Picture this. You’re sitting in a meeting, turning an idea over in your mind. You’re fairly sure it’s worth saying, but something stops you, and the conversation moves on.
Or, maybe it’s not about ideas at all. It’s about workload. Someone’s just asked you to take on yet another project and, even though you’re already stretched, you hear yourself say yes. Again.
These moments are rarely about laziness or lack of confidence. More often, they come down to a misunderstanding about what assertiveness is and a fear that speaking up means stepping on people’s toes.
Assertiveness isn’t about being forceful or difficult. True assertiveness means clear, honest communication that respects both what you need and what the people around you need. It’s a learnable skill, and developing it changes how you show up at work in ways that matter.
So, in this guide, we’ll cover what assertiveness is, and give you strategies and practical guidance to show you how to be more assertive at work.
What Is Assertiveness? (And What It Isn’t)
Assertiveness is the ability to express your thoughts, feelings and needs clearly and respectfully, whilst also respecting the right of others to do the same.
It’s the middle ground between two communication styles that most of us have encountered (and probably used at some point): passivity and aggression.
To understand where assertiveness sits, it helps to see all four styles side by side.
Passive Communication
Mindset: “You matter, I don’t.”
Passive communicators tend to minimise their own needs to keep the peace. They use apologetic language, avoid eye contact, agree when they don’t mean it, and often take on more than they can manage because they struggle to say no.
Over time, this can create a quiet build-up of resentment towards the people around them.
Aggressive Communication
Mindset: “I matter; you don’t.”
Aggressive communicators push their needs forward at the expense of others. They might raise their voice, use blaming language, point fingers (literally or figuratively) and create an environment where people comply because they don’t want the conflict.
This style might get short-term results, but it damages trust and tends to make people avoid you rather than engage honestly.
Passive-Aggressive Communication
Mindset: “I pretend you matter, but really I matter more.”
This is perhaps the most corrosive style of all, because it operates below the surface. Eye-rolling, sarcasm, agreeing in the meeting and undermining the decision afterwards, indirect complaints and pointed silences are all ways of expressing frustration without being direct about it.
The cost is a gradual erosion of trust and a workplace where people are never quite sure where they actually stand with each other.
Assertive Communication
Mindset: “We both matter.”
Assertive communication is honest and direct, but it isn’t unkind. It uses ‘I’ statements rather than blame, maintains calm and open body language, and approaches conversations with the assumption that both parties deserve to be heard.
It creates clarity and allows issues to be resolved directly rather than left to fester.
Most people aren’t one style all the time. For example, you might be assertive with some colleagues and passive with others. Or, you might be fairly direct about most things, but passive-aggressive when you’re tired or feel unheard.
Recognising your patterns is the first step to shifting them.
The Real Cost of Not Being Assertive at Work
It’s easy to see why staying quiet feels like the safe option. Staying quiet means no confrontation, so no risk of upsetting someone or causing awkwardness.
However, the costs of not being assertive are great, even if they take some time to rear their head.
Your time and energy take the first hit. Saying yes to everything means you have no capacity left for the work that matters to you, and the resentment that builds when your boundaries are constantly overstepped is surprisingly draining.
Your credibility suffers too. If you rarely share your opinions, people start to assume you don’t have any strong ones. Passive-aggressive patterns are especially damaging here, because they erode trust in a way that direct disagreement never does.
Your development stalls when you avoid difficult conversations. Growth at work, and in leadership especially, depends on your ability to give and receive honest feedback and to hold people to expectations. This is why learning how to be more assertive at work is a career accelerator.
And underneath all of this is your wellbeing. Chronic people-pleasing is a significant source of stress and anxiety. Suppressed frustrations tend to resurface as burnout, disengagement, or a creeping sense of being taken for granted.
What you gain with assertive communication
When you communicate assertively, the benefits are felt by everyone around you.
Expectations become clearer, which reduces misunderstandings and the conflict that comes with them.
Colleagues respect people who are direct, because they know where they stand. Relationships become more honest and more durable when they’re built on strong, open communication.
You also gain influence. People take your perspective seriously when they know you’ll say what you actually think, rather than going along with the room.
It’s worth noting here that many people avoid assertiveness because they’re afraid it will cause conflict. But as we explore in our article on why the best teams embrace disagreement, healthy, respectful disagreement is actually a sign of a high-functioning team.
Assertive vs Aggressive — Understanding the Difference
The biggest thing that holds people back when learning how to be more assertive at work is the fear of being seen as aggressive. This is understandable, but it’s based on a confusion between two very different things.
Aggression violates other people’s rights to assert your own. It operates from an ‘I win, you lose’ mindset.
Assertiveness, by contrast, honours both your rights and the rights of others. It operates from a ‘we both matter’ mindset.
Each of these modes of communication reflects a fundamentally different set of assumptions about the people you’re communicating with.
Here’s how those differences play out in practice:
| Situation | Aggressive Response | Assertive Response |
| Someone misses a deadline | “You’re always late. This is completely unacceptable.” | “When the report came in late, I felt under pressure because I had less time to review it. Can we talk about how to prevent this going forward?” |
| Disagreeing with a decision | “That’s a terrible idea. It’ll never work.” | “I have some concerns about that approach. Can I share why I think we might face challenges?” |
| Setting a limit on your capacity | “I’m not doing that. Figure it out yourself.” | “I’m not able to take that on right now, but let’s discuss what might work instead.” |
| Giving feedback | “Your presentation was confusing and poorly prepared.” | “I noticed the budget breakdown we’d discussed wasn’t included. Could we add that for next time?” |
Aggressive communication leans heavily on ‘you’ statements — ‘You always…’, ‘You never…’, ‘You should…’ — which put the other person on the defensive before you’ve even made your point.
Assertive communication uses ‘I’ statements instead: ‘I feel…’, ‘I need…’, ‘I’d prefer…’ These own your experience rather than attributing blame, and they leave space for the other person to respond rather than react.
The Building Blocks of Assertive Communication
Assertiveness is a skill, which means it can be learnt and developed over time. Here are the core tools that will help you be more assertive at work.
Technique 1: Use ‘I’ Statements
The most practical framework for assertive communication is the three-part ‘I’ statement, which combines an objective description of what happened, an honest account of how it affected you, and a clear request for what you’d like going forward.
Example: “When reports are submitted after the deadline [ACTION], I feel under pressure because I have less time to review the data [IMPACT], so in future I’d appreciate them by Thursday afternoon [NEED].”
What makes this work is that it’s factual rather than accusatory. It owns your experience without attributing motive to the other person, and it provides a clear path forward.
Other examples in practice:
• “When meetings start late, I find it hard to fit everything into my schedule. Could we aim to start on time?”
• “When I’m not included in client conversations, I don’t have the context I need to do my part well. Can we loop me in going forward?”
Technique 2: Set Clear Limits on What You Can Take On
A big part of assertiveness is having the right to say no without over-explaining and without completely collapsing if someone says no to you in return.
While you have a responsibility towards the people you work with, that doesn’t mean it’s your responsibility to manage their feelings at the expense of your own capacity.
Saying no assertively doesn’t require a lengthy excuse. ‘I’m not able to take that on’ is a complete sentence. If it’s genuinely helpful to offer an alternative, you can, but you don’t owe anyone a justification for having limits.
Some useful phrases:
• “I don’t have capacity for that this month.”
• “That won’t work for me, but here’s what might…”
• “I need to decline this time.”
Technique 3: Practise Active Listening
Assertiveness is as much about how you listen to others as it is about how you speak to them. When people feel heard, they’re far more open to hearing you back.
Practically, this means reflecting what you’ve heard to make sure you’ve understood it and summarising in your own words before responding. A rough guide that may help is to make sure you’re listening about 80% of the time and speaking about 20%.
Technique 4: Match Confidence with Curiosity
One of the most common misconceptions about assertiveness is that it means being unwilling to change your mind.
The most effective assertive communicators hold their views whilst remaining genuinely curious about other perspectives. They ask questions to understand, and they’re open to new information, even when they start the conversation with a clear position.
A useful example: “I’m concerned this timeline is too aggressive given our resource constraints. Help me understand what I might be missing. What makes you confident we can deliver?”
This is assertive. It’s honest, and it invites dialogue rather than shutting it down.
Technique 5: Use Body Language That Supports Your Words
Communication is physical as well as verbal. Even the clearest, most well-constructed message can be undermined by body language that signals uncertainty or discomfort. Looking down, excessive nodding, fidgeting, and crossing your arms defensively all have the potential to send a different message from the words coming out of your mouth.
Assertive body language is relaxed and open. You’re not trying to dominate the room, but you’re also not trying to make yourself small. Assertive body language may look like:
- Direct eye contact.
- Speaking in a calm voice at an appropriate pace.
- Smooth and unhurried movements.
All of these actions reinforce the message that you’re confident in what you’re saying.
Technique 6: Pause Before You Respond
In charged or difficult conversations, the gap between what someone says and what you say back is important.
Taking a breath before responding, even just a beat, gives your mind a moment to choose a thoughtful response rather than a reactive one. That tiny pause is often what separates assertive communication from a response that veers into aggression or passive-aggression.
These techniques can feel slightly awkward at first, especially if you’re used to communicating differently.
Start with low-stakes situations: practice an ‘I’ statement in a straightforward conversation, set one small limit with a colleague, and notice what happens.
Building Your Assertiveness Practice
Understanding what assertiveness is one thing, but practising it in the real world is another. Assertiveness doesn’t require a complete personality overhaul to achieve, but it does require building some small, consistent habits over time.
Start with self-reflection
Before you can communicate more assertively, it helps to understand where you’re currently getting in your own way. What situations make you most passive? With whom are you least assertive, and why? What do you actually fear will happen if you speak up more directly?
Underneath most passive patterns is a belief that your needs don’t deserve the same weight as everyone else’s. Identifying that belief is the first step to challenging it. You have just as much right to be heard as anyone in the room.
Build through small wins
Don’t start by planning a difficult conversation with the person you find most intimidating about the most charged issue on your plate.
Start small by stating a preference: ‘I’d prefer to meet Tuesday rather than Wednesday.’ Or, perhaps gently offer a different perspective in a meeting: ‘I see it slightly differently…’
Small successes build confidence, and crucially, they show you that the catastrophe you feared rarely materialises. Most of the time, people simply respond to directness with directness.
Remember: clear is kind
There’s a tendency to soften difficult messages to the point where they stop landing. We bury the actual point in so much cushioning that the other person doesn’t really hear it. This can feel kinder in the moment, but it rarely is. Vagueness creates confusion and, at its heart, underestimates the other person’s ability to handle honesty.
Prepare for conversations that feel difficult
For conversations where you know you need to hold your ground or raise something uncomfortable, a small amount of preparation goes a long way. Write out your ‘I’ statement beforehand (remember, action, impact, and need).
Remind yourself: ‘We both matter.’ That’s the mindset you’re walking in with.
Reflect afterwards
After you’ve been assertive, take a moment to reflect. What went well? What would you do differently? Did the outcome you feared actually happen? What did you learn? This kind of reflection accelerates growth far more than just hoping the next conversation will feel easier.
Assertiveness is part of an ongoing journey. Some days it will come more naturally than others, and that’s fine. What matters is the direction of travel.
When Assertiveness Meets Different Personalities
Not everyone responds to directness in the same way, and good assertive communicators recognise that. Part of communicating well is understanding the person in front of you and adapting your approach accordingly without compromising the honesty or clarity of what you’re saying.
When the other person is passive
Your directness might initially feel uncomfortable for them. They may need a little more reassurance that it’s okay to push back or disagree.
Explicitly invite their perspective with statements like ‘I’d really like to hear your thoughts on this’ and give them the time and space to offer it. Don’t mistake silence for agreement.
When the other person is aggressive
The temptation here is to either back down or match their intensity. Neither serves you well. Stay calm, and don’t get drawn into the escalation.
If you need to, simply repeat your position calmly without getting pulled into an argument: ‘I understand you’re frustrated. I’m still not able to do that.’ Consistency and calm are your best tools.
When the other person is passive-aggressive
Indirect communication tends to thrive in silence, so naming it directly is often the most effective response. ‘I’m sensing some frustration. Can we talk about what’s actually going on?’ By doing this, you’re creating space for a more honest conversation.
When the other person is assertive
This is often the most straightforward of all. Two people communicating directly and respectfully can have productive conversations, even about difficult topics. The ease of this kind of exchange is one of the best arguments for developing assertiveness yourself.
Your Voice Deserves to Be Heard
Let’s return to where we started: that moment in the meeting when you had something to say and stayed silent. Or said yes when you needed to say no. Or let something pass because the conversation felt too difficult to open.
Our experience coaching leaders and professionals consistently shows that assertiveness is learnable. Every time you use an ‘I’ statement and every time you speak up with clarity rather than hoping someone will read between the lines, you’re building that muscle and making it easier to be assertive again in the future.
If you’d like support building your assertiveness skills, Cubet’s Personal Development services include confidence-building and assertiveness coaching tailored to your specific context and challenges.
If it’s the deeper mindset beliefs, the ones that quietly keep you stuck in passive patterns, our Mindset, Culture and Business work addresses those underlying barriers directly.
Assertiveness says: ‘We both matter.’ And that’s a message worth practising, starting today.
