ASSERTIVENESS

“İnsanlara adil davranın, ancak onların

da size adil davranmalarını sağlayın.”
Alan Alda
1-HISTORY OF ASSERTIVENESS

 Socrates
 Smith-1975

 Today
2-WHAT IS ASSERTIVENESS?

 Assertiveness is about self

confidence which means having
a positive attitude towards
yourself and others.
 Ten Points about Assertive
Behaviours
1-It depends on expressing yourself
2-Showing respects to others rights
3-Being honest
4-Indirect and certain
5-Mutual equilibrim and benefit is important in
a relationship
6-It is expressing emotions, rights, realities,
thoughts and boundaries by words
7-Using non-verbal comminication for sending
the message
8-It is not universal, it depends on the position
and the individual
9-It is getting social responsibility
10-It is not the nature of the hunamkind, it can
be learned
 Being Assertive

1-Being assertive is focusing on your

goal
2-Being assertive is being self-aware
3-Being assertive is being true to
yourself
4-Being assertive is building self
esteem
5-Being assertive is nurturing yourself.
 3-TYPES OF
ASSERTIVENESS
 Non-assertive behaviour
I am not ok,you are ok
 Assertive behaviour
I am ok,you are ok
 Aggresive behaviour
I am ok,you are not ok
 Manipulative behaviour
I am not ok,you are not ok
Agressive ---Agressive
Aggresive---Passive
Assertive---Passive
 Negative attitude and
passive behaviour
 Lack of self confidence and low self esteem
 Lack of self respect
 Self putdowns
 Negative feelings and thoughts about
yourself
 Feeliings of inferiority compared to others
 Like others to be in control of people and
situations
 Feel guilty towards others
 demotivated
 Negative attitude and
manipulative behaviour
 Lack of self confidence and low self esteem
 Lack of self respect and lack of respect for
others
 Mistrustful and suspicious of others’ motives
 Negative feelings and thoughts about self
and others
 Feel very wary towards others
 Dishonest and indirect
 Twist what others have said
 Undermine others’ self esteem
 Depressed and demotivated
 Negative attitude and
aggressive behaviour
 Lack of self confidence and low self esteem
 Lack of respect towards others
 Put others down
 Feelings of superiority
 Like to be in control of people and situations
 Disinterested in others’ thoughts and feelings
 Feel angry towards others and are quick to blame
them
 Don’t listen to or ask questions
 Dismissive of feedback
 Positive attitude and
assertive behaviour

 Self confidence and high self esteem

 Respect for self and towards others
 Take responsibility for self
 Motivated to do a good job
 İnterested in others’ feelings and
thoughts
 Ask questions
 Honest and direct
 Listen to others
 Ask others for feedback
 4-SKILLS OF
ASSERTIVENESS

a) Broken record
b) Fogging
c) Negative assertion
d) Negative inquiry
e) Free information
f) Self disclosure
g)Workable compromise
 5-ASSERTIVENESS BY
VERBAL AND NONVERBAL
COMMUNICATION
“It ain’t what you say, it is the way that you say it”

 Tonation

‘I will phone you’ – It will be me not any other person

‘I will phone you’ – I will not forget!
‘I will phone you’ – I will not write or visit.
‘I will phone you’ – It will be you,not any other person.

 Faces and the looks

 Eye signal
 Body image
 Personal space
 The gesture
 6-ASSERTIVENESS IN
CULTURES

 ASIAN
Low degree of individualism ,
nonassertive.
 EUROPEAN,AMERICAN

High degree of individualism ,

assertive.
7-HUMAN ASSERTIVE RIGHTS

 The right to express  The right to do anything which

sexuality does not violate the rights of
others
 The right to have
needs and desires  The right to be assertive or
non-assertive
 The right to have
information  The right to make choices
 The right to have  The right to change
goods or services  The right to control over
which have been body,time and possesions
paid  The right to express opinions
 The right to be and beliefs
independent and to  The right to think well of
be left alone oneself
 The right to say no  The right to make requests
 The right to be
treated with respect
8-SAYING ‘YES’ OR ‘NO’
 Why is it difficult to say no?

 If I say no,they may feel hurt or injected

 If I say no this time, they may not like me
anymore
 If I say no this time,they may never ask again
 They won’t take any notice if I say no
 They would say ‘yes’ to me (and so I will feel
guilty if I refuse them)
 I can’t say no, because I feel sorry for them
 How to say ‘no’ assertively?

 Start your reply with a

clear,firm,audible ‘no’
 Do not justify or make excuses.Giving
a reason is different from over-
appologizing
 Feel that you have a right to say no
 Once you have said ‘no’ , do not stay
around waiting to be persuaded to
change your mind.Make a definite
closure by changing the
subject,walking away, continiuing
with what you are doing-whatever is
appropriate
How to say ‘no’ assertively?
 Remember you are saying ‘no’ to that
particular request,not rejecting the
person
 If the request takes you unawares or
you have not sufficent time to think
when asked,you can always say, ‘I will
let you know’ in order to give yourself
time to think about what you want to
say
 Take responsibility for saying no-do not
blame the other person for asking you
 Ask for more information if you need it
in order to decide whether you want to
say ‘yes’ or ‘no’
Why is it difficult to say ‘yes’?

 I don’t deserve it
 They might not really mean it
 I am not really sure that is what I want
 I don’t have enough information
How to say ‘yes’ assertively

 Say ‘yes’ clearly and definitely

 Identify why you would find it difficult
 Examine thoughts realistically and ask
yourself
 Having calarified thughts for yourself
then reaffirm your desire to say ‘yes’
Combining ‘yes’ and ‘no’

 ‘yes’ and ‘no’ may be combined assertively to

define what we want or what our limits are in a
particular situation.
 9-THE IMPORTANCE OF
ASSERTIVENESS IN
ORGANISATIONS
Assertiveness Need to dealing with
 Personal identity  Theirselves

 Wages or salary  The manager to

 Satisfaction from whom they report

 Their colleagues
exercising skills
 Satisfaction from  Their subordinates

helping people  Clients or customers

 Social
environment
 10-ASSERTIVENESS
TRAINING IN WORK PLACE
 Body-language awareness leading
to work body oriented therapies
 Role-plays and then work in
psyhcodrama
 Awareness of other people’s
perceptions and so work in
sensitivity groups and encounter
 Looking at situations in the past
where one was, or was not
assertive and hence traditional
psychoteraphy
 Techniques in Assertiveness
Training
 Verbal communication
 Non-verbal communication
 Anxiety reduction and control
 Anger reduction and control, and
redirection of this energy
 Increase in self esteem
 Awareness of self and others in
interpersonnal situations
 Awareness of social and cultural
rules of behaviour
 Problems in Assertiveness
Training
 The first major problem for assertion
training involves negative evaluations of
assertive people by others
 Confusion between assertion and
aggression
 Problem involves transfer of training,the
difficulty experienced by trainees in
generalising assertive from the training
context to real-life situations
 Finally some of the difficulties in applying
assertion training outside the training
context may be due to intuitive training
procedures that are inadequately based in
research
 The skills of helping the person to commit to
changing his/her behaviour from non-
assertive to assertive.

You will need action planning skills at

this stage of the counselling process.In
particular, you need to help the person
set clear objectives;a mnemonic which
can be useful is SMART.
This stands for:
 Specific
 Measurable
 Achievable
 Realistic
 Time oriented
 TO DECİDE WHEN TO BE
ASSERTİVE
 Do you know really what is the situation?
 How much importance it has for you?
 Will you get what you want?
 Do you want to just express yourself?
 What is your options?
 Do you want an optimistic result?
 Are you ready to be assertive?
 Did you count to the 10?
 Is it beter to wait?
 Will you get anger to yourself, ,f you don’t do anything?
 Have you done your best?
 What are the possible results and risks?
 Will assertiveness cause a change?
Prepared By;
Ahmet Gürbüz
Mehmet Mutlu Bayram
Mustafa Giray Zerey
THANKS FOR YOUR
ATTENTION