Why Are Women Afraid to Speak Up with Liz Kislik

Continuing our discussion on women speaking out, listen to what Liz Kislik has to say about this.

Liz Kislik is Harvard Business Review and Forbes contributor and TEDx speaker. She offers surprising insights and successful techniques for leadership, mastering collaboration, conflict, talent development, and customer loyalty. Her combination of practical experience, true stories, and current research will inspire listeners to start making a difference right away.

In this episode, Liz dives deeper and talks about what are some of the most common reasons why women are afraid to speak up generally or in a meeting. She also shares how to overcome these fears and doubts and speak up with confidence and passion anywhere at any time.

 

What you will learn from this episode:

Discover how keeping quiet won’t help avoid problems nor keep you or your people safe Understand what makes women scared of speaking up and how to overcome those fears Learn more on why it’s better to be loud and proud than quiet

 

“I think there's this assumption that quieter is better for authorities. And when we're raised that way, or believe that, when that's the lived experience, it can be very, very challenging to break out of it, and it takes a lot of deep self-work.”

- Liz Kislik

 

Valuable Free Resource:

How to speak with confidence and passion by getting over that limiting belief brought by your fears: https://lizkislik.com/resolve-conflict/

 

Topics Covered:

01:32 - Challenge is a suppressed fear of speaking up and a lack of practice with how to speak up

02:43 - Believing that keeping your head down and being quiet will keep you safe and away from problems: the common mistake business women leaders make when trying to speak up in a meeting or generally

03:24 - One free and actionable tip you can do to address your fear and speak with confidence and passion: To treat either the fear of speaking up or the situation you're facing like any other business problem. Who are the stakeholders? What are the advantages to be gained? What are the potential risks? And then go into the discussion, thinking about everybody involved as if they were your best customer?

04:14 - One valuable free resource to help you deal with the interpersonal aspects of the conflict: https://lizkislik.com/resolve-conflict/

04:38 - Q: Why are women afraid of speaking up? What gets in their way? What shuts them down? And how can we deal with that? A: And I think a lot of it goes back, actually, at least in the US, to the school system and to the family when we are young. And the idea of being a good girl who is attentive, who answers when asked, and who doesn't necessarily leap out of her chair or act out a little bit the way boys are often allowed to.

 

Key Takeaways:

“I think the challenge is a suppressed fear of speaking up and a lack of practice with how to speak up so that they feel they won't suffer for it afterward.” - Liz Kislik

“Projects and initiatives don't move ahead as quickly as they could because women are afraid to raise crucial issues for fear of ruffling feathers.” - Liz Kislik

“And deciding that it is okay to live in this kind of haze of discomfort, as opposed to actually dealing with what's going on and trying to get those problems handled.”  - Liz Kislik

“To treat either the fear of speaking up or the situation you're facing like any other business problem. Who are the stakeholders? What are the advantages to be gained? What are the potential risks?” - Liz Kislik

“When you're looking in that way at how can you serve everyone's interests, often you can find a path through the situation that actually takes care of people and sometimes uncovers the roots of the problem that you really need to address.” - Liz Kislik

 

Ways to Connect with Liz Kislik:

Website: https://lizkislik.com/ Book: https://lizkislik.com/resolve-conflict/

 

Ways to Connect with Sarah E. Brown:

Website: https://www.sarahebrown.com/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/knowguides LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sarahebrownphd/