Dr. Aziz advises professionals to speak with certainty so others will listen. He argues that hesitation often stems from fear of disagreement rather than lack of knowledge, and recommends rehearsing responses to challenges and deliberately leaning into disagreement to unlock more powerful speaking.
The truth is, people generally don't listen to you if you don't sound sure of yourself. And often when I work with people, they do know a lot. They're professionals. They have a lot of experience. They have a lot of knowledge. They have a lot of ideas. But they sound hesitant, unsure. They say things like, well, I think and maybe, and I'm sorry, but because they're afraid. Not that they don't know enough, but they're afraid of conflict. They're afraid of someone disagreeing with them. They're afraid of the challenge. And so to do this, to speak, like people will actually listen and value what you say, you have to come from a place of certainty, of sounding sure of yourself. And the key here is not to rehearse more and more. The key is to say, someone might disagree with me. Bring it on. Right? Because if you could overcome that fear of the social side of it, then you can let your ideas shine. And so practice that. What if someone challenged me? What if someone challenged me? Instead of a flight response to that, so you can get into a fight, not literally, but in your head, in your rehearsal. Okay, what would I say to that? What would I say to that? And instead of backing down, lean into the disagreement and the challenge, and you will unlock a level of power in your speaking that you've never had before.
