How To Speak Up & Be Assertive With Your Boss

Welcome to Shrink for the Shy Guy. This is the show for you. If you are sick and tired of being held back by fear, self doubt, social anxiety, shyness, anything that's stopping you from you being you. I'm going to share the most powerful tools and resources that I've been discovering over the last 15 years on my journey to eradicate social anxiety and instill confidence first in myself and then in every single person that I meet on my journey. You're going to learn these tools and how to apply them in your life now so that you can become the most free, powerful, bold, authentic version of you. Hey, welcome today's episode. Today, let's talk about a topic that is dangerous, shall we? Let's live life on the edge. And this topic is how to challenge your boss. Oh, yes. Now, I know that might seem terrifying or unacceptable or dangerous, as I mentioned in the beginning, but actually, what if it's essential? What if it's not only essential for your own sanity, but for your boss and for the entire company, organization, division, team that you're a part of? What if it's actually a good thing? Let's talk about in this episode, how to make it a good thing not only for you, but for others. And that actually can bring about a lot of benefit in your world. Okay, so let's dive right into it right now. And if you are, I don't know, you're currently self employed or you have your own team members, well, first of all, if you have employees or team members or people working below you, this will be extremely valuable for you as well. And if you say, well, I don't have any boss, I just work with clients, clients directly. Well, in some way you have a relationship, a working relationship with your clients where you might need to challenge them. And otherwise this could be if anyone in a place of authority, but boss is one of the most common. You could also think of supervisor, employer, or whatever term you use for someone who seems like they have power. Okay, couple of mindset things and then we're going to get into a lot of specific strategies of what to say and what to do. This falls into the category of assertiveness, being less nice, being more you. And this is an area that I've seen come up again and again with clients and people in my Mastermind program where they're like, yeah, but you just can't be assertive in this area. And I find that that's just a story we have because we're scared. And it requires a little more skill and a little Bit more nuance than perhaps other areas of our life. Okay, a couple mindset things. First things first. Remember that you are a powerful being. You have power in your life, and you want to be wary of giving your power away. You might say, yeah, my boss can fire me, My boss can make my life horrible and my life difficult. Yeah, and your boss doesn't control your life. And you could work somewhere else. Now, I'm not saying that that's how you go into this thing, like burning all bridges. But if that's not. If you don't have that power in your gut, in your core, and you feel like this shaky sense of like, oh, man, I don't want to do whatever they say, then problems are going to ensue because you're not going to be able. Same thing, same thing in a romantic relationship if you don't know, hey, I'm a worthwhile, valuable person. That if this person doesn't want to date me, if this person doesn't want to be with me, if this person isn't going to treat me in the way that's healthy and is respectful of me, then I don't need this. Right. And that doesn't mean you're instantly going to leave the person. Maybe you're married, maybe you have a deep relationship. You need to work through shit. But do you see that? That that's the foundation to actually work things through? Same thing at work. Same thing with your boss. You gotta feel and know on some level like I am a powerful creator in my life and if it's not here, I can do this somewhere else. Because here's the thing. If, if, if we talk about some of the strategies coming up in this episode and you hear them and you're like, no, my boss is like super immature and super narcissistic and threatened and, you know, always has to be right and can't handle any other inputs or whatever, then maybe it is time to end that relationship and move somewhere else or transfer somewhere and not just sort of sustain that forever. Remember, you have power. That's the first thing we want to cover. Okay, Second thing. Second thing to remember is disagreement, discussion. Differing ideas are good. So some part of you might feel like, oh, my gosh, if we disagree, if I challenge, if I put something else out there, that's going to be friction, that's going to be danger. And just remember this disagreement is not dangerous. I won't even write that one down and underline it. Disagreement is not dangerous. It isn't. It might feel uncomfortable, it might seem like it's going to be dangerous, but it's not. What if disagreement is actually healthy? What if disagreement is good, is good for you? Because here's the thing, imagine an organization where the boss says something and everyone's like, yep, okay, great. Uh huh. No questions, no problems. No, you're right, you're right, you're absolutely brilliant. Brilliant, right? That's gonna be highly problematic because one person can't see everything, can't know everything, can't know what's exactly happening on the front lines. You might have special, different inputs, experiences, data. You got to bring that forward to make everything function better. So it's not just about you and your own comfort here. It's about showing up and doing a better job, serving in a more powerful way, impacting, making a positive difference in the company and the customers that you serve and the clients that you have and the results. So reclaiming that power and saying, you know what, it's important to disagree, that creates a healthy environment. So it's another important mindset. So you're not coming in from a place of like, I'm doing something horribly wrong here, I'm sorry, you're gonna fire me. And actually coming in from a place of power. Okay, great foundational mindset stuff. Now, how do we actually do it? So a couple thoughts and ideas. First things first, one of the best ways to challenge anyone would be early versus letting it build up forever. And this is true for any sort of disagreement. So something bothers you if you have a question about something, not just be like, okay, great, yeah, great. And they tell you again two weeks later, okay, great, yeah, keep doing it. Yep, okay, great. Three weeks later, okay, yep, yep, yep. You know, but two months goes by and every day after day you're like, God damn it, this is such a stupid idea. My boss is so stupid. They don't know. So idiot. I know better than them. So stupid. Now here's the thing. If you do talk about it, let's say it's been two months, you've been doing that, you've been sitting on it, which is very common. We're overly passive, we're overly nice, we stuff things down. If you've done that, that's okay. We've all done it and you got to start somewhere. Ideally, though, you do it sooner because if you've been pushing stuff down for a really long time, there's gonna be a charge of resentment and maybe you're sort of implying, you know, condescending, like, well, this is a stupid idea anyway and it's gonna. Maybe that's gonna come out a little bit, and that's okay. We'll talk about how to work with that, but in general, bring it up quickly. And so you might say, well, how do I do it? How do I challenge them? Let's say they say, you know, here's the path we should take, or you should have you do this or have you do that. You could say, okay, here's one of the best strategies is to go with what they say and then explore your concerns through questions. Right? Because here's the thing, if you want to challenge them, if you have a disagreeing perspective or opinion or how to do something, it's because you have a concern about the way that your boss is saying to do it and you have a different idea. Right? Okay. So one option is to directly point that out. And depending on your work environment, you might be able to, and your boss might actually welcome that. So regardless if it's directly or through questions, it's always best to start with receiving what the other person said. So there's a couple different ways to do that. So let me just give an example. Let's say the boss says, okay, here's how we need to deal with the situation. We need to call, have you call up that other company, tell them that what we're doing is not sufficient for us, and you need to escalate to their supervisor and take this to the next level. It's kind of like a direct, perhaps assertive, maybe aggressive move in that situation. Go give them what for is what your boss is telling you to do in that moment, you're like, okay, I don't think that's necessarily our only option. I think my boss is being a bit too quick on the draw to escalate something and that actually. So what are your concerns? Maybe that might jeopardize your working relationship. Maybe you're the one that has to have the working relationship with this company and your boss doesn't. And then you're going to have to deal with the person being pissed off on the other end or whatever it is. So how do you deal with that? Well, take a moment and say, what are my concerns? I just listed a potential few there. But whenever you're disagreeing with your boss, and I'm just using an example here, so you pick where in your work life recently, where's the place where you've disagreed with your boss, and what were your concerns about the way that they were wanting to do something? Maybe it was something that was ineffective. Maybe it Wasn't planned out. Maybe it was sloppy. Maybe it didn't have the right systems. Maybe it was an approach that you thought wouldn't get the result. Okay, great. So that you're thinking about that, whatever it is, start with acknowledging their approach. Okay, so it sounds like you want me to contact so and so and escalate with their department. Is that right? Right. Reflecting back what you hear, one of the most powerful ways for people to feel instantly heard and acknowledged. If you're not using this skill with your boss, with colleagues, with co workers, with your spouse, with everyone, use it. It's called reflective listening. One of the most powerful communication tools for people to feel seen and heard. And then here's a magic phrase. I can appreciate that. That's a beautiful phrase because it helps acknowledge what they said. That's a good approach. I can appreciate that. But you're not saying, like, that's a great idea. We're totally gonna do it. See, I can appreciate that. Now is where you can start to ask your questions. This is one of the best ways to highlight your concerns. So depending on working with your relationship with your boss and how open they are, you might be able to say, okay, so you want me to call the department and escalate? All right, I can appreciate that. I do have a few concerns about that that I wanted to run by you right now. Notice how that language is very different than, like, I think that's a stupid idea, and here's why. Right. I have some concerns I want to run by you, and then you can tell them. You know, I think if we escalate, that could. I think that that's going to be taken poorly by the people at my level in the other company, and there could be some repercussions there. I think that might strain the working relationship we have with this company. I think we have ongoing projects with this company. We'll have more projects in the future. If we have a strained relationship, we may experience some problems down the line, which I can go a little more into, if you want to know, because I've actually seen that kind of behavior already. Now, here's the thing. If I was in a situation like that and an employee told me that, I'd freaking want to know that. That's intel, that's data that I might not have known because I'm not dealing with that person all day long on the other line or that other company directly. So a good boss, a good supervisor is gonna wanna know that shit and be like, oh, okay, that's helpful. But Egos can exist. Egos can be on the line. It could be a way of, like, what, you know, I know what's best now, maybe, first of all, have you expressed it in the way that I did, where you acknowledge what they said? You say, I can appreciate that. Here's some of my concerns. I wanna run them by you, or can I run them by you? Here's what they are. I've seen that work incredibly well. And even people who feel like my boss doesn't take any feedback, when we actually have them use that approach, they get much better results. Because it's much better than their approach, which has been to stuff it for two months and then come into their boss's office and say, no one listens to my opinions about those things. I think this is a bad idea, what we're doing. And of course, the person does get defensive then. Cause you're attacking. When we attack, people defend. That's just how it works. So we gotta learn how to communicate with assertiveness. That doesn't put the other person on the defensive and feel like a need to protect or defend themselves. Okay, but let's just say, you know, your boss would get reactive to you voicing those concerns or get exasperated or just brush them aside. Maybe they won't get pissed at you. They kind of. No, no, that's fine. Fine. Just go do it. Okay, so what do you do then? Well, this is the power of questions. So it starts the same way. You might say, okay, so you want me to call and escalate to the supervisor on this issue. I can appreciate that. I'm curious. I have a question about that. Again, that's the magic phrase. I can appreciate that. I'm curious. I have a question about that. I'm curious. I have a question about that. Just little phrases like that are amazing. They open up a different kind of response than the person. Cause just think about this. Like, if someone says to you, I'm curious. I have a question for you. Are they coming at you hard? Does it feel like they're gonna attack you? Do you feel like you need to defend yourself? They almost seem like a little bit confused. It's like the Columbo. I don't know if everyone has watched Columbo. I watched a few episodes when I was a kid, but Columbo was a detective in this TV show. And he'd always catch the bad guys. Not by being like, you did it and I'm gonna interrogate you. Kind of like a tough approach. He'd always be kind of Like, I'm curious. I just have a question, like, a little bit confused. And they would, of course, reveal all their secrets to him and he would bust them, and it would be like, oh, Columbo did it again. Anyway, you just want to be curious. And so you might say, so you know what your concerns are, right? So you want to highlight those concerns through questions. So it might be something like this. I can appreciate that. I'm curious. I just have a question about that and say, okay, so I'm wondering, when we do communicate that to them, what effect do you imagine that might have on our working relationship with the team that I interface with every week? And then just wait, maybe your boss never thought of that because you're forcing him to reflect on that now, or her to think about that right now. And they'd be like, hmm, you know, and let's say they just brush. They steamroll past that one. Like, oh, it'll be fine. I don't think it's gonna make much of an impact. Okay, I can appreciate that. I'm just wondering if there might be. And you just ask another question. I'm wondering if there might be a lingering effect. I've noticed that from a previous time when we escalated. There's so and so that I interface with about once a week on the calls, and they actually seem to really be dragging their feet, often as a result of it being escalating. I'm just making stuff up here, right? But you kind of highlight something, you provide a little more data. What do you think about that? And so it's this really powerful form of influence where you're asking questions, you're bringing the points forward and saying, what do you think about that? Now the questions that you ask and the concerns you're bringing forward are going to make the person have to reflect on it. And they still might push past. They still might push past. But now you've presented two or three data points, two or three concerns that are now in the room. Other people are thinking about them now, too. Your boss is thinking about them now, too. And even if there's still this kind of steamroll approach, like, oh, don't question me. Here's what we're gonna do. You've now brought it in, and then you get to raise that up again in some way, shape or form. And here's the thing, it's never about, like, you're doing it wrong. That's such a bad idea. It's never gonna work. If you come in, even with colleagues, even with people at peers at your level, with that energy, it's gonna. It's going to produce a counter force. It's always bringing up the question, bringing up the concern and asking other people about it. Think about it like this. You are trying to collaborate together to solve a problem. Collaborative problem solving. It's an approach I actually use with my kids. And so you highlight, okay, what is it that they want? Okay, what is it that I want? What are the concerns that we have in the situation and how do we come up with a workable solution? And you can bring things up again a little bit later on, say, okay, so. And look, at the end of the day, you're going to have to navigate your own work environment and whether there's things that you can or can't do. Generally, I find that it's unwise to say, okay, yeah, yeah, sure, I'll do it. And then drag your feet and not really do it better to either communicate your concerns. And let's say they're like, yeah, I hear your concerns and go do it. Well, that's part of the game you signed up for. When you have. When you're employed by somebody, they ultimately do call the shots. And you can take a stand and say, I really don't think this is a. My concerns are strong. And I'm going to say that I don't want to do that. Boom. What might happen then? I don't know, but you might feel strongly. Now, this case of escalating to supervisor might not be that good that for you, but maybe it's something else that really is meaningful for you. And that's where we started with the mindset of power of, like, I don't need to subject myself to anything. You know, there's a certain. Maybe your boss is pressuring you to get something done on a certain time frame. You got a complete X by Y, and you say, okay, so you want me to get X done by Y. I can appreciate that. My question for you, though, from my perception, in order to get X done by Y, I would need to basically reduce the quality of my work significantly. I'm going to guess about 50%. It would get done, but it wouldn't be the quality that I'd want to do. Is that what you would want? Is it done at a lower quality? Okay, okay, let's leave a conversation about that whole thing. And eventually they're like, yeah, that's exactly what I want. I just want it done. It's like, okay, okay, that's a challenge for me, given what this is going to be used for and the effect it's going to have on a customer's business or life that doesn't feel in alignment with my values to produce it at a lower quality. And so I like to see what a solution we can work out together where we can have it done in a timely manner and at a standard of quality that I can feel an integrity about. Let's come up with a. Do you have any ideas? Collaborative problem solving. Now, some of these things, I'm just sharing potential things to say, and some of this stuff feels like, whoa, my God, how would you say that kind of thing? Rewind and re listen to this episode because there's a lot of what the phrasing I'm using and the language I'm using is really powerful for influence because you'll notice how it's, boom, it's right there. I'm not backing down, but I'm also not creating a whole lot of tension in the engagement. And that's a level of skill, of assertiveness that you can create, you can develop. It's just a language, just a skill set. And by listening to this kind of thing, we'll help you with that greatly. Awesome. So let's turn this into action. Time for action. Action. Action. Your action step for today is going to be to practice this in some way, shape or form. Now, maybe you can experiment in a subtle way, small way, little way, by asking a concern or raising a concern or asking a question, or even just reflective listening or saying, I can appreciate that after you. Reflective listening to a colleague, to a friend, to your spouse. Just practice reflective listening or practice acknowledging and appreciating. And then you can also find opportunities to practice raising a concern or highlighting a concern, either directly or by asking questions. So this might literally come up in your work this week. It might not. It might come up in different environments. But find someplace to practice something that you learned from this episode. Otherwise, it sounds good and it's all that works in theory. But I'm still too scared to do it. I'm still not going to do it, and that's not going to serve you. You want to be able to do it. And I'll be sharing more about this very soon. But if you want to radically increase your sense of power and your capacity to be bold, to be direct, to speak up, you need to radically increase your inner confidence, your inner boldness, and free yourself from that fear of what are they going to think? Are they going to reject me? Are they going to be upset with me? I'm going to feel embarrassed. I have a very exciting way that I want to share about next week about how you can do that. It's going to be accessible to anyone all over the world. It involves a live event that's going to be online and and the early Bird tickets are going to be released very soon for that. So I'll share more about that in next week's episode. And if you want to find out more, just go to drz.com, dash R-A Z I Z.com and go to the Events tab and check out what we got coming up in July. All right. So thanks for being with me. Hope this serves you. And until we speak again, may you have the courage to be who you are and to know on a deep level that you're awesome. Thanks for listening to Shrink for the shy guy with Dr. Aziz. If you know anyone who can benefit from what you've just heard, please let them know and send them a link to shrinkforthshyguy.com for free blogs, ebooks and training videos related to overcoming Shyness and incredible increasing confidence, go to socialconfidencecenter.com.