Carla Miller [00:00:02]:
This week I've got another episode for you where I am a guest and this time I'm talking about how to get your voice heard at work with Aoife O'Brien on her excellent podcast Happier at Work. Now, we talked a lot about the challenge of being interrupted in meetings, particularly for women. And in the episode I provide strategies for managing interruptions, for finding opportunities to speak up how you can utilize allies, and I talk through the powerful strategy of amplification as well. In the episode you'll hear more about the impact of gender bias on confidence, we'll talk about the importance of integrating body language tools, and I share my Cloak of Authority tool, which will help you to feel more in control in challenging situations. And then we also have a conversation about how exactly can you deliver challenging feedback upwards in a way that is diplomatic and solution focused and is not going to get you in trouble with your boss? Lots in this episode. Great to talk to Aoife. Wonderful interviewer and I hope you're going to find it super helpful. My name's Carla Miller.

Carla Miller [00:01:16]:
I'm a leadership coach, author and trainer and this is the Influence and Impact podcast for Women leaders, helping you confidently navigate the ups and downs of leadership and feel less alone on your journey. As a leader in fortnightly episodes, I share practical tools and insights from myself and my brilliant guests that will help you to succeed in your career. Now, if you love this episode and want to find out more about working with me, head over to my website, carlamillar.co.uk where you can find out about my bebolder confidence course, my Influence and Impact Women's leadership Program, and how you can bring me in house to work with your managers, your leaders and your women. I hope you find this episode super useful.

Aoife O'Brien [00:02:02]:
Carla Miller, you're welcome back to the Happier at Work podcast. I know we had you on before and I'm delighted to have you as my guest for the second time. Do you want to let people know a little bit about you, the journey you've been on, a little bit about what you do?

Carla Miller [00:02:17]:
Absolutely. And thank you for having me back again and thank you for coming on my podcast as well. So I am a women's leadership coach. I've been coaching for the past 15 years and I'm on a mission to make things easier for women leaders that I found hard when I was struggling in my career. So I was very ambitious. I was a director by 29. I was in rooms surrounded by people that were older than me. Lots of older men didn't have a lot of natural gravitas and credibility ability necessarily.

Carla Miller [00:02:49]:
But I was smart and I knew my stuff. And I would find that when I spoke, I wasn't necessarily people weren't hearing what I was saying, People weren't taking it on board. And then that led to me feeling very. Feeling a bit like an imposter. And I know you talk about imposter feelings as well, feeling like I just need to work harder. I obviously need to be better. I need to work harder in order to prove myself. And of course now having coached thousands of women, I know that I absolutely was not alone in that I felt very alone at the time.

Carla Miller [00:03:24]:
But now I understand that actually as women, we are not taken this seriously in boardrooms. And that's nothing to do with how talented we are or what we have to contribute. So I'm really passionate about undoing that damage that gender bias does to our confidence, encouraging us to speak up again, and also making sure that we can influence effectively. Because no one really told me that influencing is really, really key to developing your career, being able to advocate for your team, get the resources that you need, create the change that you want to make in your organization. And when I learned to do that, things got much easier for me. I went on to be chief exec of a couple of organizations. I work with boards all the time, or I did do for a period of time, like often me and lots of very old men in suits and never had an issue with credibility. I'd learned to speak their language.

Carla Miller [00:04:19]:
And so now I run group programs. I do one to one coaching. I have a community called Women Leading and the idea is about bringing women together, sharing our stories, supporting each other, realizing we're not alone, and sharing any insights and strategies and tools that I've learned along the way that can help them. So yeah, that's sort of my purpose in life and work at the moment.

Aoife O'Brien [00:04:42]:
And such an incredible journey. I want to pick up on this thing about imposter feelings because I know both of us talk about that, but this idea that I must work harder because I feel like I'm not good enough. And I suppose what I'm hearing from what you're saying is it's thinking about it from both the individual side and also the environment that we find ourselves in. And by the environment, I mean the other people that we're working with as well. Well, so it's not just something that we feel ourselves, it's things that happen to us. So if you speak up and you're not really being heard, that has A direct impact on our own confidence levels as well. And I would love to explore that idea in a little bit more detail. And I know, Carla, you look at this from a couple of different perspectives.

Aoife O'Brien [00:05:29]:
Do you want to maybe share a little bit about, well, what does that look like first of all, like when someone's not, when someone's not speaking up at work, when does that happen? What does that look like, what's going on? What are the thought processes that are going on for the individual at that time?

Carla Miller [00:05:45]:
Absolutely. So I often find that people will speak up very comfortably in certain environments, like they're talking to their team and there's no problem at all. And then they get into a room with senior stakeholders or a peer that's got a really strong personality and then they're sat there being very self critical. They're nervous about speaking up, they're setting themselves expectations that they're struggling to meet is the way I like to think of it. So often they're thinking, I must be completely 100% sure before I speak up or I'm not expert enough in this or I haven't been in this organization long enough. We have all these thoughts in our heads that are stopping us from speaking up. And we don't ever think to flip that and go, well, what's the benefit to me, to the organization, to the quality of this meeting if I am able to contribute, if I do put in my thoughts? So for me it's about, they're thinking I should be more. Something more smart, more analytical, more extrovert, different versions for all of us.

Carla Miller [00:06:47]:
We're often sat there comparing ourselves to other people, aren't we? And thinking, oh, to be credible in this room, I need to be different. And that really impacts your confidence. It means that you can't speak up. And actually I think it's, for me it's exactly the opposite of what we want to do. We don't want to be more like the other people in the room. We want to really own our own strengths and our own opinions because that's where genuine confidence comes from. You are going to feel a bit like an imposter if you are actually faking it. If you're trying to be something that you're not.

Carla Miller [00:07:17]:
The more authentic you are, the more people resonate with what you have to say, the more people trust you. So I think there's all these barriers in our heads before we go into these meetings. And one thing I always encourage people to do is think what's a helpful thought to have in my head before I go into that meeting where I know I feel intimidated or I know it's challenging, so it might be I can add as much value as anyone else in the room or I'm the expert in my area or it's my job to provide insights or tell people things they don't want to hear sometimes. So just sort of resetting with a different thought instead of just going around in your head with whatever thoughts you have around, dread and nerves and oh, I'm going to mess things up or get things wrong. That can be a really simple thing you can do before the meetings.

Aoife O'Brien [00:08:05]:
I love that as an approach and like just something that resonated with me there, like this idea of flipping the thought to something. Like it's actually my job to challenge people on what they're doing. It's my job to bring insights and therefore I wouldn't be doing my job if I didn't speak up in this situation.

Carla Miller [00:08:25]:
Absolutely. And I think a lot of mid to senior level leaders, they are confident in their knowledge, but then they get into these rooms and that self doubt comes up and their inner critic gets very vocal and says, you're going to be judged for that. Or they say something and they're like, that person totally yawned or rolled their eyes. They think I've just said something really stupid. And we make up all this stuff in our heads and meanwhile we're not being very present in the meeting, are we? Because we're too busy self obsessing over what we might have done wrong. And so taking control of your mindset before you go into the meeting can sometimes switch off that inner critic.

Aoife O'Brien [00:09:00]:
Yeah. And it's funny, like there's a few things that are coming up to me as you're talking, Carla. It's the high stakes. Like when you're in those room, like a room with your peers, when you're in a room with your team, fine, no problem. When you're in a room of people who are more senior and the stakes are really high, that's when the inner critic can start rearing its head and feel like you don't belong here, who do you think you are speaking up? Who do you think you are saying that? But then if you flip it and say, well, the other people who are in the room are all human as well and they probably went through those same types of fears and emotions that you're going through right now and look where they ended up. And maybe they're feeling like that if they've recently been promoted to a senior position and they're like, oh, what am I doing here? I don't belong. But thinking about it from the human element, like, we're all human beings at the end of the day. And, yeah, like, we probably could get into a whole philosophical debate about hierarchies in an organization, but really it's just, I suppose, bringing it back down to that level, that, yes, the stakes are high because they're more senior, but actually they were once in the position that you're in now.

Carla Miller [00:10:08]:
Absolutely. And in fact, I coach lots of those senior people and they still have that going on in their heads. I always say we're comparing our messy insides to everybody else's. Totally polished outside.

Aoife O'Brien [00:10:20]:
Yeah.

Carla Miller [00:10:20]:
And in fact, that's what I love about when you bring groups together and create that safe environment where people can be open, is they realize, oh, these other people, their insides are just as messy as mine. And actually they're looking at me thinking, I've got it all sorted. I had within women leading, we have some peer calls where we bring people into groups of three to talk to each other. And I've been chatting with people afterwards and one of them said, I was in a room with these two super smart, very senior corporate women and they were amazing and they thought I was amazing. And actually we were all struggling with exactly the same themes and thoughts. And I was like, yeah, totally not alone in that. It's part of the human experience and more so in women because we are in this environment where, you know, the world of work was designed for men, by men, and for when that had a housewife at home doing everything else, it really wasn't designed for modern women in any way whatsoever, was it? And even though we're trying to make some changes, it's taking a very long time. So we do have to work harder in order to be taken as seriously.

Carla Miller [00:11:26]:
And that doubt, therefore, does come up a lot more for women.

Aoife O'Brien [00:11:30]:
Yeah, yeah. And what kind of things are you seeing that women are struggling with at the moment?

Carla Miller [00:11:37]:
Well, in terms of going to meetings, it's things like, am I going to be challenged? What if what I say is stupid? What if it's obvious? What if people respond strongly or I've got to say something people don't want to hear and I feel very uncomfortable about that. Or I have to challenge someone senior and I feel uncomfortable. I was coaching someone the other day and she said she always brings a different perspective to meetings and she can tell that quite often people are not welcoming that different perspective. And sometimes she'll say something and no one pays any attention. And then a man in a room, she works in a very male dominated environment. They say something like the same thing 10 minutes later. And everyone thinks it's the best idea ever. He beating is what it's called.

Carla Miller [00:12:19]:
I was like, you have experienced he beating. It's huge. Especially in male dominated environments. It's like their ears can't hear it when we say it.

Aoife O'Brien [00:12:28]:
Yeah.

Carla Miller [00:12:28]:
But they can hear it perfectly when a man says it.

Aoife O'Brien [00:12:31]:
Yeah. No. I had never heard that term until I read your book, Carla. The heap eating never knew it. Obviously knew it as a concept because I've seen it happen with my own eyes, but I didn't know that again, that it had a name and it had probably, I'm sure, a whole theory behind it as well. But it's so interesting that, that when we, when we do speak up, and I'm the kind of person that oftentimes I've deliberately wanted to be the devil's advocate to challenge how we're doing things currently. And I kind of like that role because you, you kind of, you get to be the challenger of how things are going. But it's only good if people are open and they're welcoming to those kinds of challenging ideas rather than just sticking with the status quo and how we've always done things in this way, therefore we should always do them in this way.

Carla Miller [00:13:19]:
And it turns out that's turned you into a great podcast host.

Aoife O'Brien [00:13:22]:
Thank you. Thank you. You flatter me. You flatter me. So one of the big challenges then is speaking up. How do we get more confidence to speak up to begin with when we're in front of those kind of high stakes audiences.

Carla Miller [00:13:41]:
So a couple of tools. The first one is if you're worried about throwing in a strong opinion or a fact or a statement because they might get a reaction. I find asking questions is a really powerful way to speak up, to influence within the meeting, to help change the direction or change perspectives. And it's actually quite hard to criticize someone for asking a question. So it feels safer to do it. So asking a nice open question like have we missed anything here? I wonder if we could look at things from a different perspective. What if we considered this? No one's going to jump down your throat.

Aoife O'Brien [00:14:18]:
Yeah.

Carla Miller [00:14:19]:
For that. So you feel safer doing that and you're not self editing as much. So I love a good question for anyone that's thinking it doesn't necessarily feel safe to speak up or I'm doubting myself and I need to be 100% sure. Questions are a great way to do it. So that's the first tool. The second tool is really recognizing, as we said earlier, it is it's your job to speak up. Sometimes it's your job to speak truth to power. Sometimes it's your job to give feedback upwards.

Carla Miller [00:14:51]:
And we can talk about ways to do all of those. But for me, I had that realization when I was in that first director role that I had where I had to have conversations with people and tell a lot of people things they did not want to hear. And Carla, the person, did not want to have those conversations. Because I really like to be like, I do not have challenging conversations in my personal life. I will avoid them. My cleaner's just been here and she broke the toilet seat last time. But both of us just ignored it. Neither of us said anything.

Carla Miller [00:15:19]:
I was like, I am avoiding this challenging conversation. But at work as a director, it was my job to have those conversations. And so at the time, Harry Potter was on at the cinema. And Harry Potter had a cloak of invisibility. When he put it on, he was invisible. I was like, I need some magic clothing of my own to make me feel empowered going into these meetings. And so I realized I don't need natural authority. My job title comes with authority.

Carla Miller [00:15:48]:
And for me, it was my job title. For someone else, it might be their expertise or the fact they've been tasked with a responsibility to do something, and with that comes the authority to get that done. So it's not just about being the most senior person in the room. So when I went into meetings, I would imagine putting on my cloak of authority. And when I put on my cloak of authority, I would show up differently. So instead of filling the awkward silences or apologizing a lot, I would allow those pauses if it felt uncomfortable. I told someone something they didn't want to hear. That's okay.

Carla Miller [00:16:21]:
They need time to process that and think about that. My body language changed. I probably spoke a bit more slowly as well. And it's just what we know from psychology is that having some kind of tool, whether it's a visual tool or whether I've got clients who use the same concept, but it's their lipstick or their perfume or their blazer or their heels, whatever way you do it, it gives us more of a sense of agency when we go into situations where we feel like they might be a bit out of our control. So, yeah, the cloak of authority, lots of women have been using that now. And it just reminds you, actually, it's Nothing to do with my personality. It's my job. And the authority comes with my job to say what needs to be said.

Aoife O'Brien [00:17:07]:
And interestingly, you did talk about that on our previous podcast episode. And since then, I've shared that with other people, a couple of people who, you know, if they came to me and they said, oh, this is happening, or whatever, I'm like, do you know what? Carla Miller has this amazing tool called the cloak of authority. You need to use the cloak of authority. Read about it in her book, whatever it might be. Listen to that episode. But yeah, I absolutely love that as a tool as well. And I want to come back to this questions thing again. Something sprung to my mind and it was the maybe extreme version of that.

Aoife O'Brien [00:17:41]:
When you're asking a provoking question deliberately to get a reaction, you're kind of like, oh, have we considered? And you put in your opinion, which is not really asking a question at all. That's just being, to me, deliberately provocative. So I suppose I want to highlight the difference between asking a question out of curiosity because you know that you have more to add, versus deliberately asking a provocative question because you want to kind of get a reaction out of people.

Carla Miller [00:18:08]:
And I think people that struggle to speak up are probably not the same people that will poke the bear.

Aoife O'Brien [00:18:16]:
Yes, it's such a good point. Yeah.

Carla Miller [00:18:18]:
Worried about people's reactions. They're people that are. And I say people. It's a lot of us, and it would include me in the past, very, very conscious of what others might think of them. So I think it's probably. And it's also about tone, how we use those questions. Isn't it what if? Could be a really open, gentle what if? Or it could be a really quite focused, targeted, well, what if this happens? So I think it's probably different. People use the phrase in different ways.

Aoife O'Brien [00:18:45]:
Yeah, yeah, yeah. But I think it's such a good tool and I don't think I've ever heard of it before. And I think for anyone who is struggling to speak up, and I'm picturing this in any scenario, asking a question can really help to open up the conversation so that you have the opportunity to share what you're thinking in a non kind of confrontational way.

Carla Miller [00:19:09]:
Absolutely. And then sometimes you have to tell people things that you know that they don't want to hear. And I think it's useful to have some phrases for that as well. So one of the things that comes up quite a lot is I'm in a room with senior people and I need to tell them something that they're going to respond very badly to.

Aoife O'Brien [00:19:31]:
Do you have a specific example either from your own kind of career or from one of your clients or something that's happened recently?

Carla Miller [00:19:40]:
Sure. So an experience of my own. I was working for a charity and I was a fundraising director, so I was responsible. I was an interim fundraising director. I had come in to help them work out how much money could they raise and how could they do it. And I had to go to a meeting with the board. So this is the non exec board. And There were about 60 of them, which is unusual.

Carla Miller [00:19:58]:
It's usually more like 10 or 15. There were 60 of them in this room. It's a lot. And I had given a presentation about what the team could raise and honestly, it made no difference to me. I was going to be leaving to go and have a baby anyway. I wasn't coming back. I was just trying to do the best thing I could for the organization. Anyway, collectively, they decided that they were going to take the figure that I said we could raise and triple it.

Carla Miller [00:20:21]:
And I was thinking, well, not only is that not possible, but you're going to leave yourself with a huge deficit at the end of the year because you're going to spend based on that assumption. And I raised my eyebrows, but no one was really listening. And the chief executive should have been doing something. Did not want to challenge them at all. She found it really hard to challenge. And in the end, I raised my hand in front of this room full of people, stood up and said, look, I wouldn't be doing my job properly if I didn't make sure. I've been absolutely clear about the consequences of going down this route. And no one wanted to hear that, but they changed their mind and they went with my suggestion in the end.

Carla Miller [00:21:01]:
And I just. And people coming up to me going, you just spoke truth to power. And I was like, oh, is that what it's called? Okay, Well, I told them what they needed to hear because what's important in that situation is that you respect their authority. So I was not saying you're wrong. I was basically saying, ultimately it is your decision and I totally respect that. But I need to make sure I have really clearly communicated to you why we made the proposal that we did and what could happen if you go down this route. And so I think you can challenge an idea, a concept, a decision without challenging people's authority. And they still might not like it, but it doesn't put their backs up in the same way.

Carla Miller [00:21:44]:
I think often what happens when people challenge is that they end up challenging someone's authority. You need to respect that whoever's making the decision is being held responsible for that decision and they have access to information that you don't have. But ultimately it sits on their shoulders. So you don't want to challenge that, you want to respect their authority, respect the hierarchy. But that doesn't mean you can't have a different opinion and strongly advocate for that opinion, but you advocate it for it strongly and then you leave it alone because ultimately it's up to them.

Aoife O'Brien [00:22:16]:
Yeah, I love that. I love that approach. And we kind of. We starting to talk about phrases and I think I probably jumped in saying, do you have an example? But the phrase I took from that is, I wouldn't be doing my job if. Have you got any other examples of phrases that you could potentially use in a situation like that where you have to deliver bad news?

Carla Miller [00:22:36]:
I think it's things that add to your credibility. So it might be based on the data or experience tells us or from the research that we've done. However you want to phrase it, it's something that adds the credibility. What you're basically saying is, I am the specialist in this, in the room, I am the expert in the room. And you don't really want to blatantly say, I am the expert, therefore you should listen to me. But by referring to your job title, by saying, basically, I wouldn't be doing my job properly as a marketing specialist or as a fundraising director, you're reminding them, look, I'm the person who knows my shit on this, not you, and I am very confident in what I'm saying here and I think it's important. And also, you pick your battles. If you do that all the time, it doesn't mean anything and you're just a bit problematic.

Carla Miller [00:23:28]:
But picking your battles, when you know it's a battle you need to win, then that's one of the ways you can do it. There's also a tool I have for giving feedback upwards, because you have to be a bit more diplomatic, don't you? So when we're giving feedback downwards, we often talk about. There's a few different models. I tend to use the BCA1 behavior, consequences, action. So this is the behavior that you've exhibited, these are the consequences, the negative things about that behavior, and this is the action I'd like you to take differently. So that works really well downwards, but does not work very well upwards at all because it's not really respecting that hierarchy. So I Came up with my own version, which is basically you start with the situation. So this is the situation that we're talking about.

Carla Miller [00:24:15]:
Then you talk about the consequences. And you wouldn't use the word consequences, but you basically say these are the problems that are arising as a result of this situation. Then you propose a solution. So I propose this solution. So you're very solution focused. And then finally you talk about the outcome, how things will be different and better as a result of putting this solution into place. So situation, consequences, solution and outcome. So it's a more diplomatic, less person based, more situation based way of providing that feedback upwards.

Aoife O'Brien [00:24:52]:
Yeah, no, I love that. And I think in all cases of feedback it is, we think of it as something really personal and a personal attack. If we have to give developmental feedback, let's say, and if we're on the receiving end of developmental feedback, it can feel like an attack on our personality. Like that's, that's how I am, that's who I am. Etc, etc. Like when I've delivered feedback in the past, people have got really defensive around the types of feedback that I've given, which has been a real challenge. I think as an, as an early manager that was such a challenge. But I love this idea of when you're feeding back up, it's about like what are the consequences which might be the problems or the challenges that you're encountering and the importance of being solution driven.

Aoife O'Brien [00:25:37]:
Because again, as a leader, so many people come to you with and this is a problem, it's like, okay, so what have you tried to do to solve it? Or what have you investigated in as potential solutions to that problem and what do you recommend as the best one? Rather than saying, oh, we could do this, this and this and this. It's like, well now you're giving me extra role to choose what the best solution is for you. So if you can come and say this is what I'm proposing as the one solution to this, let's try it. And here's what I think the outcome will be, let's revisit that. And you know, once I've implemented the solution or whatever, I think it's so important and I've worked with so many people who are not solution focused, which is extremely frustrating as well. They just come and they tell you all of the things that are going wrong or all of the problems and you're like, okay, so let's focus on how we can fix this, how can we move forward, what might we do differently the next time this happens?

Carla Miller [00:26:30]:
Yeah, we talked about that a bit last time, didn't we? Taking responsibility and being solutions, focused. So if we think about how this would play out, let's say you have a manager who, every time they go into the exec board, come out of the meeting and vent their stress, that you can give you a whole list of things to do and actually that ruins your day and it's not working well for your relationship. You can't just say that. So instead you can say, I notice that when you come out of that meeting, it's an intense meeting for you. There's a lot of actions, you're feeling tired. We're not having the best quality conversation we could be at that point. I really want to help you to put these actions into place. It would be fantastic if we could schedule a meeting the next day.

Carla Miller [00:27:11]:
Then you know that you've got a chance to think that through and share with me what I can do. And I can be best positioned to support you with what you need and make sure that everything's running smoothly however you want to do it. So that you've kind of spoke, talk them through the situation, consequences, solution, outcome, but in a way that makes you sound like you're really trying to support them as opposed to, you are driving me absolutely crazy venting your stress on me. Because people will take that personally. Whilst they won't take personally, oh, right. They will get a bit of a hint of, okay, I might be coming out, but they're reflecting on it for themselves rather than you telling them what their unhelpful behavior is.

Aoife O'Brien [00:27:53]:
But it's brilliant, I think, as well, Carla, because rather than thinking and complaining to your colleagues that, oh, my boss is a nightmare because of this, this and this, you're actually having the opportunity to express that directly. And I know, I know how hard it is to have those conversations, but they need to be had. And from the boss's perspective, you would much rather someone share their frustrations rather than you receive their notice of resignation within a few months because they're feeling so frustrated that their, you know, their energy is going down every time you come out of that meeting or whatever it might be. Now, we alluded to this at the start, but on the other side of that, you know, you had mentioned that, like, sometimes when you do speak up, it kind of falls flat and you're not getting the reception that you wish you could get. Do you want to talk to me a little bit more about that?

Carla Miller [00:28:48]:
Sure. So one of the things that happens quite a lot for women is when we want to say something in a meeting, we are worried about being criticized for it because we can't speak up and edit it in the way that men do. Like sometimes I hear men in meetings, I'm like, wow, it must be really nice to be of to say that without worrying about all that negative behavior based feedback that you can get. Like, they can be very sharp and to the point and no one sees that as a bad thing. If a woman shows up like that, we get judged so much, apparently we get something like 94% more negative behavior based feedback than men. And there's a whole load of phrases like no man is called abrasive, for example, a whole load of phrases that are only used for women. So it makes sense that when we have something to say in the meeting that might be challenging, we want to soften it a little bit. But the way we tend to soften it is through using what's known as qualifying statements or caveats.

Carla Miller [00:29:46]:
Things like, I might be wrong, but. Or this could be a complete waste of time or I'm not sure, but even though we know we're not wrong, we don't think it's a waste of time. And we are completely sure what we're talking about. And what all of those phrases effectively do is say it's probably not worth listening to me on this. And we start doing them in challenging conversations and then sometimes we end up doing them habitually. Sorry is another one apologizing when we haven't done anything to apologize for. So I encourage people to use different softeners instead, because I'm realistic. I don't think we can just go in and in some places, brilliant.

Carla Miller [00:30:27]:
If you're in a psychologically safe place where you can just genuinely say what you think unedited. Brilliant. Let's have more workplaces like that. But not many of us actually are. So it is again, using like gentle questions like what if? Or I wonder about this, or how about, so you're throwing things in, so you're doing that little bit of a softener beforehand that says something different coming your way that isn't what everyone else in the room is saying. So you're softening it a bit, but you're not diminishing the value of what you're saying. Because what they also know from research is that if a man is modest, everyone thinks it's completely charming. So if a man said I might be wrong, but you'd be like, oh, how charming that he's like open to the idea.

Aoife O'Brien [00:31:10]:
He's so in Touch with his feelings or. Yeah, whatever.

Carla Miller [00:31:14]:
Exactly. And when a woman says it, we believe her. So a woman says, I might be wrong, but then men in particular believe that she might actually be wrong, and she thinks she might actually be wrong. We are taken at our word. It's not charming with us. They just go, oh, okay. Because they're trained by society to take other men more seriously. And actually, as women, we're also trained to take men in authority more seriously than women in authority.

Carla Miller [00:31:36]:
We naturally respect it more. So you're operating in a system that doesn't work very well. But we're not helping ourselves by using those qualifying statements. So use questions instead. The other thing that's at the start. We also do things at the end that don't necessarily help us. So really common ones saying, does that make sense? When we know it's made sense, we haven't explained anything complicated. What we're actually doing is saying, I don't like the silence that's just occurred.

Carla Miller [00:32:04]:
Can you please validate me and reassure me that I just made a good contribution to the meeting? So I have a client who, an old client, and she was a head teacher. And when she was talking to her school, she never used any of those statements or said, does that make sense? But she was talking. She was invited to talk to other heads in the cluster of schools because she'd been doing so well and people wanted to hear about it, and she realized she was saying, does that make sense? Numerous times during her presentation because she wanted that validation, someone to say, yeah, yeah, no, that's great. You're doing great. You're on the right track here. We respect you. This is what she needed back. And so we talked about her only doing it once or twice.

Carla Miller [00:32:45]:
And when she stopped doing it, she felt so much more powerful. And obviously she was presenting more effectively as well. So drop. Does that make sense? Unless you've said something complicated. Another thing we do is that we've made our points. We're not seeing or hearing any response from people yet, so we just keep talking, not really sure what we're talking about. We're babbling. Sometimes it just kind of tails off at the end as we run out of things to say or we say.

Carla Miller [00:33:11]:
So, okay, yeah, like, we don't finish strong. And then the final thing we might do is we want people to stop looking at us. And we do that awkward shrug that says, please stop looking at me and move to the next person as soon as possible. And I used to do that all the time, you know, in Team meetings where you go around and do your bit. I still don't enjoy that, to be honest. Why? I don't enjoy that format. And I'd be like, shrug, yeah, onto the next person as quickly as you possibly can, please. And again, none of that trailing off and the shrug.

Aoife O'Brien [00:33:42]:
And it's like, move to the next person, please.

Carla Miller [00:33:45]:
Exactly. And so again, that doesn't. That's not owning the space. That's not giving the message of. I've just made an important point here. I'd want you to listen to me. So, first of all, reposition in your head what we call awkward or uncomfortable silence. That's just people thinking about that fantastic contribution that you just made.

Carla Miller [00:34:05]:
And if you keep talking, then they're going to forget that contribution because they can't think and listen properly at the same time. And they're just listening to whatever it is you're now awkwardly babbling on about. So just allow them thinking time. A third of us are reflective thinkers and really do need time to properly think about an accurate response. So don't assume, if there's silence, that that is bad. It could be you have just landed a genius idea that has blown their minds, or it could be they're thinking about the practical implications of it. And then another thing you can do is make your key point and imagine a full stop at the end of the sentence and then take a breath and you're done. And then use your body language to say, you finished talking.

Carla Miller [00:34:47]:
So it might be you lean forward and pick up a pen. It might be you sit back. If you're in person, you might turn to the next person you're indicating with your body language. Okay, I'm now done. I'm passing the mantle on to anyone else. Or you can use a phrase like, I'm happy to take any questions now, or I'd be really interested in your thoughts on that. Or ask a very specific question related to what you've said, however you want to do it. But swap that default.

Carla Miller [00:35:15]:
Does that make sense? Or babbling on thing for one of those tools. And that should mean that people are listening to you more because you are presenting more, more confidently. Now. It doesn't undo gender bias, but it just gives us a better chance.

Aoife O'Brien [00:35:31]:
Yeah, no, I love that. And these, there's. There's other words that are softeners that I've become aware of and I've removed from mine. So just as one of them. I'm just following up. I'm just doing this and you're trying to, again, I think soften the impact of, oh, maybe this is bothering you in some way. But actually I'm asking you to do your job because you said that you're going to follow up, you said you were going to do whatever. So I've removed just.

Aoife O'Brien [00:35:58]:
And if I catch myself typing it, it's usually typing, I will be like, ah, caught myself and I need to remove it. And I've seen it in younger women that I interact with as well. Oh, I'm just doing this. Or oh, I'm so sorry. And it's like you've nothing to apologize for. Like, no need to apologize whatsoever. But it's interesting that you were saying the difference between men and women in those softeners. Oh, I might be wrong.

Aoife O'Brien [00:36:22]:
And again, it's, I guess it's in the deep seated fear that maybe we're, we are wrong, that maybe we're not right, that we haven't got it right, that we haven't got it all figured out, that our opinion is meaningless, that it, that people don't care whatever it might be, but we're putting that in and we're almost giving them an out. Then by saying, oh, well, she probably is wrong. I'm going to stop listening to what saying. I loved those suggestions about what we do at the end. And I'm sure I do that as well. I have definitely said, does that make sense? And I'm sure I continue to do that. But thank you for putting in the qualifier saying if it's something that's complicated. Because sometimes I'm explaining something that's complicated.

Aoife O'Brien [00:37:04]:
So I do catch myself saying does that make sense? But I'm glad to know it's okay to use that if I'm explaining something that's complicated. I love the just an indication with your body language. Now, something that is occurring to me as I'm listening to you talking about all of these things is it takes practice. And really it's about awareness, first of all. So catching yourself using those phrases, not berating yourself but just being aware that this is happening, I'm like, okay, so maybe I need to practice using some of those or verbalizing my thoughts or using some of the phrases that you've mentioned at the end. And I know it's really cringy to practice this stuff, but if that's what helps you to get better, then like, maybe that's what needs to happen.

Carla Miller [00:37:49]:
Yeah. And practice. Maybe start your practice in a meeting where you feel more comfortable. Get used to using the phrases there. And then once you're used to using them and they feel natural to you. Then you move into it, into the more challenging meetings and just pick one. I am not asking you to change everything that you do overnight. Like, as with anything with coaching and training courses, you can give people a whole toolkit, but don't go and use the whole toolkit at the same time.

Carla Miller [00:38:13]:
You only need one tool at a time. Master one tool at a time.

Aoife O'Brien [00:38:16]:
Yeah, I love that. And yeah, I share that all the time. And of course I'm thinking, oh, here's all of the changes that I need to make when I'm having these conversations. But yeah, reminder, one step at a time. Just pick one thing that you might do differently. Stop saying, does that make sense at the end of something that is not that complicated because you're disqualifying what you said and replace it with, does anyone have any questions about that? Does anyone have questions about the implementation, whatever it might be? Carla, anything else to share before we wrap things up? Anything that maybe we haven't covered on today's conversation?

Carla Miller [00:38:49]:
There are just a couple more things in terms of if you get interrupted, that's always a challenging one. So we get interrupted a lot more than men do. So when we're in mixed gender rooms, we get interrupted about 50% of the time and the majority of those interruptions are by men. Now, we all know women that interrupt. We may well be women that interrupt. And we know that if someone has adhd, sometimes it's very hard for them not to interrupt. So the first thing is recognize someone is not necessarily being disrespectful or it doesn't mean that you weren't saying something valuable when someone does interrupt. So first that.

Carla Miller [00:39:24]:
Because otherwise you're triggered and you've got unhelpful stories in your head and you're not going to perform at your best. The other is work out, right? Do I want to let them keep talking because they're more senior than me, for example, or do I want to keep talking? So if you recognize actually there's some hierarchy here and I can't say, hey, you've interrupted me, then as soon as they finish, find a way to pick the microphone back up again, basically. So it might be yes and. Or building on that, John, and then make the rest of your point. Do not let the whole meeting then go off on their tangent if you can possibly help it. But if you're talking and actually you just want to keep talking, then you can just say things like, I've always finished or one moment. So just Something that says, still talking here. You will get your chance.

Carla Miller [00:40:15]:
I flag that. You want to add something as well. But let me finish my point. And I think a nice gentle way to say that is I'm still talking. It's not I'm still talking is just a moment or almost finished. And I tend to use my hand to kind of indicate, yeah, I hear you.

Aoife O'Brien [00:40:31]:
No, that's really good. And I'm thinking back to my corporate days and being in those meetings, and one of the struggles I had was finding a place to speak up. So it wasn't that I lacked the courage or the confidence to make my point. It was finding that opportunity. And oftentimes the conversation was moving so quickly, I was maybe processing what was being said, also thinking about what I wanted to say. And other people seem to jump in much more quickly than I was willing to jump in. And so I missed my opportunity. Any thoughts around that? Is that something that you've encountered yourself or that you found with the women that you work with?

Carla Miller [00:41:11]:
It happens a lot. So the first thing I suggest people do is if they know they've got a point to make, instead of doing that rehearsing it in your head thing that I used to all the time write down your bullet points. Just write down one, two, at the most, three bullet points, so that when you do get a chance to speak, then you can say, there's two points I want to make here. First point is this. Look down. Second point is X. So that you're therefore much more able to judge when you can jump in. The other thing is, if you have done the thinking later and the meeting has moved on, I think it is okay to say that having reflected on what Jane said earlier, we need to make sure we haven't forgotten X or however you want to do it.

Carla Miller [00:41:50]:
I think it's okay to do that. We have a lot of reflective thinkers in meetings. About a third of us are reflective thinkers, and we should get used to that. It's not taking people off at a tangent. It's saying, okay, we need to do some more thinking on this in terms of getting the space to actually speak. This is where allies and sponsors can come in really well. So if you've got someone more senior, whether it's your line manager or just someone that you know has your back and you know you want to contribute to a meeting, tee them up beforehand and tee them up with, this is what I. I want to make sure that I have a chance to put this viewpoint forward, or I want to make sure they have this information, then they can have that in their head and help open the door for you.

Carla Miller [00:42:33]:
And the more specific you can be, the better, because otherwise they might just land on you at a particular point and go, have you got anything to say? You'll be like, not right now, because this isn't the topic I had something to say on. So pre brief people. And there's a strategy called amplification as well, which was created by the women in Obama's first. I've never worked out the word for it. Not his cabinet, but the people who were in his presidential room advising him. Basically some of the smartest men and women in the world. And the women noticed that their contributions weren't being valued as much, they weren't being called on as much, that men were heap eating all over the place and getting the credit. So they got together and said, let's amplify each other's voices.

Carla Miller [00:43:17]:
So your colleague Claire says something and the first thing you do is go, what a great point, Claire. And if someone. Then he beats it, then you go, I see how you've built on Claire's point.

Aoife O'Brien [00:43:27]:
Yeah. Like you're referring back to what Claire said earlier.

Carla Miller [00:43:31]:
Yeah, exactly. Or Claire gets interrupted and you're like, was there more you wanted to add? I'd love to hear more from Claire on that. So you don't necessarily have to say you were interrupted. Yeah, but you're passing the microphone back when you're interrupted. It's very hard to deal with it, to raise it yourself.

Aoife O'Brien [00:43:47]:
Give me the microphone.

Carla Miller [00:43:49]:
Exactly. It can be really hard to do. And sometimes you create more tension and more attention on that than the point you were trying to make. So doing it for each other, like getting together with your peers or getting together with a few friendlier people in the meeting and saying, look, what do you want to contribute on, you know, or can. If I get interrupted, can you help me out? Just having each other's backs for any voices that are underrepresented.

Aoife O'Brien [00:44:12]:
Carla, the question I ask everyone who comes on the podcast, and you will have shared this before as well, what does being happier at work mean to you now?

Carla Miller [00:44:20]:
I forgot to wrap up to look and see what I said last time, but this is what it is right now. So for me, right now, it's about using my talents and skills and experience, working alongside great people to make a positive impact that makes me happy. I get to use all of me. I get to hang out with great people and making a difference. Making a positive impact is a huge.

Aoife O'Brien [00:44:42]:
Driver for me and if people want to connect with you, if they want to learn more about what you do, what's the best place they can do that?

Carla Miller [00:44:48]:
So a few places I'm always on LinkedIn. I'm far too active on LinkedIn, so do follow me and connect there. I've also got a free resource at the moment which is my how to say no challenge. So many of us struggle to say no and then we're overwhelmed from saying yes too much. So if you head over to carlamillertraining.com say no s a Y N O. You'll be able to download that as well.

Aoife O'Brien [00:45:13]:
Love that. And I'll put the link to that in the show notes. And of course you have your amazing podcast. And don't forget to mention your book as well.

Carla Miller [00:45:20]:
That's true. I also so my podcast is called Influence and Impact for Female Leaders. It's a global top 2% podcast. Do go and check that out. Listen to Aoife's last episode and there'll be a new one coming as well. And then my book is called Closing the Influence Gap, A Practical Guide for Women Leaders who Want to Be Heard. Thanks.

Aoife O'Brien [00:45:39]:
And I highly recommend the book. I thought it was so brilliant. And the personal examples that you're able to share as well of a lot of the stuff that we talked about today. So thank you so much for your time today, Carla. Really, really enjoyed this conversation. Loads of practical stuff that people can start implementing straight away. Really appreciate that. Thank you.

Carla Miller [00:45:55]:
Thanks for your great question.