8
WAYS TO GET PEOPLE TO TAKE YOU MORE SERIOUSLY
Maybe colleagues ignore your input in meetings . Perhaps they interrupt you or don ' t include you in important decisions . It ' s easy to blame that on a bad boss or a toxic work environment . In some cases , that ' s even true . But if you really want to be taken more seriously at work , you should start by looking in the mirror and doing what you can to increase your influence .
There are eight things you can do right now to increase your credibility , get people to take you more seriously , and ensure you get treated with the respect you deserve .
1 . Don ' t let your statements sound like questions . One of the most common things people do to undermine their credibility is end their sentences on a higher inflection than where they started . It ' s called " upspeak :' and our brains are trained to interpret that pattern as a question . So instead of delivering information , you end up sounding like you ' re asking if your own input is correct . And people notice . In a survey of 700 managers by Pearson , 85 % considered upspeak to be a sign of insecurity and emotional weakness , and 44 % said they mark job candidates down by as much as a third for using upspeak . That ' s one habit you should break right now to give yourself an instant credibility boost .
2 . Don ' t just give reports-tell stories . The most successful TED talks follow a magic formulathey are 75 % stories and 25 % data backing up those stories . Stories provide an emotional hook that helps people remember what you said , and they give you a platform for connecting your knowledge to the real world . There ' s a huge difference between memorizing mathematical formulas , for example , and being able to use them to calculate whether a particularly dangerous asteroid is going to hit us in our lifetime . Stories help people take you seriously because they demonstrate that you can apply what you know and can connect to your audience with emotional intelligence .
3 . Encourage people to talk about themselves . When you first started dating , your mom probably encouraged you to get your dates to talk about themselves . Sure , it ' s good manners-and we all know that everybody likes to talk about themselves . But it turns out that there ' s a scientific basis for this . Your brain rewards you for self-disclosure . In fact , talking about yourself feels so good that it causes neurological changes in the brain . So if you want people to pay attention to what you have to say , let them talk about themselves first . Once those " feel-good " neurotransmitters are flowing and people start feeling connected to you , they ' re much more likely to take you and your contributions seriously .
4 . Do your homework . One of the best ways to get people to take you seriously is to be prepared and know what you ' re talking about . Americans attend 11 million meetings every day , and unproductive meetings cost the US economy $ 37 billion every year . Why are there so many unproductive meetings ? Because people are unprepared . Don ' t be one of them . Whether it ' s a team meeting or briefing your boss , always take the time to prepare .
8 ways to Get People to Take You More Seriously Dr . Travis Bradberry Jacksonville , Florida September 2019
Know what you want to say , be able to back up your opinions with data , and be prepared to answer questions two or three levels down .
5 . Stay informed . If you look at the employee handbook for tech company Valve , it says that it looks for " T-shaped " employees : people who have a lot of broad knowledge layered on top of their primary area of expertise . Do whatever it takes to keep up with what ' s going on in the world . It ' s particularly important to stay abreast of trends in science and technology , especially as they relate to business . You don ' t want to look like a deer in the headlights when
By Dr . Travis Bradberry
Author of # 1 bestselliang book , Emotional Intelligence 2.0 , and president of TalentSmart , world 's leading provider of emotional intelligence . somebody starts talking about how the Internet of Things is going to transform manufacturing .
6 . Dress for success . Fair or not , we judge people on their appearances every single day . And it happens so fast-in about a tenth of a millisecond , according to researchers at Princeton-that we don ' t even realize we ' re doing it . We make inferences about a person ' s character and capabilities based on appearance . If your appearance is sloppy , for example , people are likely to subconsciously conclude that your work will be sloppy too . Looking polished and well-groomed , on the other hand , creates the impression of responsibility and competence . That doesn ' t mean you have to rush out and blow your budget on a designer wardrobe . But it does mean that you should show enough respect for yourself and for your colleagues to make a substantial effort .
7 . Strike a power pose . If you assume an expansive pose-taking up more room by keeping your shoulders open and your arms wide-other people see you as more powerful . This is a hard-wired human characteristic , as people who have been blind since birth throw their arms out in victory , even though they ' ve never seen someone do this . Moreover , power poses actually change our body chemistry . Researchers at Harvard found that after participants held a power pose for just two minutes ,
their levels of testosterone rose by 20 % and their cortisol ( the stress hormone ) levels dropped . Power poses are a win-win : they make other people see you as more powerful , and they actually make you feel more powerful .
8 . Be confident but not too confident . No one is going to have confidence in you until you have confidence in yourself . But you have to balance that confidence with a little humility . Truly confident people aren ' t afraid to admit that they don ' t know everything-it doesn ' t make them feel threatened at all . In fact , the most confident people are eager to ask questions and learn . The best way to show your confidence is to own what you know and what you don ' t .
Bringing It All Together
If you feel like you don ' t get the respect you deserve at work , nobody can change that but you . Sometimes people don ' t take you seriously because of little things that you don ' t even realize you ' re doing . And that ' s something you can fix .