When the team’s heads drop, someone has to lift theirs first. Might as well be you.

Groups take their emotional reading from whoever moves first. When everyone is looking at the floor, the room is waiting for permission to re-engage, and that permission usually arrives as one person’s ordinary behavior rather than a speech. You do not have to feel confident to be that person. You only have to act slightly ahead of how you feel.

Be the first to clap, to reset the drill, to ask the next question in a dead group project. Nobody will name it or thank you for it. The room changes anyway, which is the entire point.