Stand Up for Yourself.
Without Damanging Your Career.
Rewrite your work relationships
You're in the right place if...
- You know you need to push back, and every time the moment comes you tell yourself you will raise it next time.
- Something unfair happened to you, a staffing change, feedback you did not see coming.
- You want to give some honest feedback, but you are afraid that saying it makes it worse.
- Underneath it all, you feel out of control of this relationship. (You're not).
You resolve this conflict, or you walk away with a better path ahead that is fully in your control.
The Conflict Turnaround Program
4 Steps from stuck to control.
Diagnose the Situation
- Before we meet. You share the exact emails, chat messages, or review comments they sent you. We take an evidence based approach to work from what was actually said, not from memory.
- 1-hour online session. We'll discuss 3 things in this order:
- Who you are dealing with. I diagnose their communication style and place them in one of the four workplace profiles I have mapped out over years of coaching. We craft our communications according to their profile.
VisionaryMicro-managerTeam-builderHands-off pleaser
- What is actually going on. I ask you a designed series of questions to find the real cause. Every answer gets anchored to facts instead of feelings, because facts are the only thing you can build a plan on.
- What winning looks like. We lock your goal and, just as important, your non-goals. Everything we build afterwards is built to reach that goal and nothing else.
Build Plan A and Plan B
- 1-hour offline session. I take everything from our session and write two plans.
What's the goalWhat must be doneWhat must not be doneHow to do it
- Plan A, if they engage. How to open the conversation, how to sequence it so they hear a shared problem instead of a complaint, and what to do in the weeks after so the change holds instead of fading.
- Plan B, if they never do. The same goal reached without them. Which moves need nothing from them, who else can move things for you, and how to protect your career while the relationship stays cold.
Align and Rehearse
- 1-hour online session. We'll discuss both plans:
- Refine both plans. We go through both plans together and revise them until the plans become yours.
- Live role-play. We role-play the crucial conversations together, and run the worst case scenarios, so that you're always prepared.
Ready for Whatever They Do
- Your plan covers every response they can give. Both plans are built on moves you control rather than on them behaving a certain way. Whatever they say, your next move is already written down.
- Q&A support. During the conflict period, I am happy to answer your follow-up questions on the situation.
People who were exactly where you are
Steve got the same vague line in every review for years. It turned out his manager had simply never defined what good looked like. One prepared conversation fixed it. Three months later they were writing his growth plan for a new role together.
Yifu got a "Did Not Meet Expectations" rating with three reasons attached, one of them "too passive." We brought his manager a one-page plan and asked for a specific check-in rhythm. Four weeks later his manager put the improvement in writing.
Celeste's manager kept adding work outside her scope and dropping last-minute meetings into her calendar. That never stopped. So we worked on setting boundaries at work, she learned to push back on most of it without ever looking difficult.
Straight from their messages
Everything it takes to stand up for yourself
Left alone, this kind of conflict usually costs a stalled promotion and often an exit you did not choose.
What's included
- The real cause of the conflict, diagnosed from facts rather than feelings
- A full read of the person you're dealing with: their communication style and workplace profile
- Your conversation scripted in your own words and rehearsed in a live simulation
- A written plan, action by action: the goal, what to do, what not to do, and how
- A backup plan, so you still take control if it does not go as planned
- Async follow-up with Jonathan while you put the plan into action
Meet Your Coach
Ā Jonathan Li
Career Coach & Former Leader @ Shopify
"Storytelling was my edge. At 10, I won a nationally-televised English language competition and was interviewed by CBC as the youngest contestant. In high school, I went on to win national presentation championships twice.
In the workplace, telling stories for disruptors like Uber and Shopify, I learned that talent alone isnāt enough. Visibility is built through communication. I grew into leadership by telling the right stories: for my company, for my team, and for myself.
Since 2017, Iāve coached Chinese professionals navigating Western workplaces, reaching over 150,000 followers along the way. My philosophy is simple: if you donāt know how to tell your story, you wonāt be seen; no matter how capable you are."
QUESTIONS
FAQ
Ā
What if speaking up makes it worse?
What if the other person won't change?
How will we work together?
What does your guarantee mean?
What if I actually want to leave this job anyway?
How do I get started?
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