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Silence is not always golden. Organizations lose out when employees hold back their ideas and opinions. It may be because of the specific situation, the organizational climate or their own personality and past experiences.
“I hate having to speak up. It’s exhausting and at times degrading,” executive coach Elaine Lin Hering, former managing partner at Triad Consulting Group and lecturer on law at Harvard Law School, writes in her book Unlearning Silence.
“It means having to parse out why you think what you think and to justify your existence. And if no one else is speaking up or speaking out, it can feel like you’re putting yourself in the line of fire alone, without sufficient armour or defences.”
She’s highly accomplished but also female and Asian. She often is asked to validate opinions from “a minority perspective.” It leaves her feeling a token, with a seat at the table but her voice not really welcome. She’s not alone in that situation, of course, and there are people with other backgrounds or in other situations who feel it’s wise to not speak up.
“Silence means not having to engage in so-called healthy debate that leaves me raw and reeling. In some cases, it quite literally means not losing the job that pays my bills. Silence is what I have learned, internalized, and, at many times in my life, been rewarded for,” she says.
There can be an incentive to stay silent. But our individual and collective safety, well-being and progress requires us all to use our voices. So she argues it’s vital to unlearn silence.
She stresses that unlearning silence isn’t about always speaking up. The world is too noisy and complex for that. You must be aware of when you are silent and whether that silence is one that you have chosen or whether it is chosen for you.
She highlights what social psychologist Adam Galinsky calls the low power double bind: If you don’t speak up, you go unnoticed but if you speak up you can be rejected because you are outside the range of acceptable behaviour. The decision on what is acceptable behaviour, of course, is typically made by those who currently hold power.
“Being ‘the only’ in any context is a special kind of low-grade pain,” she adds. “You contort yourself to fit in, because fitting in seems like a ticket to acceptance. You’re celebrated for your difference when convenient and dismissed when your utility is over.”
In the moment, the benefits to silence will always be immediate and clear, while the benefits of speaking up hazy. But silence can harm you and others. Whatever you are not changing, she notes, you are choosing.
Your voice is worthy and deserves to be heard, she insists. “The systems we are part of may not always give us a voice, but it doesn’t deny the truth that we each do have one. If our voice is our thoughts, feelings, passions, cares, experiences and what we choose to do with them, only you can be you. Don’t deprive others of all you have to offer. Don’t deprive yourself of the freedom to live as authentically as you desire,” she writes.
Even if your voice has become dormant, weak from disuse, she argues it’s still there. It matters because your voice, thoughts and ways of influencing the world is unique.
Give yourself permission to use your voice. Start with small experiments. Her first effort was simply to ask the cab driver from the airport in a new city to open the window because it was stuffy. She had to talk herself into it: The request seemed modest and she would never see the guy again. She was unlearning her silence.
Make the experiments time bound. For meetings in the next three weeks, pledge to share your perspective. Knowing it won’t be forever might help unleash you. Along the way, you will become comfortable with being uncomfortable and learn that speaking up can be golden.
Quick hits
- “The truth is whispered while opinions are shouted,” suggests Ottawa thought leader Shane Parrish.
- Burnout expert Kandi Wiens realized recently she was experiencing “hurry sickness” – always in a rush, and always feeling behind. She is working on becoming more comfortable letting other people down, increasingly saying “not right now” or “no, thanks” to requests. She is also blocking out buffer time in her calendar to deal with unexpected to-dos and scheduling time to reflect and recalibrate her to-do list.
- Preparation always beats planning, says venture capitalist Sahil Bloom. Planning is based on the expectation of order while preparation is based on the expectation of chaos. If you plan for order and chaos comes along, you’ll be destroyed. But prepare for chaos and you’ll thrive in any condition.
Harvey Schachter is a Kingston-based writer specializing in management issues. He, along with Sheelagh Whittaker, former CEO of both EDS Canada and Cancom, are the authors of When Harvey Didn’t Meet Sheelagh: Emails on Leadership.