Cat Matson

speaker

1,623 appearances 6 recordings 1 series first heard May 2026 last heard 6 Aug

Cat Matson’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.

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Recordings per month over the last 12 months — 6 in all, peaking in Jun 2026 with 3.

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Speaking with Confidence with Cat Matson: communication coaching for humble leaders · 204 - How To Speak With Authority Without Sounding Demanding · 6 Aug 2026 podcast

I appreciate that being that, I'm going to call it authoritative rather than assertive, being that authoritative and owning our expertise and making direct recommendations can feel uncomfortable, particularly if we're not used to it.

If we're needing to work on shedding our nice girl routine or our get on with everyone routine, we might need to transition to being more assertive

direct in our recommendations so how do I suggest you do that well you can say things like I'm thinking about doing this and that's what I'm going to do unless anyone has any objections or based on my experience and based on what we saw last time my recommendation would be that we do this any objections

That way of saying it, I'm thinking, this is my recommendation.

You're still owning that it's your opinion, but it's your expert opinion.

It's your informed opinion.

And then asking if there are any objections, it shifts the conversation.

It shifts the conversation away from does anyone have an opinion?

And, of course, everyone has opinions about freaking everything, right, whether they're informed or not.

But asking if there's an objection, it's like, well –

Do I care?

That sounds good.

Let's give it a go.

Now I want to comment here that some assertiveness training would tell you not to use a phrase like I'm thinking because it diminishes your credibility or your authority.

They would probably also argue not to say something like unless anyone has an objections because similarly it could be seen

or they would argue that it could be seen to be undermining your authority.

I disagree.

In a context where particularly a lot of our meetings are online and we don't have the same strength of in-person relationships, we don't have the opportunity to build trust in the soft conversations that happen in the tea room or in the lunchroom.

And all of our interactions are happening in structured, get-things-done meetings where

We need to find different ways to be personable and to be connected and to also practice new ways of communicating in relatively structured setups.

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