251. How to Stop Performing and Start Communicating with Presence

What It Covers

Kate Mason, world champion debater and executive coach, explains why confidence is unhelpful feedback, how to reduce performative communication at work, and strategies for combining assertiveness with warmth in professional settings.

Key Questions Answered

• •Confidence paradox: Telling someone to be more confident creates self-surveillance that pulls them into their head rather than into the meeting. Focus instead on being of service, connecting, and listening, which naturally produces confident-looking behavior without performative thinking.
• •Imposing syndrome: People diminish their requests by saying phrases like just take two seconds or I'm probably not the expert before making asks. This hedging devalues both the request and the person making it. Instead, directly schedule time and state your purpose without apologetic qualifiers.
• •Counterintuitive pairings: Rather than choosing between assertive or agreeable, combine seemingly opposite traits into leadership identities like competitively calm or ambitiously communal. This gives people language to inhabit their authentic communication style without forcing binary choices that feel inauthentic or limiting.
• •Preparation threshold: Over-preparation creates rigidity and reduces in-the-moment creativity and agility. Try reducing preparation by five percent to rely on muscle memory and natural communication skills. Good enough preparation often produces better work than perfectionist over-rehearsal because it maintains presence and adaptability.