Why Confident Professionals Lose Their Voice in English
Confidence speaking English at work has very little to do with how much English you know. I coach senior professionals who write flawless reports, follow every meeting without effort, and still go quiet the moment something matters. Their English is not the problem. Their permission is.
A client of mine, a CFO with years of experience, once told me: “I can speak confidently in my mother tongue, but in English? Forget about it. I feel like I’m auditioning!”
You likely can relate. I know I can. There is a performative quality assigned to communication in a second language that we all feel and continue to feed into.
What linguistic self-esteem actually means
If you can already construct relatively accurate sentences in English, then what’s missing isn’t more grammar practice and more intensive drilling. It’s granting yourself the internal permission to speak with the same authority in English that you have in your first language.
This concept is called linguistic self-esteem. It is the belief that your ideas deserve airtime before you have mentally translated and polished them.
Three signs your confidence, not your English, is the problem
Here’s what it looks like when linguistic self-esteem is missing:
– Over-qualifying every statement. “This may not be the right way to say this, but…”
– Rehearsing sentences internally before speaking, and then losing the thread of the conversation.
– Softening opinions through the use of hedging language and diminutive expressions.
None of these are vocabulary failures. They are all responses to a feeling of being assessed. Now that you can finally name this feeling, you can take steps to lessen it.
A drill for speaking without a disclaimer
This week, in one meeting, give one opinion without a disclaimer in front. No “I think,” no “maybe,” no “this could be wrong, but.” Just deliver the sentence. Then reflect.
Reflection right then in the moment is the most important part. Identify exactly what your thought was and where it came from.
For me, it is usually a nagging voice saying, “Stick to the structures you know,” which causes me to play it safe, keep my point underwhelming, and open the door for everyone else to carry on. “Phew,” the nagging voice returns. “That was close. They don’t realize you’re nervous.”
To hell with your inner voice. Find yours and kill it.
Vinh Giang says, “We become what we practice. So, if you feel shy, it’s because you’ve been practicing shy behaviors for the past 10, 20, 30 years. This is just who you are now. It doesn’t have to be who you are forever.”
Oh, and that CFO I mentioned? He now opens his leadership meetings without a translated script in his head. Nothing changed about his English. He just stopped auditioning.