Transcription
Your brain leaks signals before you even speak a word, and when you do speak, your language that you choose and the habits that you display either elevate your presence or they undermine it. So, in this video, I'm going to be talking about those habits and those languages that quietly undermine your executive presence and also share with you the framework I use with executives to transform the way they are being perceived. Let's dive in.
Now, I've broken it down into three simple steps for you, starting with the first step. The first step is to understand the insight, the science, and the vehicle. So, let's begin with the insight. Here's the insight: You can still be truly confident and still undermine your executive presence. Here's what I mean by that. When it comes to feeling confident, you're genuinely confident when you have a high self-esteem, and self-esteem is really internal perception. It's how you feel about yourself in any given moment. Now, haven't you had that experience where you felt good about yourself, maybe because of something that happened around you, maybe something in terms of how you see yourself, and in that moment, you have this high self-esteem and you're more confident, and it's genuine confidence? But here's the thing about confidence versus presence. Confidence is internal perception, whereas presence is how other people perceive you in real time. And when you have presence, if they perceive your presence as leadership, then they will confer leadership to you based on their experience. And that's the thing about leadership. You can't claim to be a leader. I mean, you can, but just because you claim it doesn't mean that other people agree, right? So, it's not about claiming leadership and putting your stake in the ground and saying, "I'm a leader." You can't claim it and have other people accept it and follow you. But leadership is not claimed. Rather, it is conferred by others in how they're experiencing you in real time. So, that's the difference. That's the insight when it comes to executive presence.
So, now we've talked about the insight. Let's talk about the science. Science studies show that people make snap judgments about you all the time. Now, when they are meeting you for the first time, the snap judgment is based on how you look, right? And I'm not just talking about clothing. I'm not just talking about the way your face is or anything like that, but it really is the whole of how you look. For example, someone might meet you and say, "Well, that person looks friendly," or "That person looks like I can approach this person," or "That person really seems like someone who is open to a different way of thinking about things," right? So, they make snap judgments based on how you look, which is a whole overall appearance, not just pertaining to one aspect of it. And then, right when you speak, the second part of their snap judgment, and this happens within microseconds, the second part of the snap judgment is in the languages you use, how you speak, what you're saying. Is it aligned with what they thought that you were, that snap judgment they made in your appearance? So, for example, let's say someone meets you for the first time and they go, "Well, this person looks very friendly and approachable. I'm just going to go talk to her or him." And then they talk to you. And then you respond. The first thing you say in that snap judgment, now they're going to experience you because you're speaking, and what you say and how you say it, that the language could either match their initial snap judgment of you being friendly and approachable, or it could be opposite from what they initially perceived about you being friendly and approachable. So, this is why the snap judgment happens. And the reason why we do this is because we have mirror neurons in the brain, and they pick up on these very micro cues based on your behaviors. Language is a type of behavior because you're speaking, that's your behavior. And they pick up on cues, like, for example, nervousness, insecurity, inauthenticity, lack of confidence, or confidence, or authority, or lack of authority. So, they pick up on these micro cues, and that's the job of the mirror neurons.
So, then we've talked about the insight. We've talked about the science. Now, let's talk about the vehicle. The vehicle is executive presence. And it's important to note that presence and being present isn't just one thing. It's a system. It's a whole system of signals that's made up of your communications. It's made up of your consistency. It's made up of your identity. It's made up of your connection. It's made up of your credibility, and so on and so on. So, it's a whole system of signals that begins. So, now we have the first step: understanding the insight, the science, and the vehicle. So, let's move on to step number two.
The second step is to be aware of the language that undermines your executive presence. Now, the language to be aware of is something that I'm going to call posturing language. Now, you think about the word "posturing." When somebody is posturing, what are they doing? They're trying to become or portray a role or identity that they perceive they are not yet that role or identity. So, if you desire to be the next level of leader from where you are, then if you are posturing in your language, then you're doing all sorts of things in your language and through your language to portray that next level of leadership that you desire to be into. And people do all sorts of things when it comes to posturing language. For example, some people give into over-formality in their language. And over-formality are using words, bigger words, or jargon words, or very formal words. And it's all with the intent of sounding smart. So, that's one thing. That's one type of posturing language. Another example of posturing language is some people overcompensate because they try very hard to sound like a leader, how they think they should sound when they're a leader. So, that's like overcompensation. That's another type of posturing language. Still another type of posturing language is over-explaining things, giving a lot of details, or over-explaining your knowledge or your insights. And this is really trying to be interesting. It comes at the root of that, or sometimes it comes at the root of needing to seek approval or recognition. So, that's another type of posturing language. And another type of posturing language that I've seen as well is people can sometimes have these self-confidence qualifiers where they say things like, "Well, I'm not sure, but," or "I'm not the expert here, but here's what I think," right? A self-qualifier because deep inside they feel a lack of self-confidence, and they don't want to be wrong, and they don't want to give bad consultative advice. So, then that's another type of posturing communication. And there's all, the list can go on, but you get the drift. Posturing communication.
Now, studies in psychology, when it comes to relationships between people, either personal relationships or professional relationships, these studies consistently show that people have trust and people remember ideas when they're conveyed in very clear and very fluent forms of communication. And you see how posturing language is just the opposite of that. So, when it comes to this, it's important to understand your reasons for posturing communication. So, whatever your reasons are for choosing posturing language, that type of posturing reduces trust, and it also reduces the perception that people have of you being a leader that you desire to be.
Now, when it comes to individuals making snap judgments, let's go back to that for a moment. Did you know that humans are better, are more confident and more precise in their judgment when it comes to listening to people speak, right? You can judge someone before even if they haven't spoken. You can look at their facial expressions, you can look at their body language, you can look at their eye movements, you can look at all these things about them without them speaking, and you can make judgments. But people tend to be more accurate and more confident in their judgment when they judge while they're speaking, judge the way someone's speaking. And here's why: is because when people are making snap judgments about you when you're talking, especially in meetings and boardrooms, what they're really judging is your level of competency, your level of credibility, leadership, and your level of trustworthiness. And this goes way back into the way our brains have evolved to make judgments about people when they're speaking because, you know, words go directly into your heart. And in doing so, it's a form of protection. It's also a form of prudence, and it's also a form of filtering out the right people to be on my team. You can understand that.
Now, I talked about posturing language. The opposite of that, the opposite of posturing language is effective communication. And when you are choosing effective communication, it is a whole language. It's a whole language where you have authenticity, where you're grounded in understanding what you're saying, and your insights are very deep, and your confidence is not based on everything that happens around you. Your self-esteem is not based on whether or not you achieve the goal or whether or not your higher-ups see you in a positive light. Your self-esteem is not based on these external factors, which are hard to control. And here's the thing about effective communication: it's really understanding these three things. It's understanding your audience really well, and then being able to know exactly how to craft your message so that your audience will engage with you, will be fascinated and interested in your message, and buy into it, if that's your purpose and intent. And then, after audience and message, the last thing is conveyance. Precisely, how do you convey it? Because as we mentioned earlier, how you convey it says a lot about you and how they perceive your leadership in real time and how they experience you in real time.
So, if you're listening to this and executive presence was maybe something that you received feedback from, from your higher-ups, or maybe you have a realization through your awareness and your experience that presence was something that you need to work on, then I invite you to click the link below and download my Executive Presence Formula. In this Executive Presence Formula, I have seven key pillars, and it walks you through step-by-step on how to build your executive presence right now and how to apply it in your situation. And particularly, I want you to note "Communication with Impact." This will help you to take care of what we talked about in terms of posturing language.
Now, let's talk about the third step. Step number three is to be aware of the habits that undermine your executive presence. When it comes to habits, there are two categories of habits. You have movement habits, and you have mindset habits. So, let's talk about each one, starting with movement habits. Earlier, we talked about posturing language, but words and language are not the only thing that undermine your presence. Your actions do too. The way you move does as well. And I'm not just talking about productivity habits. When I'm talking about movement habits, it's not just productivity habits. I am talking about all of those unconscious activities that you have repeated again and again over time so much that they've been etched into your nervous system. Let's look at what the neuroscience says. Neuroscience research shows that your body movements can become actions too. And here's the thing: if you haven't been intentional about planning your actions, or if you weren't even aware of what your actions are, and as a result of that, your movements, your muscles are uncoordinated or not in harmony, then what happens is that your body compensates with shortcuts, and you're going to experience things like fidgeting, awkward eye movements, stiff movements and gestures, really awkward postures that cause pain here and there. Or it could be things like slouching. It could be things like shallow breathing, all sorts of things. I have just the tip of the iceberg here. So, that's what happens. Your body compensates with these gestures and with these movements. These movements are habits over time that are etched into your nervous system, and they are inefficient because they waste a lot of energy. And while they are inefficient, they're wasting energy, they're repeated over time because they're etched into your nervous system. Guess what? They also leak signals of insecurity, tension, nervousness, incompetence, and so on and so forth. It leaks those signals, and therefore, it goes right back to language. If you're leaking those signals to your body movements, it also undermines the words that you actually do speak.
All right, that was the movement habit. Now, let's talk about the mindset habits. Mindset habits refer to the way you think about presence, and the way you think about it can hold you back as well. So, let me share with you some mindset habits that hold you back in exuding the executive presence that's needed. The first mindset habit is mistaking confidence for presence. Now, those two are not the same thing. Sometimes you can be truly confident and also have executive presence, but not always. As I mentioned earlier, confidence as someone who's genuinely confident does not necessarily mean they have executive presence. And that's because confidence is an inner self-perception. It comes from self-esteem, how you feel about yourself in that moment. And depending on how you perceive yourself, it could be very much influenced by things that are going outside of you. That's confidence. Presence is not the same thing. Presence is how other people experience you and perceive you in real time. So, it's outside-in. And that's the difference. If you mistake confidence for presence, you're going to be doing a whole lot of things to try to up your confidence, but you're not necessarily transforming your executive presence. So, that's mindset habit number one.
The second mindset habit is relying on credentials and titles rather than signals. I have worked with many executives who were brilliant on paper, on work experience. They were brilliant in their thought processes, in the ideas and solutions they had for their company, but somehow they repeatedly got feedback from higher-ups that they need to exude more executive presence and they need to have more presence inside of high-stakes meetings and inside of these conversations. And no matter what they did, they came to me and said, "I tried everything. You know, I tried the affirmations. I read a lot of self-help books. I tried a lot of yoga and meditation. I've tried to boost my confidence with those common confidence boosters that are out there, and I'm still getting this feedback, and therefore, I'm being overlooked for the leadership roles that I desire to have." So, what's missing? And oftentimes, what I see is that they then choose to go for another degree or another title, or they go for another certification. And really, upon speaking with these brilliant individuals, more or less, or actually more often, they're using credentials and these degrees to validate their intelligence rather than working on the thing that matters. You see, as an executive coach for more than a decade, what I've noticed is that these credentials and these certifications matter less than really understanding and understanding and working through the signals that you give off. These are unspoken signals that you give off on that other people perceive your authority and your credibility and your competence as a leader. The degrees matter less. How you work on yourself in terms of how you show up in your entirety matters more than the degree or the certification.
And the next mindset habit that I see holding a lot of people back is reducing presence to an image. And it's the internet's fault and social media's fault for a lot of that mindset habit. Because a lot of times, you see these social media posts and these images that talk about executive presence, and it weighs heavily on an image, right? Your clothing, your body language, put your shoulders back, your eye contact, things like that. And here's the thing: sure, clothes and posture, they factor into a part of it. But you know what? Presence is not a costume. It's not something you can just put on and it changes the way people perceive you, not by a landslide. So, understand that you can't reduce your presence to an image because you are much more than that. And people pick up on cues that are much bigger and much more meaningful than that. So, this is where you've got to understand that presence is the integration of your whole identity, of your communication, of your understanding of self, of your understanding of other people, of your consistency through it all, and of the way you conduct yourself and the way you connect with others. It's the sum total, the integration of all these pieces, a system of all the signals. This is why in high-stakes environments, you can feel like you're doing everything right, but for some reason, the higher-ups, when they are experiencing you, they just feel like something is off, and they don't call you in for the leadership opportunity. And even if you ask them why and ask them for feedback, they won't tell you, they can't tell you anything meaningful because chances are they aren't even aware of themselves. But what they're noticing are these subtle signals that aren't matching. They're not quite matching. They're not quite aligned with the leadership identity that you want to have. So, that's why if you desire to align that identity, then I invite you to download my Executive Presence Formula right here below this link in the video. There's a link for you to download this. And it is seven pillars that through my research and my experience coaching executives, these are the seven pillars to really understand and to embody and integrate in your day-to-day to build your executive presence right away. Download the link below and use this right away to support your leadership growth.