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Making Your Words Count 169

Guideline 9: Decide if You Want to Be Direct and Forthright or
Indirect and Subtle

The decision to be forthright or subtle depends on whom you are
speaking with and what you want to achieve. Too much of one style
and your listeners can feel as though they were hit by a bulldozer; too
much of the other and they’re not sure at all what you were trying
to tell them. Finding the right balance can be difficult, especially if
one or the other approach comes more naturally for you.
If you are exceedingly subtle and discreet all the time, and just feel
it’s too aggressive or pushy to ever be direct, it can limit your ability to
demonstrate your leadership by making things happen or by making
your wants, needs, or opinions clear. On the other hand, if you are
always entirely blunt, you can come across as insensitive or boorish or
you can discourage people from engaging you in dialogue—also not a
good way to show that you’re leadership material.
Anne Altman, managing director, U.S. Federal, IBM Corpora-
tion, has often seen managers end meetings without giving their
teams clear directives out of a need to be polite. “We fall short in not
being more direct or straightforward,” she says. For example, a man-
ager might ask, would you consider doing this? Whereas, if they
know it’s what they want, it’s okay to be polite but clearer: I recom-
mend the following and I need your help in getting it done.
It’s possible to be nice without being unnecessarily deferential.
Anne observes, “We sometimes use self-deprecating or disempower-
ing disclaimers before we speak. This approach weakens our credi-
bility.” If you have a habit of suppressing what you really want to say
or you find it hard to step up and provide direction in meetings for
the sake of not ruffling feathers, you have a good chance of losing
your authority and credibility. It is important to know how to be
both forthright and subtle, and to know which one is warranted by
the dynamics of a situation. Following are some helpful tips on being
both direct and subtle.