Really good points! These apply to people with disabilities too. Not every human thinks, processes, ideates, or speaks at the same cadence so it's great to create an environment that allows for variability and maintains fair engagement.
Agreed to some of these. But again, this is in the vein of "lean in" ideologies which slap on bandaids without addressing the real root causes of power imbalance in the tech space. So I would take this advice with a grain of salt. I'm a non-American who has been perceived as "shy", "quiet" and an "introvert" when I am none of those things. The reasons why non-Americans may hesitate to speak up are in fact complex, myriad and varies across individuals.
Amazing points and re-read your piece on "the bias no one talks about" which has so many gems!
I found it really tough to find meaningful places to practice speaking. I used to do Toastmaster's as well, but it overfocuses on prepared and performative presentations and not enough on impromptu. Long meetings, but little time to practice.
If folks are looking for a better place to practice, Ultraspeaking is phenomenal for impromptu speaking and is 100% experiential + practice-based in nature.
This one hit home: "Your words carried disproportionate weight—in some ways, more weight than the actual work you had done. Though these discussions make up only about 5% of the time you spend at work, they make up more than 50% of how others judge you."
"English was his second language, and while he thrived in 1:1 conversations, he rarely spoke up in larger meetings. The PM spent hours prepping his EM. They practiced and practiced, and when it came time to speak, the EM did an excellent job of presenting their product and progress.".
Why all this prep was necessary for a internal meeting? Wouldn't this environment be more opened for those less articulated? It looks like putting more burden on the EM to achieve a communication level/standard set by someone else.
This is something that did not come naturally to me. Luckily i had mentors that guided me through what you outlined here. One hack that helped me was I could be an ally even though i wasn't entirely comfortable speaking up; it was a low-risk way to practice speaking up and build relationships.
This is such a timely read - I struggle with being a 'processor' as well and it's definitely a lot of work to come out of that shell. Thank you for putting this out there.
Really good points! These apply to people with disabilities too. Not every human thinks, processes, ideates, or speaks at the same cadence so it's great to create an environment that allows for variability and maintains fair engagement.
Agreed to some of these. But again, this is in the vein of "lean in" ideologies which slap on bandaids without addressing the real root causes of power imbalance in the tech space. So I would take this advice with a grain of salt. I'm a non-American who has been perceived as "shy", "quiet" and an "introvert" when I am none of those things. The reasons why non-Americans may hesitate to speak up are in fact complex, myriad and varies across individuals.
Amazing points and re-read your piece on "the bias no one talks about" which has so many gems!
I found it really tough to find meaningful places to practice speaking. I used to do Toastmaster's as well, but it overfocuses on prepared and performative presentations and not enough on impromptu. Long meetings, but little time to practice.
If folks are looking for a better place to practice, Ultraspeaking is phenomenal for impromptu speaking and is 100% experiential + practice-based in nature.
This one hit home: "Your words carried disproportionate weight—in some ways, more weight than the actual work you had done. Though these discussions make up only about 5% of the time you spend at work, they make up more than 50% of how others judge you."
"English was his second language, and while he thrived in 1:1 conversations, he rarely spoke up in larger meetings. The PM spent hours prepping his EM. They practiced and practiced, and when it came time to speak, the EM did an excellent job of presenting their product and progress.".
Why all this prep was necessary for a internal meeting? Wouldn't this environment be more opened for those less articulated? It looks like putting more burden on the EM to achieve a communication level/standard set by someone else.
This is something that did not come naturally to me. Luckily i had mentors that guided me through what you outlined here. One hack that helped me was I could be an ally even though i wasn't entirely comfortable speaking up; it was a low-risk way to practice speaking up and build relationships.
This is such a timely read - I struggle with being a 'processor' as well and it's definitely a lot of work to come out of that shell. Thank you for putting this out there.