Omnichannel - How to Use Silence as a Leadership Tool | Emotional Intelligence in Business

Episode Date: September 10, 2025

Send us a textIn this video, we talk about the overlooked power of silence in leadership, sales, and client relationships, especially for service-based business owners.We explore how speaking less can actually increase your authority, why over-talking is often driven by low-level anxiety, and how to hold space without feeling the need to constantly fill it.This is for anyone who’s ever felt the pressure to prove themselves, explain too much, or overperform in conversations, and wants to lead from grounded presence instead.🔎 In this video, we talk about:How anxiety shows up as over-talking in client conversationsThe difference between over-delivering and over-speakingHow silence builds trust and authority in salesWhy over-following up can push clients awayHow to improve client debriefs and check-in callsThe art of listening 80% and speaking 20%Choosing not to interrupt or rescue during client processingHow to plant seeds without giving unsolicited adviceGet a FREE Copy of the High Converting Online Events Book: https://book.dominikalegrand.com/

But I have learned over the years that many times I choose not to say something intentionally because it sometimes can dip over that savior or territory of me trying to change the perspective of the client when really they will eventually get there by themselves and they always do and I see it for them at the moment I just don't need to say it and when it comes to over following up it's also an anxious energy because then what you do is you don't recognize that your client is powerful enough to come back to you if they say it would. Hello, my dear entrepreneur friends. Welcome back to another video. Today we're going to talk about silence, especially in leadership. Now, the more I have matured as a person,

and I'm not saying it's a done deal. It's still a work in progress. But the more I have matured, as a leader myself, as a service provider for my clients that I work with, the more I started to actively appreciate and utilize silence in business, especially when it comes to my own expression. Now, what I have noticed is that, and this is true across the board, but what I have noticed is that when we are a little bit anxious, like there is a baseline anxiety, some of us tend to speak more and talk more and express more. And sometimes that can be, the underlying thing can be out of many things. Either it's feeling like you're inadequate,

you're trying to a little bit overcompensate, or you're trying to show off your knowledge, what you know, and you're trying to win the clients that there is a proving energy behind it, or there is like a base level anxiety. But even when it comes to proving energy, I do believe that underneath there is a bit of a base level of anxiety. And what I have noticed is that when we are leaders who like to overspeak, and I don't want to kind of mix like over delivering versus over speaking,

because sometimes over delivering is above expectations. It's about going the extra mile, which is completely different than over speaking or almost like overcompensating. I think that's a different lane. So I don't want to, I don't want us to mix those two together. I want to talk about this aspect when we feel that we need to express more and speak more. Now, I also want to dissect it into two sections. The first one would be in terms of a social conversation.

And the second would be after someone comes to you in terms of a consultation. or you are reporting or debriefing. So in terms of a sales conversation, what I have found is the more you speak, the less confident you will come across. Very simply because it's more about measuring and understanding when to speak and when to listen and take notes. And the more you can hold back your silence

and ask people questions to kind of. kind of prompts them a little bit. So you understand more. The more you are in the observation and understanding role, which I believe that in a sales conversation, it's where you should be. Now, this also means that, and I'm sorry to kind of burst your bubble, if you are the, I'm just following up, I'm just following up, I'm just following up type of person. It's not about not being proactive. It's about trusting that when you had the chance to create an impact on the client that by you choosing when to speak and when to listen and when to understand them, which is, by the way, the whole idea is to help you understand the client better.

But knowing and choosing that moment really well will help you stand out enough for you then to get the client if this is a match, right? And when it comes to over following up, it's also an anxious energy because then what you do is you don't recognize that your client is powerful enough to come back to you if they say it would. The following up is then becomes this anxious energy. Then you if you overdo it, then you end up turning people off instead of having them come to you.

Now you can make arrangements to speak again to kind of go back to the conversation and help them make a decision. That's okay. But what I'm talking about is, after initial discussion, you talk about when you're going to speak again, by when you're going to make a decision. Sometimes that's okay too. Like sometimes my clients does this as well. Like when you give like, hey, by next week, like let's talk again. Let's see. Like let me know by Wednesday, by this day, like by having you put that timeline for them to come back to you, it helps you to not

just be in the dark and uncertainty and kind of have that urge to speak and to fill the voice. It's kind of like dialed back completely. Okay. So that's something I wanted to kind of put that out there, that it's by you wanting to understand. It's by you measuring and holding back and knowing one that wants to do that. You're going to come across as much more valuable than if you were just blubbery blob over someone.

I think I talked to you guys about my chiropractor experience when I went to this chiropractor and he was talking so much and he went on tangents that I just was so, like, confused instead of feeling heard and understood. And I think sometimes when we overspeak, I think that could also be confusing people. So that's another reason not to do it. And just to be to be silently listening and observing and taking notes and understanding and prompting, line prompting. I think the more you can become a person who is okay with silences,

the better when you speak with impact and gravity, the more that can be respected. So this is alive, guys. Another thing that we talked about is like after you already have a client and they work with you, they pay you your retainers, like there's a relationship already. And what I have found and learned over the years is the same thing. Like many times I noticed that when they hire like third party service providers,

they tend to just use the calls to, like, you know, sometimes how you set up those catch-up calls or reporting calls, use them to just blub or a blob and talk about the results. And, you know, instead of slowing down and asking questions from the client and in their experience, inexperienced service providers, they would just talk all over the client instead of slowing down because there is also the base of all anxiety of almost like trying to conceal something, sometimes lack of result, sometimes anxiety, sometimes the fact that they are just not knowing what to say, so they just say whatever comes to their minds, right? So that sometimes, and I also observe there is a mismatch between the conversation itself

and they can go off tangents as well that are not related to the conversation and observe clients getting upset about it and just be like, okay, we're really. good here. Like, especially when you're busy and you are working with clients who have like bandwidth issues. Like they need you to just, when you speak, you just, you say what you need to say and then zip it and then let them be. Sometimes that can be an overextension, over staying in a conversation longer than you should be. I think that's a skill itself to recognize when the conversation fizzles out and when you need to wrap it up and keep moving. Right. And if the client has to do that for you, then you probably have done this wrong. Just a cube. You missed a cube probably. Okay, that's one thing. The other thing that I have noticed, and now this is a conscious practice of mine, is when we are sitting on the weekly calls and some of the clients that I work where we do sometimes weekly checking calls and we go through what we've been working on, where is the next step, what's going to be down the line and just planning ahead in the future, using

that to kind of see what's going on for us. Many times there are things they express, there are concerns, there are ideas. And many times I would say I speak 20% of the time and I listen 80% of the time. And what I consciously started doing is just grab a notebook and just put down words and words and words. And so I don't forget what comes up to me, but I don't feel the need to interject, meet conversation, and express media at least I don't disturb the client's natural flow of expression. What I like to do is just words and I speak when they're like, okay, what do you think? So that is a cue as well that you need to look for. And then I kind of try to structure and put like more weight behind my points instead of saying everything. And another

thing, which I have developed as well in terms of my silence is there are things sometimes I know down that are not to be mirrored back to the client right away or there are not to be spoken about. So what I have learned over the years and as I was honing on my skills of listening and emotional intelligence that many times I choose not to say something intentionally because it sometimes can dip over that savior territory of me trying to change the perspective of the client when really they will eventually get there by themselves and they always do.

And I see it for them at the moment. I just don't need to say it. So I can trust that they will get there and they will see the perspective eventually and I don't have to interject and react to every single share and every single line and every single. single turbulation and emotional, you know, processing thing. I don't have to always respond to those.

Those sometimes can just be left alone. And I can then focus on what really is important from this. Like, what do we need to focus on and reflect those parts? But I think that also is something that you can develop over time as you're helping people, as you are consulting or working together with clients for a long time, is that when to speak, when to let them be, and want to share, and want to choose silence over not sharing something because you trust that they will eventually get there. What I sometimes like to do, and I think this is such a good way of being, is I like to plant seeds. And what I like

to do is use my own example. I think those are the most powerful seed planting exercises. When you do believe there's something that you feel that is very strongly in misalignment for the client right now, but you don't want to interject and kind of save them from their lessons. What, what you can do is just talk about your own example and just say like, you know, in my business or what I have found was this and I did this and this happened. Like those are planting seeds instead of you trying to tell them what to do. And sometimes that can also be the best way to go about things. But the more you practice silence and the more you practice being okay with not talking a lot but learning when to be speaking with gravity and like precision as well like getting more concise on what

you're saying and listening I think the more you can become not just invaluable to the people you work with but like respect it I think there is this misconception that respect comes from domination and I'm Dominica so if anything I love I love that word I don't but whatever like that respect comes if you are like very authoritative and you tell them what to do and you speak your mind but I think respect comes from is your ability to to know when to be silent and when to speak and being okay with silences I think that's also a form of respect that you can learn in your own quiet leadership way we do go deeper into honing into this emotional intelligence piece of the silence inside of the human to human

program. I do want to bring this point home. I do believe that this is something you can learn if you tend to be blubbering a lot and anchoring a little bit into how to be okay with this and how to be a better listener and develop your emotional intelligence skills to do so. Thank you so much for watching and listening and I'll see you guys very soon.