1:1 with my boss, one of the areas of improvement was: “be more vocal”.

Being an immigrant who struggles a lot with the language barrier is just super hard to digest this. I do my best, he doesn’t know how hard is keeping a Google Translate tab open on my browser all day long, he doesn’t know when people look to you because you sound “funny”. Just wanted to vent it, and say for all the leaders out there, if you want us to be more vocal, give us a chance to be heard with our own voice and truth

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Right?! Why can’t we tell people: “be quieter”. The speed, volume, and performance that it requires to fight to be heard in these settings is tiring.

likeuplifting

I've been told to be quieter...

I’m sorry you’re in this situation; I’ve managed a number of people where English isn’t their first language. I always try to make the time to do mock walkthroughs of their presentations before big meetings to give feedback and an opportunity for practice.

likeuplifting

I appreciate your support. We really need people like you.

Are there ways you can be more communicative via written forms? Eg, having greater ownership of slides, etc

Im also an immigrant and English is not my first language, my biggest leap was when I understood that there’s no such a thing as “broken” English, it’s just different ways to use language to communicate. I stop giving a crap about my accent, I notice some of the best creatives where also inmigrants who knew that their ideas were louder than their accents. If they gonna judge you while you’re making an effort, you are in the wrong place.

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i feel you, as an immigrant this is one thing i cant wash away. i cant wash away my accent, color of my skin. be it at work, relationships. its a white mans world.

and im sorry

I struggled with this too. I was even told that I couldn’t take leadership roles because of this. English is my second language and I stuttered growing up. What my employers didn’t know was how hard I tried, how hard I practiced and how much I’ve grown. I pushed myself, joined debate clubs, model un, took improv and public speaking classes to be better, only to be told that I need to be more vocal and own the room. It’s pretty insidious to measure someone’s competence and leadership ability by how much we speak, how loud we speak and how we speak with conviction. A good chunk of the time, I hear mostly empty words repeated over and over to fill up a void. Are we still agreeing not to see that the emperor is not wearing any clothes?

I wish you the best of luck but it might be worth considering what growth opportunity you’ll truly have in an environment that don’t hear or see you, that will require your added efforts to acquiesce your value. Does it reinforce a system that haven’t even given it a second to see the root cause of why they don’t perceive you as being vocal?

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