Introduction

The Communication Playbook

For three years, my jaw didn’t work correctly. Eating anything that required opening my mouth more than two inches (sandwiches, apples, and corn on the cob were all out of the question) resulted in my mandible popping out of place and painfully dislocating. Forget about watching sporting events. I’d forget about this little issue while wildly cheering for the home team after a nearly impossible three-pointer and my jaw would painfully remind me to take the enthusiasm down a notch to a six-inch voice.

This was a direct result of my job. No question about it. Not convenient for someone who talks—a lot—for a living. What was really going on behind the poised, well-spoken, thousand-watt Crest Whitestrips–smile and shellacked anchor hair, was a stressed, anxiety-filled, insecure woman in her early twenties who grinded her teeth subconsciously at night as if to pulverize all her problems away. Even though I was working the morning shift, waking up at 3 a.m. and dead tired by 4 p.m., most nights were spent staring at the ceiling, thinking about the troubles and drama of the day, playing over and over again on an endless loop. The co-anchor, twice my age, wouldn’t talk to me in the commercial break but would pretend to be my friend when the red on-air light was flicked on for tens of thousands of people. I had to continually extract myself gracefully from Eddy, the administrative assistant who talked my ear off while I tried to get work done. (And even worse, all while staring at my boobs.) How could someone supposedly be so well-liked by viewers to be named “best morning anchor” by the local newspaper, yet go home in tears nearly every day feeling like a nobody because of the awkward/difficult/emotionally charged conversations that took place inside the office? Or how, being the new kid at work, 15 years younger than everyone else, makes me a prime target for jealousy, trash-talk, and drama. Or that I’d be that person at a networking mixer hiding in a bathroom stall, petrified. Neither school nor industry conferences had prepared me for the reality of an office and the daily interpersonal challenges I had to face. You may know the feeling. If you work with people (and who doesn’t?), you’ve probably found yourself in intense office settings trying to figure out how to navigate situations you never dreamed of encountering.

It took four moves across the country, working as the first and only full-time Asian American anchor in three different markets in an incredibly competitive, often cruel industry to finally figure out what was wrong. In the business of communication, I was communicating all wrong! On the air, I could make magic. Not only did I have a knack for convincing reluctant people to go on camera and talk to me, they often spilled their guts, pouring out their hearts, and telling me everything about their lives, just short of their bank account numbers. Even an entire auditorium full of rowdy, puberty-stricken, angsty teens at my public appearances would sit still and listen as I made a story come to life. Yet in the office, I couldn’t get the attention and respect I knew I deserved.

It turns out the intangible skills I honed out in the world as a reporter made for an excellent training ground in mastering the micro interactions of the workplace and in my career. Interacting with everyone from suspected child molesters to rural farmworkers and Hollywood starlets, coupled with the inherent talent of growing up and dealing with a Chinese Tiger Mom and dad who culturally didn’t know how to communicate with their very Americanized daughter, prepared me for almost everything that came my way.

It just took me a long time to figure it all out. And in this book, I hope to share all my hard-earned lessons with you.

Your workplace may be an interpersonal battlefield and it’s likely not getting any less complicated. Along with competition and predatory behavior, there’s a new online dynamic to contend with as well. Status updates and ideas spread at the speed of light on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and what seems like a new social network that pops up every other week. But so does the hate, judgment, negativity, and all the behaviors that rear their ugly heads out from behind a computer screen.

Take Carol, who always tattles about your workplace performance to the boss because she wants your job. Or, the room full of high-powered doctors or executives at an end-of-year work party you want to rub elbows with, but are too intimidated to even approach. Then there’s finding a way to gracefully recover from totally flubbing a lecture in front of three dozen colleagues because your PowerPoint presentation crashed. We haven’t even gotten to the World Wide Web yet either, where it takes just seconds for someone to Google your name and a few more to spew out some nasty trolling remarks meant to hurt your feelings and get in the way of your success.

How are you supposed to move up the ladder, when all of these factors are trying to keep you down?

As women, I know we’re constantly being told to “speak up,” “lean in,” and be a “badass,” and to go “unf**k” ourselves and represent the hashtag #MeToo movement. We absolutely should. We must! But we have to execute these things in the right way. Here’s a secret: you don’t have to be the most talented, the smartest, the most attractive, or even the most skilled person at your job to get what you want out of your career and in life. I’m definitely not any of those, and have a very mediocre SAT score, C chemistry grades, and remedial math classes to prove that! (Being promoted at almost every job I’ve had has nothing to do with knowing the square root of pi.)

So, let’s do it better. In this book, you’ll learn the hard-earned skills of mastering communication with the world and with yourself. With the tools I provide you, you’ll be able to tackle it all. Whether you’re fresh out of college, accepting your first job at a law firm, or a seasoned manager ready for a new career breakthrough, you’ll learn how to master the basic interactions nobody taught you in corporate training—or even talks about, period. You’ll learn that these “micro” interactions are what actually build our reputations and credibility and ultimately shape our careers. Each chapter will take you through one of the most common workplace challenges and show you how to use communication to successfully navigate that challenge. The right kind of communication will create new opportunities, empower you, and give you the self-assuredness needed to accomplish whatever your goals are in your career—all without years of having to wear a dorky dental night guard like I did.

So, are you ready? Let’s dive in!