There have been hundreds of books written on the concept of assertiveness. It’s one of those skills that are regularly referred to in communication skills training. So, how assertive is your communication style?
What’s interesting is that assertiveness is often confused with aggression, when actually they couldn’t be more different. Assertiveness has no requirement for a raised voice or making yourself bigger than the other person. Assertive people aim to be neither passive nor aggressive in their interactions with others.
From time to time we all at in passive and aggressive ways, and yet during these moments we’re often reacting to our own lack of self-confidence.
If we grew up in dysfunctional families, we may never have learned to communicate effectively in relationships. We may be passive when we don’t express our needs, aggressive when we attempt to dominate others, or passive-aggressive and smile whilst sabotaging others behind their backs. Any of these three behaviours can lead to problematic relationships and feelings of isolation.
Conversely, if we learn to be assertive (clear, direct and respectful in the way we communicate) we benefit from building healthy and long-lasting relationships.
Being assertive also involves the ability to handle feedback, both positive and negative without being passive or aggressive. Ask yourself, how comfortable are you when you receive feedback?
Let’s look at an example.
Speaker: “Wow, I loved what you did with that project!”
Passive response: “Well it didn’t take much” or “It’s my job to do that.”
The responder could react much more assertively by saying:
“Thanks, I was pleased with it too. What did you love about it specifically?”
Everyone has the right to act assertively
For a variety of reasons, which I’ll talk about in just a moment, we forget that we actually all have the right to act assertively. When we’re not, we forget that we can:
- Make decisions;
- Say “I don’t know” or “I don’t understand”;
- Change our minds;
- Say “no” without feeling bad or guilty;
- Express how we feel and what we value;
- Be ourselves – however much that does not conform to group opinion;
- Have privacy.
So what stops us being assertive?
There could be number of reasons; some emotional, some cultural, some belief-based, and some based on how stressed we are at any given moment.
How We Perceive Ourselves
Some people actually believe that they were born either passive or aggressive and can do little to change how they interact or respond to others. Naturally, we can all learn new behaviours.
Cultural Perspectives
Also, it is deemed inappropriate in some cultures to assert your individual rights over the rights of the group or group leader. We are much more likely to see assertive behaviour in Western cultures than we are in Asian cultures.
Work Personas
Some people consider certain genders to operate in specific ways. For example, women can be seen as passive, while man might be expected to be more aggressive. In the same way, specific types of work are often considered to attract either aggressive or passive individuals. Or we might find that we are passive with our manager and much more likely to be either assertive or aggressive with a colleague or peer. It’s good to remember that our behaviour is not who we are. We can adopt any behaviour we choose, whatever we do or whoever we are.
Build-up of Stress
If we’re stressed or anxious, we’re more likely to be passive or aggressive or both. Get good sleep, take exercise, empty your emotional bucket and find a way to reduce your pressure so that you stress-free personality can shine through.
Modelling Our Early Role Models
Many people learn from parents or other role models to respond in a non-assertive way. This is where we have non-assertiveness as a learned behaviour and it can challenging to for individuals who have learned this behaviour early on to adopt more assertive behaviour. This low self-esteem behaviour tends to become a self-fulfilling prophecy, since not asserting our rights or expressing our feelings can lead to low self-esteem or confidence and may indicate to others that this how they should be treated. Operating in this way ensures that a low self-esteem is maintained through destructive, co-dependent or unhelpful relationships.
So How Do We Behave Assertively?
Assertive communicators tend to:
- Have a relaxed body posture
- Communicate respect for others
- Speak in a calm and clear tone of voice
- Have good eye contact
- Have good listening skills
- Speak using “I”
- Stand up for their rights
- Feel confident in expressing their feelings and ideas
- Feel in control of themselves
The impact of this behaviour is that people tend to be able to connect with others, appreciate other perspectives and feel at ease in the presence of others. Effectively, by creating a respectful environment for both self and others, assertive communicators can address issues as they arise, allowing the potential to develop emotional maturity in both themselves and those around them.
Assertive communicators have the awareness that they are unable to control those around them. They are aware of the choices that face them and take responsibility for the choices they make. They know they are responsible for their own happiness, expressing their views; and they tend to be able to express their views clearly and concisely.
So how are we behaving if we’re not being assertive?
If we’re not honouring our beliefs, values and emotions it is probable that we are demonstrating passive communication, aggressive communication or passive-aggressive communication. Here are some of the signs.
Passive communicators:
- Don’t assert themselves
- Behave in a way that allows others to deliberately infringe upon their rights
- Don’t express their feelings, needs or opinions.
- Speak softly
- Often apologise before or after speaking
- Resist direct eye contact
Aggressive communicators tend to:
- Attempt to dominate others and may use humiliation to control
- Blame, criticise or attack others
- Speak in a loud voice and may act in a threatening way
- Have a low patience threshold
- Be poor listeners
- Use “you” statements
- Interrupt others when speaking
Passive-Aggressive communicators tend to:
- Be sarcastic
- Appear co-operative and yet deliver disruptive behaviour
- Deny there is a problem
- Mismatch facial expressions and feelings e.g. they may smile when they are angry
- Mutter under their breath rather than confront
- Use subtle sabotage and the concept of ‘revenge is best eaten cold’
So, if you find yourself behaving any other way than assertive, ask yourself how you can honour your own feelings. Speak out and express what you really feel. Always better out than in!
Find Out More About Working With Me
To find out more about coaching with me, or if you’d like to arrange a call to see if we’re a good fit for one another, please send me an email to sarah@sarahmerron.com.
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Find out about NLP Training here.
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