Assertiveness Skills
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Assertiveness skills are something you have to possess as a leader. How can you be assertive, get your point through with effectiveness without being pushy and over aggressive?
Great leaders were all assertive people; they believed in something and they stood up for it.
As a leader, there will be a lot of people who will disagree with you; a lot of people who will tell you there are better ways to do things and so on.
But you need to learn to be firm about certain things that you do. This does not mean that you become inflexible or stubborn, but it means you hold on to your principles and assert them.
Asserting yourself means that you put your view across confidently and with conviction such that people do understand your viewpoint and respect that from you.
Assertiveness skills are not methods to be learnt, nor techniques to be mastered. Assertiveness comes from conviction within your heart.
Reasons Why People
Don’t Assert Themselves As Leaders
1. They don’t have values
The majority of people don’t have values that they would hold to the death. Values are important and they are worth more than life themselves.
People without values are like a stationary boat with a sail; they move as the wind blows. When one person tells them to do one thing, they do it even if it violates their principles. When another person comes and tells them to do another, they’ll just follow.
Every great leader was an assertive person because of values he/she held in his/her heart. They held it more strongly and valued it higher than their life itself.
Braveheart held on to the value of freedom for his people; even unto death. At his execution, before he was beheaded, he shouted for the last time, “Freedom!”
It was beautiful.
Your values make you who you are; ask yourself, what do you value today?
Another person why people don’t assert themselves is because…
2. They’re afraid of what people say about them
It’s not easy to hold on to your principles and value them greater than your relationships. Sometimes it means you have to disagree with everyone.
I hold on to the value of truth as very important in my life. There was once when my project group mates wanted to misrepresent our project by lying about some things we performed which we didn’t.
I stopped at that moment and told them very firmly that if they want to do that, then I’m not presenting for the group anymore.
That rocked the boat a little. One accused me of being inflexible; but most of them were just stunned; they didn’t know how to respond. In the end, they decided to go as how I wanted it to proceed.
Asserting yourself for the right things can be hard sometimes, but you have to learn to live beyond people’s expectations of yourself.
If you try to please everyone,…
well… you cant.
And that’s a fact.
Especially for a leader, you’re going to walk one way and someone’s going to come along and tell you how it’s supposed to be done. You just have to learn to assert your own way.
But of course, that having said, it doesn’t mean you become a stubborn person and inflexible. Assert your values, not your methods or for personal gain.
Don’t be asserting yourself for the wrong things, you can get ugly.
So start realizing the values you hold on to as a person, and stand by them.
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