How to tackle that next tough talk with your confidence intact!

Do you ever find yourself about to enter a tough talk and wonder if you've got what it takes to pull it off? 

If you have read the first chapter of my book, you know I have! One particularly challenging meeting, that's hard to forget, I wondered if I was about to upchuck my morning oatmeal...but I digress...

️If you are really curious to hear the whole story, you can listen to the first part of my book for free here!

If you struggle with tough talks and want to learn how to prepare for them, keep reading!

3 Kinds of Tough Talks!
There are certainly more than 3 kinds of tough talks, but let's look at what might constitute a tough talk.

1. One-to-one meetings that are dealing with performance issues or completing a performance appraisal.
2. Group meetings that you are leading the conversation. These meetings might be tense, charged, or complicated.
3. It might be that the tough meeting you are entering is with someone that you deem more important than you or superior to you. For me, that would have been my boss or my funder. In those kinds of meetings, I might have been asking for a raise, a promotion, or to take a training course that costs a substantial amount or would pull you away from the team.

What makes these talks tough?
What makes these talks tough for you or me or anyone for that matter? For any talk to be considered "tough," they all have one thing in common.

Do you have any guess what the one thing is that makes talks tough?

The one defining factor is...
The thing that they have in common is that you THINK they are tough. That's it!! Each of us can enter the same meeting, and some of us will think that it's going to be a tough meeting and some of us will think it will be just fine.

It's your perspective on it that makes any conversation tough

It's time to turn it around
If you want to enter your next meeting or talk and not see it as tough, you need to change your perspective. I am not suggesting you snap your fingers and say, "It's easy peasy!" No. A perspective change is about seeing in a way that is ALSO true.

3 ways to change your perspective about upcoming talks
To change your perspective, do these 3 things:

Learn more about the Inner Guidance Cycle in my book Mastering Confidence.

1) PAUSE before you engage in the conversation.

• Mindfully and intentionally prepare for your meeting

2) PONDER your current perspective

• Ask yourself: What's the story I am making up about this meeting?
• You are telling yourself something about your ability to handle it.
• Ugh...this is going to be hard.
• I am NOT good at conflict!
• S/he's going to think I'm a bully if I address that issue.

2) PIVOT to a new perspective

• Ask yourself: What is another story I tell myself about my capacity to handle this talk?
• You are telling yourself something about capacity to handle it.
• This meeting will be tense, and I've prepared well for it.
• I'm getting better at handling conflict because I am becoming more emotionally intelligent.
• I know my goal is about helping this person grow, and I'm learning how to best do that in a way that they feel supported.​

Feel the difference? It's not easy peasy, but it is doable! And, you, my dear, have got this!! Now you are ready to PROCEED with confidence that you can handle the talk

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Want more practice?
Not convinced? No, perhaps not. This work takes practice. But please keep at it. This is why I am always harping about the need to do the inner work. Practice makes progress!

️If you need more help with preparing for upcoming tough talks, I encourage you to register now for this month's webinar: Preparing for a Tough Talk: So you can handle it with integrity!

Here's the bottom line: 
I believe you can handle tough talks with your confidence intact? 
​Do you?

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