Appear confident even when you don’t feel it

Maintain eye contact, a level voice, and an upright posture — confidence is performed before it’s felt.

Why it works

Nonverbal signals — voice tone, posture, eye contact, pacing — communicate as much as words and often more. A hesitant delivery undercuts the content of a direct request, signaling ambivalence that the other person reads and responds to. Deliberately adopting confident nonverbals does not require feeling confident first: the performance of confidence through posture and vocal tone feeds back into subjective confidence through proprioceptive and interoceptive channels.

How to do it

1. Before the conversation, take a few deep breaths and consciously settle your posture.
2. Speak at a moderate pace — faster or slower than usual both signal anxiety.
3. Maintain eye contact during the assertion itself, even if you look away at other moments.
4. Avoid upward inflection at the end of requests, which turns statements into questions.

Evidence

Nonverbal communication research consistently shows that posture, voice tone, and eye contact affect listener perception of confidence and assertiveness. There is also evidence that adopting confident body posture can increase subjective confidence, though the "power posing" specific claim has had replication issues. (observational)

The nonverbal signaling of confidence is robustly supported; the claim that posture causes internal hormonal shifts (power posing) has not replicated reliably. The practical advice here rests on the signaling, not the hormonal claim.

Common mistake

Apologizing for the request while making it ("I’m sorry to bother you, but...") — which communicates that the request is an imposition before the other person has even heard it.