Have you ever noticed that the people who are farther ahead in life than you are not necessarily smarter than you, but they are the best communicators? Let’s work on our communication skills right now.
1. Fix Your Cadence and Tone
The first thing to address is cadence and tone. When many people speak, every word blends together. Talk in periods, not commas. Speak in complete sentences with clear pauses. This gives your words weight and allows people to process what you’re saying.
Next is tone. When I first started, I would often speak with an upward inflection at the end of sentences—it sounded uncertain. You need to turn it down, use a downward tone. This allows people to take you more seriously. A steady, grounded tone signals confidence and competence.
2. Be Unselfish and Get Others to Talk
The best communicators are the most unselfish people in the world. Nobody wants to talk to someone who only talks about themselves the entire time—it comes off as desperate. In your conversations, focus on the other person and get them to talk most of the time. You do this by asking questions.
Think of conversations as having threads. If someone tells you about their work, a few different threads can come from that: “What exactly do you do for work?” “What’s your day-to-day life like?” “Do you enjoy it?” “How did you get there?” Each thread invites them to share more, and you get to learn and connect at the same time.
3. Learn to Re-Hook Attention
People’s attention spans are super short. The best communicators in the world know how to capture attention and keep it. One of the most effective ways is to use lists: “There are three things you need to know about this. Number one… number two… number three.”
You can also use a hook like, “The biggest thing isn’t what I thought it would be. It was actually this. And let me tell you why.” That pause creates curiosity. People lean in. They want to hear what’s coming next. If you can master this, you’ll always have people’s attention.
4. Be Assertive
This is arguably the hardest part. Many women are scared to be firm, to have frame, to be assertive, and to simply ask. A lot of the people who are farther ahead than you are less skilled than you, have less heart, and don’t deserve it as much as you—but they just asked for it. And you were scared to ask for it.
The worst that people can say is no. That’s it. Then you can move on and ask someone else until you get a yes. If you can combine all of these communication skills—you will stand out and get what you want.
