Empowering Others. For each situation below, indicate what you might say to help empower the other person(s), using such strategies as (a)raising the other persons self-esteem; (b)listening actively and supportively; (c) being open, positive, and empathic; and (d) avoiding verbal aggressiveness or any unfair conflict strategies. As youll experience, empowering others, far from reducing your own power, will actually increase it.

a. Your partner is having lots of difficulties recently he lost his job, received poor grades in a night class, and started gaining a lot of weight. At the same time, youre doing extremely well. What are some of the things you can do or say that might help bring back your partners confidence?

b. Youre managing four college interns who are redesigning your companys websitethree men and one woman. The men are extremely supportive of one another and regularly contribute ideas. Although equally competent, the woman doesnt contribute; she seems to lack confidence. But the objective of this redesign is to increase the number of female visitors, so you really need her input and want to empower her. What are some of your options for empowering her and thereby getting her to contribute more actively? What might you say?

c. Youre a third-grade teacher. Most of the students are from the same ethnicreligious group; three, however, are from a very different group. The problem is that these three have not been included in the social groupings of the students; theyre considered outsiders. As a result, these children stumble when they have to read in front of the class and make a lot of mistakes at the whiteboard (though they consistently do well in private). You want to empower these students. What do you say?