Latest / Speak In Flow / Breaking Glass Ceilings and Embracing Emotions: Communication Propels To New Heights With Melinda Lee

Transcript

Breaking Glass Ceilings and Embracing Emotions: Communication Propels To New Heights With Melinda Lee · Speak In Flow

• 0:01
  Melinda Lee: Welcome, dear listeners to the speak in flow
• 0:04
  podcast. This is where we dive into the art of communication
• 0:08
  and leadership development. I'm so glad you're here. Today's
• 0:13
  powerful episode is about breaking the glass ceiling, and
• 0:18
  how our communication can propel you to new heights. A glass
• 0:25
  ceiling, we think about that when we're thinking about it's a
• 0:28
  metaphorical barrier, right? When we're thinking about when
• 0:31
  we're at work, and we're climbing up and trying to get
• 0:34
  promotions, and then suddenly, there's a glass ceiling, the
• 0:38
  system may not be set up to promote you. Many of us women,
• 0:43
  minorities feel this the most, when I think about a glass
• 0:48
  ceiling at a personal level, because it can affect us both
• 0:51
  professionally and also personally, I think about my
• 0:55
  grandmother, when she was 25 years old, she was sold into a
• 0:59
  marriage to a man who's 35 years her senior. That means she
• 1:04
  listened to her husband, and also three wives talking about a
• 1:10
  glass ceiling. She had no saying lots of barriers, couldn't say
• 1:16
  what she wanted, or get what she wanted, because she couldn't
• 1:20
  even speak it. Most of our glass ceilings are actually they're
• 1:26
  not as difficult and challenging as my grandmother. In fact, most
• 1:30
  of our own glass ceilings are own. They come from ourselves.
• 1:34
  And I call those communication barriers. These are the barriers
• 1:39
  that sounds something like I don't know if I should say this.
• 1:42
  I don't know if I have all the information. I better not see
• 1:46
  it. I'm not ready yet. It's our own doubt, preventing us from
• 1:51
  speaking up. Think about when you're in a team meeting. And
• 1:55
  there's lots of people talking and they seem to know all they
• 1:57
  have all the information and you're sitting there thinking,
• 2:00
  Should I say something? Is that my time, I don't want to
• 2:04
  interrupt them. So we place our own communication, glass
• 2:08
  ceilings upon ourselves. So whether the system is not set up
• 2:13
  for us, let's not consider that right now. But let's think about
• 2:18
  our own because we can control ourselves. So what are our own
• 2:21
  communication, glass ceilings that we want to break through.
• 2:25
  Because when you do, you can start to be seen, heard and
• 2:30
  respected as the leader that you know you are. So today, we're
• 2:35
  going to dive into how to do this. I mean, this hits home for
• 2:40
  me, I know this personally. And all too well. As I mentioned, I
• 2:44
  was not given a good communication model, or role
• 2:48
  model. And so when I went to work for corporate, it was hard
• 2:52
  for me, I did what I was told and worked really, really hard
• 2:55
  and, and then suddenly I get an email one day I've been into
• 2:59
  this company, 15 years, I get an email, it was an announcement
• 3:03
  that a new hire gets promoted before me. It was all of my
• 3:12
  effort.
• 3:29
  So all of my efforts went two ways. And I noticed that this
• 3:32
  person that did get promoted, was a better speaker than me,
• 3:36
  have the right connections, was communicating and meeting with
• 3:40
  the right people putting himself out there. And at that point,
• 3:45
  for better or for worse, it propelled me to get better as a
• 3:48
  speaker. So I did not, I was not born with a gift to communicate
• 3:53
  and speak publicly. And here I am. 20 years later, got all the
• 3:57
  tools and techniques. And now here I'm sharing this from a
• 4:00
  deeply rooted hurt. But now I have this passion to help so
• 4:05
  many others. And so I encourage you to really take a moment and
• 4:10
  take these tips for you today. Because I want you to break that
• 4:13
  glass ceiling. So here's how to increase your communication
• 4:19
  competence and influence. Self awareness, regulating your
• 4:25
  emotion, listening to others, setting your boundaries and
• 4:31
  communicating them and storytelling. So first self
• 4:36
  awareness, having your own self awareness and having critical
• 4:41
  thinking about it. Really asking yourself, How am I
• 4:45
  communicating? Am I communicating like the leader
• 4:48
  that I know that I am the leader that the organisation wants you
• 4:51
  to be needs you to be? Am I avoiding conflict? Am I avoiding
• 4:58
  opportunities to speak up, or on the opposite side, am I speaking
• 5:04
  up and being aggressive, trying to demand my way. On both sides
• 5:12
  of the continuum, I want you to just really do some self
• 5:14
  reflection. And ask yourself where you are, because that will
• 5:19
  give you the baseline, right, you're not going to change
• 5:22
  overnight, but at least you can start to take steps. Once you
• 5:26
  have acknowledged your baseline, and then you regulate your
• 5:30
  emotion, to write emotion regulation, managing your
• 5:35
  emotion, whether you are nervous, because you don't want
• 5:37
  to speak up, or whether you're angry, because you're not
• 5:40
  getting your way. Both you want to start to regulate your
• 5:45
  emotion, using breath, right. It's a visceral feeling, it's so
• 5:50
  instinctive. So you have to learn how to use your breath.
• 5:53
  And I'm sure you've heard it all the time. But this is so true.
• 5:57
  If this helps I take cold showers, because it forces me to
• 6:02
  be uncomfortable. And then I do deep breath, I do the box
• 6:06
  breathing technique in before, hold it for 234 and all the cold
• 6:16
  water is dripping on me and I'm freezing and I just exhale to
• 6:19
  try to slow down my nervous system. So whether you're
• 6:24
  nervous or angry, you're slowing down that nervous system,
• 6:27
  slowing down the emotion, calming it, and then in before
• 6:32
  hold it for for exhale for four fold for for just like a box. So
• 6:38
  that will allow you to calm your nervous system as much as
• 6:41
  possible, then this opens up your brain to free to free
• 6:46
  itself from the cloudiness of that emotion and then you can
• 6:49
  communicate more effectively. Then once you're able to
• 6:54
  communicate once you have communicated more effectively
• 6:57
  using respectful words, you move on to the next step, which is
• 7:02
  listen, listen to others. Listen, carefully understand
• 7:07
  where they're at. And the other day I was in a workshop and the
• 7:12
  facilitator did this beautifully. She knew where the
• 7:16
  people were at, she just did an exercise and activity, people
• 7:19
  were speaking and she was trying to close up the exercise. And a
• 7:23
  person in the audience just kept on speaking, kept on talking.
• 7:27
  She's trying to reconvene people. And so she walked up to
• 7:30
  that person and says, Hey, I know it's frustrating, you're
• 7:34
  speaking and you're engaged in your conversation. It's
• 7:37
  frustrating to have to stop. I understand. It can be
• 7:41
  frustrating. And that's part of the exercise. And I want you to
• 7:45
  know that you can speak again or you can continue the
• 7:48
  conversation later. For now, let's all reconvene. So notice
• 7:55
  that the facilitator address the person's frustration or the
• 7:59
  feeling so listening to other people, knowing where they're at
• 8:02
  calling it out, and then bringing it back to what you
• 8:05
  need. clearly, concisely, which then brings you this to the next
• 8:10
  point, which is know your boundaries.
• 8:24
  Far, and has have no regrets and no apology to communicate that
• 8:31
  if someone is giving you too much and burnings too much with
• 8:35
  more tasks, more things, your kids your boss, you can kindly
• 8:39
  say, Hey, I cannot possibly take on this I want to you can
• 8:44
  acknowledge the importance of the tasks I know this task is
• 8:47
  very important. And I cannot take on this task without
• 8:51
  sacrificing my own energy or without sacrificing the quality
• 8:55
  of the other things that I am committed to doing. And not
• 9:00
  apologise. And lastly, you storytelling. Storytelling is a
• 9:08
  powerful communication technique. Most people want to
• 9:13
  just take just say it like it is here are the facts. This is what
• 9:16
  we need to do to demand it. Or you can inspire action with
• 9:21
  stories. Imagine being able to tell your team, if you're stuck
• 9:28
  in a project and not knowing what to do, maybe you're set the
• 9:32
  client. And you don't want to tell the client what had just
• 9:36
  happened. You can bring in a narrative, a project where you
• 9:41
  did communicate with the client communicated with the client
• 9:44
  effectively immediately and the lessons learned around it. So
• 9:48
  communicating and telling a narrative is better than you
• 9:52
  going into your team and say hey, talk to the client right
• 9:55
  now. You're all in trouble. Right then the team feels
• 9:58
  contracted telling us your narrative inspires action
• 10:03
  because the emotion around it excites your team because it's
• 10:07
  been done before. So tell it with the positivity and the
• 10:12
  excitement that is possible inspires action. So using
• 10:17
  storytelling is a powerful way to communicate with influence
• 10:22
  and leading people. So those are the key tips on how to break
• 10:30
  your own communication barrier. Know yourself know how to manage
• 10:36
  those emotions of fear or aggressiveness. Right. Listen to
• 10:42
  others. Communicate your boundaries, and storytelling,
• 10:48
  for inspiring action and others. I hope that you will go and
• 10:53
  implement these techniques to break your own communication
• 10:57
  barriers and that glass ceiling, propel yourself to new heights
• 11:01
  expand to new heights and lead people in a way that is positive
• 11:07
  and inspires change. Until the next episode, I am your sister
• 11:13
  in flow. Take care. See you next time.