Speaking and Communicating Podcast

do that we have courage to put faith in positive outcomes. We don't just say things to ourselves like, oh, I'm not going to bother, she won't listen, they'll never change, he doesn't care, right? Because the power of one person to change the world is well documented. Welcome back to the Speaking and Communicating podcast. I'm your host Roberta. If you are looking to improve your communication skills,
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both professionally and personally, this is the podcast you should be tuning into. And by the end of this episode, please log on to iTunes and Spotify and leave us a rating and a review. Let's get communicating!
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My guest today has written a book titled, Communicate with Courage, taking risks to address the hidden challenges that we face when you communicate. Michelle Gladio, who is the president of Gladio Consulting, hailing all the way from Indiana, right next to, I'm in Chicago, by the way, is here to talk to us about not only her book, but the work she does with college students, leaders, and her corporate.
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clients and how crucial communication skills are. And before I go any further, please help me welcome her to the show. Hi, Michelle. Hi, thanks. So nice to see you. It's so wonderful to see you finally. I've received a copy of your book. I read it and I'm excited to be discussing it today amongst your other things that you do. But before we get into that, please tell us a little bit about yourself. Sure, I'm one of those lucky people who has a job that I love and I sort of invented it.
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As many of us do, I went different ways in life, but I really enjoyed human resources, organizational psychology, instructional design, and just getting a group of adult learners in a room or virtually together online and deciding on a topic related to communication and then teaching it in ways that could be hopefully immediately useful to their life. So I started out studying.
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organizational psychology at Purdue University. And then through my career, worked in HR and different training departments. In 2004, I decided to go for it, Roberta, and I launched my business, my consulting business, named it Gladio Consulting to honor my deceased parents who really believed in the value of education and that that is the one thing that no one can take from us is our learning. So.
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We've set out to make them proud and luckily have built a nice large client base. And we travel around the United States with one-on-one executive coaching and doing training seminars in communication topics, as well as some strategic planning. Twenty-five years, I would say, since I started in the business. And over the last four or five years, dedicated myself to making some quiet time happen, to put thoughts in a short book that I hope will be a handbook.
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of sorts, a guide for adults of all ages who want to be their best self as a communicator. I'm amazed that you started 25 years ago when this wasn't common. At least this type of business model of leadership coaching wasn't as common. How challenging was that for you? Well, I didn't charge for the coaching for a long time because what was happening is I was known for designing and delivering training in conflict management or presentation skills or change management.
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workplace behavior kind of trainings. And what would happen is whoever hired me are the most senior leader in the room. We would develop a relationship and they would bring a lot of workplace challenges and problems to me that would relate to how they were leading or perhaps dysfunction in their employees behaviors. You know, there was a lot of like standing outside by my car for an hour while coaching and then taking notes and then sending them an idea for a goal plan later.
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by email and I did that long enough until I finally realized like, hold up, this is all vital and valuable guidance and it's called executive coaching and I should start charging for that. So I've been doing it probably since I was a kid, caring about communication and wanting to offer advice. And then it took me a little while to realize that's a whole different arm of the business. What is it about communication gives you this cause even talking about it, you have the spark, you have this light.
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In you, what is it about communication gets you so excited? I can't think of any other variable in our lives, our personal lives and professional lives that equates to living a happy fulfilled life any more than communication. So the better we can get at it, the more simple and joyful life becomes less complicated. And I think we're all out to try to lower stress and make the most of our time here on Earth.
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At least the reason I think I'm here on the planet is to help people to do that in more professional and positive and polished ways. There's a lot of difficult things we have to communicate about. That's the truth for all of us. Why not read a book? Why not attend a seminar? Why not work with a coach? Why not get some of these ideas, as you know, that I call pro moves? Why not work on building our pro moves? And I know you do some research as well in this regard.
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What have you found, especially when people leave work environments, what is the number one reason that they... The number one reason, yeah, that we've found has been their relationship with their direct supervisor. So there have been a lot of studies that show people aren't leaving to make a few dollars or a few thousand dollars more per year, per hour. They're not leaving because the work is hard. They're leaving because they don't feel a strong connection with the person who...
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is supposed to be there mentoring, guiding, delivering performance reviews, helping them set goals for personal and professional growth. It's tough to find great supervisors, but the good news is those skills can be developed. They certainly can indeed. Which is the work that you're consulting from does they are four main things at least I'm sure there's more that you said your corporate clients usually ask for. The first one is high performance.
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What goes into a team being a high performing team? Well, I think that there needs to be a mutual understanding of the mission and the vision of the organization or of the team and a deeper knowing of how the work impacts others' lives. And with every job, we can find that. Whatever we're doing, we can think about how do my unique gifts come into play here and find some way to make sure that we polish our work.
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so that we're proud of it, and we see that it changes lives in some way. And that could be as simple as getting the numbers right before we pass the report on to the next person. Does that impact a life? Of course it does. So as we give and receive feedback in the workplace, we can achieve higher levels of performance. If we study just that, how are we coming across to others? So another big part of high performance, I'd say, is self-knowledge. Know your strengths. Know your weaknesses. They are welded.
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together, whatever you are best at is likely to be something you overuse. And in that overuse, income, those hidden challenges sometimes and facing them can create fear. So I wanted to write the book to help people take an honest look at themselves and identify where do I start to feel a little fearful? Where, where am I not stretching myself as a communicator? Because
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Perhaps I'm defining to be right, you know, I just like to be right. And so people can't disagree with me and win. Hello, that's, that should be my middle name because I'm very competitive and always working on being more collaborative. Um, is it that you're hiding something like you're hiding from risk because you don't want anyone to see that you're not perfect or a perfect communicator. So the book goes through four hidden challenges and in a loving and lighthearted way.
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brings the reader along for the journey so they can see in my own life and my clients' lives and friends and family. I write about real people and I prefer to do that rather than case studies because those stories tend to be more colorful and I think more applicable to people's lives. And more relatable. I think we remember things that are more relatable rather than the conceptual, oh, you know, Coca-Cola does this and then Pepsi did that.
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Whereas when you talk about one of your clients and the experience you've had, I can relate to that a lot more. Terrific, that's what I was going for, that's for sure. And then what makes a leader excel? Cause we talk a lot about leadership here. Oh my gosh, so much, right? People who step over the line from employee to leader, and then they begin leading sometimes their friends or previous coworkers, it's a mental challenge. It's a mindset challenge. Some of the things you can bring with you are humility.
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mixed with confidence. You need both sides of the coin when you're a leader. You need to be assertive. It's good to be kind and think about how your words are received. I would say a good leader, an excellent leader is always looking for feedback. Even if they don't agree, they should be easy to approach with genuine constructive feedback. And I love to teach leaders and see them grow in praise skills, in the ability to notice when others are trying.
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not just succeeding and knocking it out of the park, but trying to get better. And I think a good leader should be right there with their employees or coworkers saying, hey, you didn't get it this time, but I see the effort, keep the effort up. I know that means a lot to me in my learning experiences. You know, I'm kind of a beginner musician. I've just signed up for some voice lessons to learn to sing better. First lesson was two nights ago, half an hour.
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And I stood in line with all these little kids, just waiting for my teacher to come out at the music academy to get me. And I went into the room and I was nervous. And I thought, what is she gonna have me do? She played some piano and had me just sing a few things and gave me some breathing exercises. The point being, I'm there in my humility, admitting that I still have more to learn. So somebody who wants to be a good leader of others, I keep putting myself in a position where I am the beginner. And that helps me remember.
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what it is like to not have all the answers. And leaders aren't expected to have all the answers. Sometimes I think that's the myth they buy into, thinking they should present themselves that way. But they're not expected to have all the answers. And it's more difficult not to have all the answers when you are the minority, as you know, in the population, or you are some way different from the people who possess most of the power in an organization.
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So for that reason, one of the types of training that my team and I love to write and present, healthy workplaces, inclusion matters. What is the law behind how we treat people in the United States in our employment practices here? And then how can we go above and beyond that to try to not just be careful about illegal discrimination, but to try to be more inclusive and interested in others' concepts, ideas, backgrounds, diverse thoughts.
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And then you touched on earlier something which is you have your friends, your colleagues in one team, you're all on the same path. And then suddenly you get promoted. So now how do you make the switch from, Hey, Michelle, you, you know, you're one of us to Michelle is the boss now. Let's listen to her. Yes. Well, and it was more fun to not be the boss in many ways, because then you can complain about the bosses and you can complain about the company.
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and complain about management. One of the normal things that humans do, and then all of a sudden that line, somebody steps over that line and now they're supervising folks who used to be their friends. It's difficult and it normally brings some healthy conflict. I guess one tip I would give our readers and listeners would be to acknowledge the weirdness. I've noticed that when I say like, you know Roberta, something seems a little bit off with us today, is everything okay? Have I done anything to offend you?
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And not that that has to do with boss, employee, or it could. Just to mention, there's some weirdness here. I think it really can reduce the stress in the situation. So I would recommend that the new supervisor take the initiative to say to their friends, this is maybe a bit awkward, especially if one of the friends or coworkers tried for the job and didn't get it, which is very common, right? Yeah. I'm going to rely on you. I respect you. I know how good you are at this.
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I hope to be a really good boss and to help you shine. And I know this is a little awkward. The takeaway there, the pro move is, the leader speaks what others only think, right? With diplomacy and ideally emotional intelligence, but it's okay to say, here's what's new and we're gonna adjust to this together. I hope you'll still give me your honest feedback and I will always be fair in my interactions with you. And I hope to bring more information from top management to our team.
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Right. If you could promise and do your best to be a good advocate for the team would be perhaps another pro move. So the leader must address the elephant in the room. Once they do, yes. Let's talk about communicate with courage, taking risks to overcome the four hidden challenges. So first of all, Michelle, why is it risky?
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Well, because it means engaging in a new mindset or behavior, something that's challenging for us, that doesn't come easy, without any guarantee of how the outcome will turn out. So we might decide to take the risk and engage and then be rejected or not be heard, or our opinion might not be respected, or...
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as what happens to me often when I'm presenting, people, audiences will laugh and I'll stop and say, even on the mic, like that, no, that wasn't a joke. I'm serious about that. And they keep laughing. And I think, okay, well, I took a risk and shared something about myself I didn't think was funny. Maybe there's some humor in it. The risk is to lower the wall and be vulnerable and be seen for who we are and take appropriate risks so that we're not sharing too much too soon.
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And the book is written, I hope, to be both timely and timeless. So whatever someone is facing a difficult conversation or communication planning, they can figure out what's stopping them and then follow the instructions or the ideas in the book to overcome that. Right. Risk is about new. Risk is about either scary or it's new. And it's worth taking more risks that we think through when it aligns with our values.
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If I need to stick up for myself, if I'm not being respected, that's a good time to take a risk, if possible. If I could stick up for someone else, improve their circumstances, offer them feedback that might be valuable, they may or may not want it, but I could take the risk to ask, and it might turn into a beautiful friendship. So there are all these opportunities. I don't know, I see them, and I want your listeners to see them.
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They're all around because we make thousands of decisions every day, and so many of those decisions are about communication. Most of us, I think, just walk on by, and we might notice an opportunity to use our voice, but talk ourselves out of it. I think that's a bit of a waste of a life. So I'm not saying always be striving or be taking uncalculated risks, but let's take some intelligent risks that can better our lives.
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I think it certainly is, like I said, it's a risk. We have that fear of being vulnerable or the case you just given of helping someone at a grocery store. Sometimes you can look at them and think, I think I can help that person. But the fear of them saying, I don't need your help or however, the rejection or I should have just minded my own business and you go away with your car. You know what I mean? That is a good point. Yeah. So we might be rejected.
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I think that's perhaps we might be fired, we might be made fun of, and I certainly don't want anyone to jeopardize their security or safety by taking a communication risk. I think in the book I wrote about risks not to take, one of the stories in the short, each chapter is short, ten chapters, but one of them is risks not worth taking. And I open with, you really want to give a toast at your friend's wedding. Okay, that'd be a good risk to take.
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drink four beers or four glasses of wine and then do the toast, not a good risk worth taking, right? That's not the right risk for you. Like you said, emotionally intelligent risks. That's right. And that's rather new term, you know, this is a pretty exciting time to be alive. It's only been coined in the 1990s, this term emotional intelligence, we've only had it even in our vernacular for a couple decades. But those who are interested in
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learning about emotional intelligence, they're better negotiators, they're better feedback givers, better writers, better public speakers, better moms and dads, significant others, brothers, sisters, daughters and sons. We do better in all of our roles in life when we start to look at, do I handle my emotions intelligently and where and with whom do I want to take some risks to convey them?
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I think we're all going to be learning about communication forever until our last day on the planet. And we'll also all be trying to become more emotionally intelligent. Monitoring. What am I feeling now? How can I honor it? What's the appropriate way to deal with this? So it doesn't leak out on undeserving people in our communication, right? And then take it a step further. What is the person I'm communicating with likely feeling? Or what have they told me they're feeling? And do I need to?
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revise my approach in some way to respect what they are feeling. I mean, it sounds like a lot of work and sometimes it is more work and you end up more successful and proud of yourself. That one of thinking of the other person, not only does it apply professionally, but personally as well. We are starting to be at an age where we say
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I'm just expressing myself. I'm expressing myself and not even taking time to consider. Yes, it's okay to express yourself, but could you have used a different approach? Could you have taken into account how your words, the way you phrase them could hurt Michelle or you just expressing myself and just write up. And yeah, well, I have to be honest with you that guess what? The way you're being honest with them is damaging your relationship. So that's not okay. We have to think about both being direct.
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and aim for directness whenever possible, but mix in some empathy for how the words, whether in writing, text, email, letter, whatever, or verbally, how will that be received? So in my executive coaching practice, I meet with leaders once a month for a couple hours, and then I take a day or two to create a one-page goal plan for them. One page because everybody's busy, and it will have four or five. Yes, the 30-day one.
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Yeah, I'll have four or five next steps and I ask them to bless it because I'm not their boss. So once they bless it and say, I will do these things, it's pretty cool. They go do those things. And I've asked quite a few lately, hey, for the month of June, once a week or something until I see you, after you communicate with someone, pause and document, how did you leave them feeling? Your best guess. How did you leave that person feeling when you got off?
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the Teams or Zoom meeting, when you left the in-person meeting, when you got off the phone, after they read your text or email. Describe the emotions that you likely helped to create in that other human. And it's been quite eye-opening for not only them, but for me to go through that exercise of how am I leaving people feeling. And sometimes we advance to a more challenging exercise. It's on our website.
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wonderful question and answer, coaches corners with our readers. And one of the free tools there is the feedback challenge and anyone can download it. And it's a one page e-fillable document that you hand out or email out to colleagues and friends. And it simply says, I'm participating in getting some feedback for my growth. And the question is, what's something that you like about communicating with me and what is something
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that you feel like could do differently or better. It's e-fillable, it's easy peasy, downloadable and free. And you can send that out to maybe a dozen people. You can't make anyone respond, please don't. Please don't make it a, you must do this. Leave it up to them. And then it comes across as much more sincere and it's less scary for them. And you receive these notes coming back to you, both with praise and hopefully constructive criticism.
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Some folks are a little better at giving that than others. But you're gonna take that with a grain of salt and you'll find some gems in there. Some wonderful things that make you sit taller and I always view it as like it's a bouquet of flowers almost, these nice pieces of praise, different from different people said in different ways. And then there's the other side of it. Hey Michelle, here's what I think you could do better as a communicator. And I read those and take them to heart and then.
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I can make those changes if I feel they're appropriate with that person who gave me feedback. Brave people do this. Certainly, the risk again, yes. So let's talk about them. The first one is hiding from risk, avoidance. I sometimes think I am guilty of conflict avoidance, but how would you describe it? Sure. Hiding from risk is being afraid that somebody will see our weaknesses, our scars, where we're a beginner.
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where we're not sure of ourselves. And so to overcome that, get clear on your values and then decide when it involves your values, you're going to take a risk. For example, if I see racism, sexism, ageism, ableism, if I see discrimination happening in front of me, I don't have to go home and think about it and then go back to work the next day and say something. I've made a deal with myself. I'm gonna try to be diplomatic, but I'm gonna say something as soon as possible in that moment.
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such as, you might not have meant it this way, but here's how that sounded to me, this kind of thing. So figure out a couple of values, what you stand for, and then plan to speak for that. You can also, to overcome hiding from risk, you can do a little more public speaking and put yourself out there and let other human eyes look at you as you present to them and that will quickly help you become more comfortable in your own skin. It's not immediate.
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But every time we do any public speaking, we gain self-esteem and it's never perfect. But there's a section in the book about how we can get better at that. So for each of the risks, you have what you call a pro move. So a pro move for hiding from risk is public speaking. It is, it is. Or think about, here's a pro move to overcome hiding from risk. Think about what you lose when you decide not to get in the game. And as one of my coworkers, Tim said, you know, it's regret.
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Sometimes when he doesn't take a risk as a communicator, then he realizes he has to live with the regret because these opportunities, sometimes they are once in a lifetime. Every day is different and no situation remains the same. So you can choose fear or regret. You're probably gonna face one of the two. I personally don't like the feeling of regret. So I'd rather give it my best shot and be imperfect as a communicator than miss an opportunity when it aligns with my values. You've regret certainly is the worst feeling.
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Number two, defining to be right. That's putting too much stock into our assumptions and just being so sure that we're right. And we might be right, but there's often room for understanding a subject or topic more deeply if we ask others what their experience has been and listen humbly. So defining to be right, we can. A pro move would be to notice role model communicators in your own lives who get very good at listening.
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and you're not afraid to give them feedback because they aren't a know-it-all. And to avoid being a know-it-all, we have to be a humble question asker. Yep, not assume that you know it all, like we mentioned earlier for sure. And then rationalizing the negative. That relates to choosing or forgetting that we choose our mindset and choosing pessimism. So overcoming rationalizing has to do with
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taking a chance to say the hard thing, to apologize, negotiate, ask for help, say I love you, ask for a raise, do a performance review that's really got some hard things to say in it. But as we do that, we have courage to put faith in positive outcomes. We don't just say things to ourselves like, oh, I'm not gonna bother, she won't listen. They'll never change, he doesn't care, right? Because...
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The power of one person to change the world is well documented. And with every opportunity that we take to communicate at our best ability, ripple effects can happen. So here's another opportunity to put some faith in possible positive outcomes and shoot for those. And at least if it doesn't go the way you want, you can put your head on the pillow at night and sleep better knowing that you didn't talk yourself out of trying. And I think when we align with pessimism,
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we often talk ourselves out of some beautiful opportunities. Yes, and usually you find the pessimist assumption you have is was not even the truth to begin with. And often, yes, and it can be hard to work with or live with someone who is dedicated to pessimistic thinking. It can be a real drag on the energy in a relationship. For sure, and then the last one, settling for good enough.
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Settling for Good Enough is about making satisfying decisions, like you figure out what's the minimum that will work here, and then you give the minimum as a communicator. One of our training participants wrote me a lovely letter after we did a 90 minute book workshop. And so I brought in some materials that just highlighted information from each of the 10 chapters, and we gave each chapter about nine to 10 minutes. Well, afterward, she wrote me a letter saying,
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friend passed away four weeks ago and she was 22. How sad. Lifelong friends. And she said her mother, my friend's mother asked me to do the eulogy. And I was very afraid because of my emotions. My emotions were running very high. At the same time, I was worried that I wouldn't do my friend justice. But I had been reading your book and discussing it with coworkers. And I thought if I don't try, then I am hiding from the risk.
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that I might cry in front of people or that it might not be good enough as I look back at it, but I could give it my all and that would help me stop hiding from risk. And also, I could settle for good enough, the fourth hidden challenge, by showing up and offering my condolences to the family or giving them a card. Not the same though as living the rest of her life remembering that she stood and spoke about her best friend at the memorial service. So she said,
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It was a lot of people and I went for it. And she said people thought it was great that she had one sleepless night or she'd already had one sleepless night, replaying it in her head, wondering if she did, said everything she could say and if it was good enough, but she said she's practicing reassuring herself that at least she wasn't settling for good enough and she brought her best self to the table. How about that inspiring? Her name's Elise and she's in economic development.
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associate in Fort Wayne, Indiana, where I'm from. That is amazing. Changing lives, the impact. Yeah, and that's one of the toughest gigs as a public speaker is a eulogy. I did not eulogize my mother. I was 19 then, and I don't think I was brave enough to put my hand up and tell the Catholic Church I would like to speak. But then I sat at her service and thought, no one is saying anything about her personally.
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This is not as good as it could be, nor is it as healing. So my dad passed away when I was in my mid-20s, and I was braver then. And I went and spoke with the church where the funeral would be held and said, I intend to do the eulogy. And my brother joined me and spoke after me. And it wasn't perfect, and I didn't even have all my words together until that morning. And I decided, I'm just gonna write him a letter, and that really helped. I started with, dear dad, I want to tell you. And I recommend that to anyone who has
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something they need to present, you could just start with, I want to tell you that, and then go back after you write what you want to tell that person or that audience and cross out that part. Like intro without saying, I am here to tell you that. And it went pretty well. And I remember my brother, older brother Mark kind of climbed up the steps at the lectern on the altar. And as I was getting my papers and leaving and he was coming up to speak, he kind of whispered to me, you're a tough act to follow. And I thought.
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You know, that means a lot from an older sibling. That means a lot from an older sibling. But it wasn't perfect. I still think of things I could have, should have said, would have, should have, could have, but I'm really glad I put my hand up and said I want to speak. It was just important not to settle for good enough. And also just on that perfect thing, and because you've said it more than once, that's what a lot of people shy away from public speaking. They think it's supposed to be perfect. A speech is not supposed to be perfect. The audience, whether it's
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or 200 or 2000. We don't even care if you mess up the words. We don't care if you forget what you were saying and think, well, I have to come back to that. What we're reading is your overall energy and most especially your body language. Does it look like you want to be there? And God forbid, it always kills me inside when someone gets up to speak and says, well, I'm very nervous. I don't want to be here doing this. Don't mention it.
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No! Call your friend and tell your friend or family member that. That's secret. And the reason that's secret is because if you speak those words, true as they may be, many people in the audience feel your dislike for the situation and your nervousness. And now you have transferred it to all of us because we are living through you vicariously. That's a little secret I will tell my co-workers.
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I'm nervous about that. I have a keynote coming up in two days at my alma mater at Purdue University about this book for 250 women. And I'm getting mentally prepared for this, knowing that when I step off that dang stage, Roberta, there's going to be something I think, oh, I forgot to say this. I messed up this pronunciation or whatever it is. And they might not even remember that. They're going to remember my overall joy in participating.
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And be with them. Yeah, for sure. I will practice. I will practice. And I have practiced. And that's a big part of it, too. Rehearsal, you know, and getting feedback throughout your life. So every time we can get in any body of water and swim, we become a little bit of a stronger swimmer. Same deal with public speaking. For sure. There is an eyeshadow story that your neighbor, look at you looking down at you. We were talking about how.
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Sometimes it's the approach, but the message gets across. If it's a tough conversation, please tell us that story. I like it. Well, my favorite color is the color of the book. Yes. This teal. And I don't know, I was 12 or something and I was getting a ride to ballet class. And I thought, I'm going to use my new blue eyeshadow. And I put it on from lid to eyebrow. Boom. She was an older, really cool, sweet neighbor.
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And I looked up to her and I got in her car and she looked at me and I looked at her and she said, did you get some new eyeshadow? And I thought, uh oh, no. Oh no, it doesn't look right. And it wasn't that a nice way to say it. Wasn't that, I said, yes, do you think it's too much? And she said, well, you know, I think she might've said like, I think you're already pretty without makeup, but I have some tissues. But that's so beautifully said, dude. I have some tissues.
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So I sat there and you know I have some tissues in my purse so I took some tissues and she saved me a little embarrassment. I looked like a clown. I'm still not good at putting on makeup. Right? In such a kind way. She wasn't malicious about it and I think that's when a lot of the time when you say I'm being honest that's what we're missing. Yes, can I give you some feedback? Get ready. Mean. Those people are manipulative. They are not emotionally intelligent and it's mean.
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So sometimes we have to think about, is this more about them or is this more about me? Do they have my best interest at heart? And that was an example of a nice person in the neighborhood who had my best interest at heart. So that you don't embarrass yourself. At the same time, she knew that something had to be said. I thought it was great. Oh, blue eyeshadow. Michelle, as I was saying, I'm conflict-avoidant. It's still something I'm a work in progress on.
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You wrote a love letter to conflict, which I thought was beautiful on page 85 of the book. Would you like to read that for us? I would be honored. This is what I did my master's work in when I was asked to choose a topic for my master's degree to study and research. I chose conflict. I struggle with it. I can be too competitive. You can be too avoidant. Most of us fall into some trap. Here's what I said.
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This love letter illustrates what healthy conflict can do for us. Dear constructive conflict, we've known you all our lives. We watched our elders acknowledge that you're vital to communication or refuse to. You are always present in our homes and schools. You will always be part of our work lives and professional relationships. You help us find our beliefs and push us to lift our voices for causes that matter. You reveal others' unique positions when we're brave enough to listen. Without you,
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We'd never admit that we see the world from one limited perspective, our own. Because of you, we've learned our way is not the only way. There's often more than one way. You remind us that those we see as dead wrong or out to get us may have positive intentions. You bring anguish at times, anger and shouting, but you should not be confused with abusive communication. You have the power to restore harmony.
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You allow emotional release when we can't find a solution and tears arrive. You encourage us to find coaches and counselors to guide us through the rough waters. You help us identify our purpose. You encourage tough discussions that lead to higher ground with coworkers, friends, enemies, strangers, and families. You're inescapable, a worthy puzzle that requires brain and heart working together to solve. You shape our workplace culture.
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You shape our family dynamics. You're never the same thing twice. You keep us growing as communicators and we're grateful. Love, Michelle. That was so beautifully said. And the personification of conflict, that was absolutely amazing. I'm glad you like it. I love it. I want to continue to study it. And I appreciate being a person folks can call about it. It certainly is a big one. Like you said, you know, some of us,
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to compare some of us avoidant. There's a beautiful story told about your mom where you came to realize that it's not me versus you, but us versus the disagreement. I remember there was a marriage counselor who said, you can tell if couples would last based on how they fight, whether they fight each other or they're the married couple fighting the issue outside the house.
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Yes, right. And mom, my mom and dad did fight a lot. I now remember putting that in the book. They did fight a lot. They were married 47 years. How could you not? I mean, I don't know. I thought they were my siblings. I loved them to death. Until death did them part. So they were in it for the long haul, but they would argue and I was a sensitive kid and you know, very sensitive to communication. Still am. They have yelling fights and I would
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be upset and maybe crying in my room. And they were trying to get to the best place they could be and they were committed to each other, but they argued. And my mom came into my room once and said, hey, Michelle, I know that's hard to hear when your dad and I disagree, but remember, there's nobody else we would rather be fighting with. When we have to work something out, we're not going to push it under the rug and you'll be here sometimes to hear the arguments, but we remain committed.
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and we would rather be arguing with each other than anyone else. She was humorous like that. My first heartbreak, same bedroom, she came and sat on my bed when I was a teenager. I felt like my world was ending. I had never experienced... I thought we'd get married, my high school boyfriend and I. And when it ends, you feel like your heart is being ripped apart. It was. And she comes and sits down and listens and says, Well honey, this is going to happen about six or seven more times.
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And so feel better because this is just the first heartbreak. What? That's not going to make me feel better. She was right. She was saying, it seems like the end of the world. But I think what she meant is people recover from heartbreak. You'll love again. And then know that if that doesn't work out, you'll recover from heartbreak and you'll love again. I guess she expected a lot of courage.
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from me as a communicator and she also demonstrated it. So I think a lot of the book is based on what Rosemary Gladio taught me. She certainly did. And that is courage. Like Jim Rohn, Tony Robbins' mentor said, when you block the lab out and you put up this wall, you block the hurt, sorry. If you block the lab too, the wall just blocks everything. It blocks everything. It doesn't penetrate the lab and the heart is blocked. It doesn't work that way. So don't put up the wall.
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you'll be able to love again. One last thing, Michelle, before you go, you say you detest the term soft skills, which is funny because we talk about them so much on this show. Our conversation has been about courageous communication. What about this theme soft? I don't get why people refer to things related to giving, receiving feedback, presentation skills, impressive ethical leadership, dealing with diversity and trying to welcome inclusion.
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What about change, change management? What about this seems soft? I am sticking up for my profession or in organizational communication in studying how communication can improve lives and saying, I don't think it's soft. I think it's actually something that requires real mental toughness and an open heart. And serious work. So there's nothing softer about serious work. Yes, but I think I'm a family of electrical engineers who when I announced, I will be going to college to study.
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organizational psychology and communication, they said, oh, soft skills? Not a real science? Like, no, it's a real science. It's just a less predictable science. Less visible. I think they want something tangible, like, you know, the electric wires and the... Sodium plus chloride equals salt. Sodium chloride. But when I go to an organization to do a climate assessment and see how the team is feeling, I can go back a month later and job satisfaction rates can change. Humans are changing variables,
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sodium and chloride. So that doesn't mean it's soft though, right? Thank you for bringing that up. Point, point, point. Certainly not soft. Being a change agent. Michelle, this has been an amazing conversation. I really enjoyed talking to you. Me too. Can we stay in touch after this? For sure. And if you ever wanted your part too, I'm interested. Absolutely, yes. I've had a guest return three times. So please, you most welcome. You are now a friend of the show. Okay, okay, super. And Chicago to Fort Wayne, three hours, so you never know when we might.
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We will have lunches right on the board of our state. Congratulations on more than 130 podcast episodes and shining your light to educate so many listeners. Michelle, I appreciate your kind words. Thank you so much. I hope you know how much that means to me. Thank you, Michelle. And before you go, where can we find you? I know where I'm going to connect with you, but for listeners, we can make a connection with you.
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You can find us at gladioconsulting.com, G-L-A-D-I-E-U-X, like X-Ray. And there's just a ton of resources there. My phone number, our email address, you can get a hold of us there. Or you can reach me at michelle at gladioconsulting.com. I hope folks will go check out the book. I did the audible recording and that required courage because that was a first for me to narrate a book. So I personally narrated the audible book if folks prefer to listen rather than to hold a book.
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Wow, I'm going to go get an audible now because I already have the hard copy. I'm not saying it's professional narration, but it was the very best I could do and I'd be interested in any feedback. I'm on it. Thank you so much because I've really enjoyed the book as well. Communicate with courage. Thank you so much, Michelle Gladio, President of Gladio Consulting. This has been an amazing conversation and we will continue to stay in touch. Thank you for being here today.
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