, almost by definition, that all of us are salespeople and so all of us can learn from the best sales people.
I have found that the words sales, selling and salesperson always have feelings attached to them. Some of you are reading, pondering the title of this article and thinking a stream of positive thoughts about selling, things like:
Nothing happens until a sale is made or someone sells something.
Sales is the engine of a capitalist economy.
Others are reading thinking a stream of extremely different thoughts:
I’m not in sales, I’m a .
If I wanted to be in sales, I’d be selling used cars, insurance, or spending my whole day on the telephone.
The last thing I want is someone selling me something.
So I write on, knowing that people have very different perspectives on this profession and activity.
For those of you in the first camp, hang with me for a second. For those of you with some amount of distain for sales, or even the slightest resistance to the idea that you might be a salesperson, let me ask you a couple of questions:
Does any part of your daily work/life involve communicating your ideas to others?
Do you ever find yourself trying to influence or persuade others?
Do you ever wish, hope or try to encourage change within an organization or with others?
I believe the chances are very high that you answered positively to at least one of those questions.
And if you did, you are in sales.
I know you may not be selling a product or service, but you are selling yourself, your ideas and solutions, and perhaps a vision of a better future for yourself and others.
Truly professional salespeople will see their jobs as doing those same things, even if they are also helping people buy a particular product or service.
We're all in sales: five reasons why
Since you are still reading, hopefully you can see some positive connection between what you do and the skills and practices of an effective salesperson. What follows are five particular reasons why we are all in sales, and how you can learn from the best salespeople, regardless of your role.
Communicating effectively. Good salespeople are more than glib or good at telling a joke. They hone the craft of connecting and communicating with others through their words, actions, and thoughts.
Asking questions. One reason the best salespeople are such good communicators is that they are masters of asking questions. They know that the right question can be the way to learn more, to understand the other person’s perspective more completely, and to set the stage for the next two skills.
Being persuasive. Salespeople hope to persuade us to buy something. If you don’t sell products, you may be trying to persuade people to do a task, go to a certain restaurant, play a certain game or any of a hundred other things each day. The best salespeople persuade knowing that their product or service will serve, delight and/or improve the lives of those they are persuading.You are hopefully doing the same thing – expecting others will learn something from the task, enjoy the restaurant or the game. There is a difference between persuasion (where everyone benefits) and manipulation (where only the “seller” wins).
Being influential. Influence seems to follow persuasion, often like the next logical step. Once you have been persuasive and the other person found value from that situation, they likely will come back to you since trust has been built. Now you are more influential, potentially on a broader range of topics, than you were before.
Championing change. Persuasion and influence both are about change – changing minds, habits, behaviors, etc. Great salespeople understand that change is sometimes hard so they help others with that process. As you understand change and resistance more, you are better able to help others see the world differently, make new choices and do new things.
Looking at these five skills and behaviors it is easy to see how this helps anyone who is a manager or leader, works with others in any capacity, is a parent or is in any type of relationship at all.
In other words all of us are salespeople – and all of us can become more successful if we learn and practice the skills of great salespeople.
Think about these five skills and find a great salesperson to watch and learn from. The skills that you will learn will benefit you today and for the rest of your life.

Do You Speak Assertively?

If you want to put your relationships onto a more assertive footing, and earn more respect from others (while at the same time, showing your respect for them also), there’s no better way to do it than with the following techniques:
1. “I” Messages, Not “You” Messages
When we use "You" messages, as in "You make me angry" or "You made me do that", we disown our feelings, make others responsible for how we feel, and, for good measure, pass judgment on their behaviour. It's no surprise that "you" messages are called "poison phrases". In Assertiveness, "you" messages are replaced by "I" messages. "I" messages dispassionately describe the feelings we have and the event that caused these feelings. We own them and don't blame others.
Not: "You make me so angry when you turn up late."But: "I feel angry when you turn up late."
2. Describe, don't evealuate
When we talk about ourselves and others, we often use evaluations without thinking: "She's so clever!"; "He's so rude!"; "I'm such a fool!" Evaluations are value judgments. They unwittingly praise or condemn at a stroke. Assertive people avoid evaluative words and phrases. They know the difference between who people are and what they do. They may condemn what people do, but they never condemn who people are.
Not: "He's so absent-minded!"But: "He turns up late to our meetings about twice a week."
3. Specific, not generalized words
When we want to make a strong point to others, we often exaggerate or generalize. "You're always leaving the lid off the toothpaste" is not likely to be factually true, but it expresses how strongly we feel. A more honest approach is to use specific statements. These are accurate, less likely to lead to arguments and, because they specify the problem, make it easier to find solutions.Instead of the universal and generalized statement: "You don't love me," be specific and say what you want: "When you come home from work, I'd love it if we could stop and have a cuddle now and again."
4. "Just" and "only"
We often allow the words “just” and “only” to slip into our everyday language to show how little we think of someone or something eg “He’s only a waiter” or “It’s just a scratch”. This can sometimes be interpreted as a put-down. Instead, avoid the words altogether and see the difference you make.
5. Fogging
"Fogging" is an assertive way of dealing with dishonest or indirect put-downs from others. In "fogging", you treat the put-down as serious, pick out and agree with any truth in what is said and at the same time show the other person your refusal to rise to the bait of their sarcasm.
Boss: (as you arrive late for the second time this week): "I see the train's running late again, then!"You: "Yes, that's twice this week and it's made me late on both occasions. I'm going to have to re-think my travel arrangements if this continues."
6. Broken record
"Broken record" takes its name from a stuck gramophone record. It is a technique for repeating over and over what you want when someone refuses to listen. It can be used when someone is making a demand on you that you don't want to accept, or you are trying to make a point to someone else that they don't want to accept. Because broken record depends on a repetition of your point, it is easy for your words and actions to become heated and possibly aggressive. Because of this, make sure that you let others know that you are listening to them, that you accept their right to an opinion, but that you are not going to be deflected from what you want.
7. Constructive feedback
Giving people feedback is one of the defining functions of managers. You can give two kinds of feedback: complimentary or critical. The danger in being too complimentary is that the receivers become complacent; the danger in being too critical is that the receivers take offence. You can avoid both these traps by using Constructive Feedback.
Constructive Feedback tells people what you liked about something they did as well as what you didn't like. It is essentially an assertive way of paying a compliment while also offering a view on how someone might change. Constructive Feedback only gives your views about someone's behaviour, not about them as individuals. When delivered successfully, it makes people feel good and helps them move forward.
Many of the arguments between people arise through the inappropriate or incorrect use of language. By checking what we say, and finding more honest means of expression, we can move in one leap from rubbing people up the wrong way to stroking them with respect and care.