Articles

If I’ve always been agreeable, won’t it be weird if I start disagreeing? It will be weird. But not as weird as you think. Why? People aren’t thinking as much about you as you are about yourself. The spotlight effect means we pay far more attention to

It’s back-to-school season for many. It’s a time of transition. When I asked how people are managing their schedules to deal with the inevitable load of kids experiencing restraint collapse, testing out new rhythms, and pre-frontal cortexes still growing, someone replied: just say no! It’s great

Leaders can’t make sound decisions based on skewed data. And yet, when the costs of speaking up are high, people go quiet, and leaders find themselves operating on incomplete, distorted information without realizing it. Many leaders expect people to speak up. Others tell their teams,

As humans, we’re incredibly attune to how costly speaking up can be. If the cost of sharing our perspectives, insights, expertise, or ourselves is too high, then it makes sense that we wouldn’t want to incur those costs. But what if we’re making these choices

Do you wonder what history books will say about this time? I know I do. Daily headlines, volatility, and things “above our pay grades” can lead to confusion or despair. Are tariffs on or off? Do I have a job or not?​In all of this,

One of the emotions often associated with speaking up is fear. What will they think? What will they do? Will I lose my job? How will I provide for my household? And certainly, headlines in the United States these days can both amplify and reinforce

Last week I heard yet another well-intentioned leader say to their team — “I want to hear what you have to say. I won’t necessarily do it, but I want to hear it.” While I knew the leader was sincere in wanting people to speak

While speaking at a conference last week, someone in the audience asked: what do you do when people make it really costly for you to speak up? The lawyer in me wanted to ask for specifics. The human in me could see the pain she