- How to be a confident woman in meetings starts
with one key thing, getting your timing right,
of when to speak up and contribute.
Watch to the end, and I'll also share
how your inner perfectionist is actually
only getting in your way on this count. (laughs)
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I'm Dr. Suzanne Doyle-Morris, founder of inclusiq,
and I have talked with literally thousands of women
and have helped so many of them who come to me,
initially, because they want to build confidence.
Well, today I'm here to tell you
that you're gonna get further if you first focus
on highlighting your competence, that is,
your skills, your abilities, your qualifications,
more, before you worry about your confidence.
So I'm gonna give you the tip about timing
in meetings that I shared with Moira,
who's a senior associate at a law firm,
or was, I should say.
Within a few weeks of thinking
through her timing at meetings,
people were commenting on how Moira was
"holding herself much more like a partner." (laughs)
Now that worked out for her really well,
because six months later, in that next partnership round,
Moira was indeed promoted, yay! (laughs)
She was complimented on how she'd grown
her confidence, it seemed.
But really, we only ever worked on her competence
around using timing to her advantage.
So she went from being a person who clammed up in meetings,
all the way to increasingly being asked for advice
by junior associates who now saw her
as someone to definitely emulate.
So let's start with a secret.
Now, the key thing to realize is that
there is no such thing as a perfect comment.
Perfection lies in the eye of the beholder,
so what you say versus what other people
are expecting you to say actually play a big part.
So just say something!
Start there, you're never gonna get the message
that's perfect for absolutely everyone in the room,
so don't wait for that magic comment
to come into your head as if be given
by a fairy career mother.
A question, an observation, what you've seen work elsewhere,
or even just praising someone else's idea,
they all count as valid contributions in those meetings.
So my tip for more confidence is to speak up early
in the first few minutes of any meeting
to reduce any mounting but self-imposed pressure
you may be feeling to make the perfect comment!
Before the meeting ends! (laughs)
So I'm about to get all scientific on you.
Researchers found that in looking
at discussion groups of both men and women,
women were much more likely to regulate
how much they spoke, taking up less time overall.
Now no doubt women do this for a variety of reasons,
from not wanting to appear dominating,
all the way through to just having a long list (chuckles)
of other things they've gotta do after that meeting!
I know, we have all been there. (chuckles)
I'd see this tendency in my work,
where women almost seem to do a subconscious
mental calculation in meetings.
The math they're working to is that,
if there are five people in this meeting,
then I probably shouldn't speak more than 20% of the time.
So they get completely surprised or annoyed
when someone else takes up 50% of the time,
particularly if they're adding really nothing of substance.
Worst yet, if that person is another woman,
because she should know the rules, right? (laughs)
So speaking early, however, also allows you
to see who else might support your idea,
and could become an ally, something we need to work with.
That's awesome to have those people on board.
The trouble with waiting until the end is that by that point
everybody's kind of ready to move on,
and so they might interpret your carefully-crafted point
as lengthening the meeting for no reason.
And let's be honest, no one is lovin' that person
who keeps you all in the seat longer.
When I was writing "The Con Job,"
Sasha Mooney, who is a Barrister at Law,
also saw the difference in how women display
their competence in the first few minutes of any meeting.
Sasha told me women often have
their heads down, taking notes.
She said, "I've done this too, so I know they want
"to ask well-considered questions with their facts
"recorded before they make their case."
"But," she said, "What I notice is that the guys
"are much more likely to pipe up when and as thoughts
"occur to them, interrupting when they see fit.
"You can almost see them thinking things
"through as they're speaking."
If you, too, have been in this type
of con job meeting that Sasha and I have,
well, give me a quick "Meeting Con"
in the comments below to let me know you've been there too,
(chuckles) 'cause they're not fun meetings to be in.
But in my experience, women often do
most of their thinking before they start
talking in meetings, for a couple reasons,
mainly because they don't want to get anything wrong
and be judged harshly for it, which is a reality
for women who work in male-dominated fields.
So Mooney's advice, put your pencil down
and start making points or asking questions
in the first 10 minutes of any meeting.
Because waiting until you have it
all figured out is far too late!
This challenge totally resonates
for the many women that I coach.
In my experience, non-status quo members
assume crucial decisions will be made
at the end of the meeting.
So not surprisingly, they leave confused or very frustrated
if it seems the decision was already made,
maybe even before they even started
a public debate in that meeting.
So get your points in early,
because waiting for the perfect and most
insightful comment of the whole thing,
that you inner perfectionist wants you to contribute,
well, it's not gonna serve you.
In fact, those who are in the know
can actually resent those difficult people
for asking detailed questions later on in the meeting!
To the status quo, the end result,
well, it was already decided either ahead of time
or in the first few minutes, because they read the room
and could start to predict the outcome,
based on where the alliances were.
So this topic is exactly why I wrote my third book,
"The Con Job," which focuses on why we need to stop
assuming the outwardly very confident people
are the only ones who should be making all of the decisions.
Instead, we need to better value those
with the right skills and experiences
to be making a much larger proportion
of the decisions that are gonna affect us all!
And if you want to stand up to the status quo
and help me put an avowed end to the over-valuing
we do of confidence in the workplace,
then click the link below to check out the book.
And keep up to date with the activity following the book
by looking at #Morecompetence on Twitter or Instagram.
And share it with your friends or colleagues,
because no doubt, you and me are probably not
the only one who have been in these types of meetings.
(chuckles) And subscribe to my channel
so that you are the first to see the rest of the videos
in this series as they get released.
And if any part of this video resonated with you,
well, give it a like, because it helps us to know
that this is useful for you guys!
And in the meantime, go and check out the rest of our series
on how to be a confident woman at work.