You are the star performer in your team, have a good rapport with your colleagues, boss; you have completed additional assignments given to you by your boss on time, or do work-related favors to your team mates frequently.
You slowly start feeling overwhelmed; unable to say no, you notice you have become an easy target, it has become a norm to be considered first and forced to take up any new assignment.
It makes you angry, depressed leaving you with a poor work-life balance, stress anxiety burnout.
Slowly it affects your performance thus delaying your promotion, salary hike, career advancement in general.
What went wrong here is you not being assertive.
Assertiveness at work is simply being confident in communicating your needs, feelings, ideas, abilities, and interests without being aggressive or offensive to others.
Here are ways to improve assertiveness:
ANALYZE YOUR COMMUNICATION STYLE:
Recognize your style of communicating whether it is passive or aggressive.
Find the areas where you need to be more assertive while speaking with others and be consistent in doing so.
SPEAK UP:
Start to speak out your opinions, ideas wherever necessary don’t hold back or wait; seize your opportunity without being rude.
Exert self-confidence while putting forth your ideas.
KNOW WHEN TO SAY NO:
If you feel you are overworked, OVER STEPPED or taken advantage of, be firm and say NO WHEN required.
At the same time, express yourself sensibly without hurting others.
GAIN YOUR RESPECT:
Behave at work in a manner, that you are taken seriously as a professional, not just as a well-liked employee.
DEVELOP SELF CONFIDENCE:
- Dress confidently.
- Practice self-care.
- Set small goals and work towards them.
- Make few positive changes around you.
- Empower yourself with knowledge.
- Greet your co-workers with a smile.
- Believe in yourself.
FOCUS ON YOU:
When you explain your view to the co-workers, try shifting the conversation towards you, by using words like I can do this rather than using words like you cannot do this.
Let us go back to the scenario that we discussed at the beginning.
When you feel overwhelmed with additional responsibilities by your boss, you can reply by saying I understand this needs to be finished, but I have pending tasks that need immediate attention;
I can start on them in two days will that work for you, or please reassign them to XYZ in our team?.
DON’T CROSS THE LINE:
There is a thin line between being assertive and aggressive;
Forcing your ideas on others, being overconfident and degrading others, yelling at your subordinates or colleagues are not assertiveness.
Be mindful and don’t cross the line.