Leadership Presence

Clients often come to me focused on learning tactics or strategies for being a better leader.   What I have learned over time is that effective leadership is as much about who you are being, your presence, as what you produce or accomplish.

 Still there are a few misconception of what presence is and how to develop it. In this quick take,  I share the three critical access points for an effective and compelling leadership presence. 

One-Moment Meditation 

Nina Simonds Coaching
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Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:00

Hello, hello, hello. I'm Nina Simons. Welcome to Let's Get Real. Today I'm doing another briefer episode. This time I want to talk about presence. And I'll be speaking directly to you, no guests today. And I thought this topic would be helpful because I often have clients asking me about this and or coming to work with me specifically to develop their leadership or executive presence. And there's a lot of misunderstandings, I think, about what presence actually is, especially in the organizational context. So I know people want to feel more confident and inspire and motivate others. And that's one of the reasons presence matters to my clients. Presence is also important in terms of working with peers and having influence with others, especially when you're in a high stakes meeting with your team or your peer group and your boss. It can be helpful to talk about what presence isn't as we get into this conversation. Presence isn't exclusively about presentation skills or tactics for getting what you want with others. In fact, these things can be helped by a strong presence and a centered presence, but it's not all of what presence is. Presence is a resilient, resourceful state of being that allows you to access your best in yourself and also be aware of what's happening in the moment with others. I'd like to share a very simple model with you that I believe you can use to think about how you want to develop your presence. It's a three-part model. It's three elements, almost thinking of it as a three-legged stool or having a centered, calm, and connected presence. The first element is a centered body. There is no presence if we are not fully embodied and connected to our full selves. This one is an easily overlooked one because, as I've said before in other episodes, we spend a lot of our time speaking to others from one neocortex to the other. And we forget that in order to actually really connect with others and actually to be fully expressed ourselves, we need to be fully embodied. We need to personify the fullness of who we are, including our physical form. For me, a great example of a leader who has a embodied presence is Michelle Obama. Anytime I've seen her on stage, whether she's seated or walking or standing and delivering a presentation or speech, I am so drawn to her sense of calm and her sense of confidence in herself and how embodied she is. Now, I'm not saying that we all have to have the same physical presence as a Michelle Obama, because part of being present and having presence is finding your own unique style and personality within your leadership. But I think she is a great example of someone who is fully embodied as a leader. The second and equally critical leg of the stool for presence is to have a clear mind. This in and of itself can be really challenging for us in the digital age when we have access to so much information all of the time. And yet, if we're not clear and present and able to see what's going on around us and to have people have a sense that we are present for them, then presence doesn't really exist. I think about even something as simple as my dog Zoe and how she kind of knows when I'm on my computer or on my phone that I'm not fully present and that I'm not really available to her. But yet when I connect with her and I let go of the devices in my life and really am present, it makes a huge difference to how much she interacts with me. So just a small, fun little example for why having a clear mind can lead to greater presence. It's also really valuable when you're in a conversation or a meeting. So rather than worrying about the next thing you're going to say, of course, it'll be brilliant, I know. Instead, just keep your mind clear, listen to what's being said in the conversation, kind of suspend your opinions and what you want to add, and just allow the conversation to evolve and be present. And I guarantee you, I worked with a leader who was really, really talented and had a great influence on his peer team. And he attributed it to his ability to actually be present and be silent and be a good listener in peer meetings and then come in when he had something that really felt essential to moving the conversation forward. So self-management, of course, is a part of a clear mind. And as you can tell, it also means Less is more. Talking less, listening more is a really wonderful, easy way to develop your leadership presence. And now the third and equally critical leg of the stool for having a strong leadership presence is an open heart. I guess you knew I couldn't have this conversation without bringing in the heart and the emotional landscape of who we are as leaders. I really love Brene Brown's description of having a strong back and a soft heart or soft front. I think that's what this one means to me. This isn't about being overly emotional or needing to do a lot of caregiving in your team meetings or conversations, but it's really about your willingness to be vulnerable and be known by the people who work with you. So your willingness to share of yourself and also your willingness to be affected by others, by how they're feeling, what they need. And so this openheartedness, uh, I, you see it often in, uh, emotionally intelligent leaders. And oftentimes it's not something that people spend a lot of time developing. Uh, I think there's a misconception that, um, being openhearted is either something you are born with or, uh, or something that your family gives you, but that you can't develop it. But actually that's an I know as a faculty member for the Coactive Training Institute, where we train people in becoming coaches, I've seen firsthand how being curious and holding people with positive regard can really develop this openheartedness. It's easy to stay openhearted when you're in a relationship where there's a lot of positive regard or a lot of respect. But one of the most vital places where openheartedness can really make a difference is when you need to have a difficult conversation. Because that's the times when it's most easy for us to get reactive. Even if we're not holding the other person in a negative way, we might just be in our own anxiety about giving bad news or having to give tough feedback. And in those moments, if we can stay open-hearted and remember that this person is much more than this particular situation that you find yourself in, that's a really great way to have the conversation go better because that of the person is really going to feel your respect. So these are the three access points to greater presence, having a centered body, having a clear mind and having an open heart. These are things that you can develop. And I'm going to give you a couple of ideas for exercises to do just that. The first one is, of course, to develop more present moment awareness. And I'm going to leave in the show notes a really fun little one minute video. Actually, it's a five minute video about one minute meditation. So it's a way to integrate more mindfulness into your day when you're in an elevator or when you're taking a walk or just in any moment at your desk. And so it's a very fun and playful way for us to have a structure to remember that the present moment is available to us all the time. It's just there for us when we're ready to access it. The next, um, idea I have for you to develop your presence is to, uh, do a data detox, uh, or a device, uh, break, you know, December is a good time to try this because you have some time with family, uh, and then you can take baby steps. It doesn't have to be a 24 hour, um, phone free day, but maybe take an hour in the morning and just put that phone away, put it out of sight somewhere and just focus on, uh, the people in your life, the people you love, or if you're on your own, Use that time to write or to dream or just to relax device-free and see what you discover from just having more present moment space for something. I hope you found this conversation about developing your presence helpful. If you have and you want to get more information from me, including a short guided meditation on developing a specific quality in your leadership presence, please write to us at info at ninasimonscoaching.com and we'll send you that recording and we'll sign you up for a newsletter. We so appreciate you being part of our listener community.

UNKNOWN: 10:41

Thank you. Thank you.