Carol Cox: What exactly is executive presence and why do
you need it? That's what we're talking about
on this episode of the Speaking Your Brand
podcast. More and more women are making an
impact by starting businesses, running for
office and speaking up for what matters.
With my background as a TV political
analyst, entrepreneur and speaker, I
interview and coach purpose driven women to
shape their brands, grow their companies,
and become recognized as influencers in
their field. This is speaking your brand,
your place to learn how to persuasively
communicate your message to your audience.
Welcome to the Speaking Your Brand podcast.
I'm your host, Carol Cox.
Have you ever been captivated by a speaker
who seems to effortlessly command the room,
inspiring everyone with their words and
presence? That's the magic of executive
presence combined with powerful public
speaking. Whether you're leading a team or
an organization or a workshop, either
internally or externally, whether you're
presenting to 20 people, 200 people or 2000
people, your ability to communicate your
ideas clearly, get buy in from your audience
and deliver with energy and confidence can
make all the difference.
But here's the thing executive presence
doesn't just come about overnight, nor is it
the exclusive domain of the naturally
charismatic, which is what we think that it
is. It's an art that can be cultivated, and
one of the most powerful tools for doing so
is honing your presentation and storytelling
skills. That's why we're doing this brand
new podcast series all around executive
speaking. We're going to explore how you can
elevate your executive presence through
impactful communication.
If you work at a company and are looking to
enhance your leadership skills, this series
is meant for you.
Now, if you're an entrepreneur and I know
for many of you who are listening, you are
entrepreneurs, you're also going to get a
lot out of this series by learning how to
effectively convey your vision and inspire
your team, as well as your other audiences.
I'm going to share with you some things that
you can think about regarding executive
presence. And I'm also going to share about
a speaking workshop we recently held for
women who are running for office, what we
saw and what they learned, which I know is
going to help you as well.
If you're new to the Speaking Your Brand
podcast, I'm so glad that you're here.
We work with women entrepreneurs,
professionals, and leaders to clarify their
brand message and story, create their
signature talks, and develop their thought
leadership platforms.
Through our proven framework, we've
empowered countless women to step into their
power and make their voices heard.
We know that we want to see more women in
positions of influence on boards, on
leadership teams, in business and in
politics. Executive presence matters.
For that to happen.
Before we dive into the main part of this
episode, I invite you to take our free
speaker Archetype quiz as speaking your
Brand.com slash quiz.
This quiz will help you to discover your
unique speaking and communication style, and
how you can leverage it to enhance your
speaking and your executive presence.
It only takes a few minutes to take the
quiz. It's ten fun multiple choice
questions. Again, go ahead and pause right
now. Go take the quiz at speaking your
brand.com/quiz. Get your results and then
come back and listen.
Now let's get on with the show.
Have you ever found yourself delivering a
presentation, especially in presentation
internally at work, or say at an industry
conference or even an academic conference
and it's packed with data, or it's packed
with information only to see your audience's
eyes glaze over?
Or even worse, they start picking up their
phone, or maybe they even leave the room.
Or have you ever found yourself delivering a
meeting and you're going through item and
item on the agenda, but you've lost the rest
of the team members. Not only have you lost
their attention, but you've also lost their
enthusiasm. Or on the flip side, have you
been an attendee at a meeting and thinking
to yourself, well, this could have been an
email. The person leading the meeting is
just passing along information, maybe
answering questions from a few people.
And that's it.
These are classic examples of falling into
what I call the expert trap.
So what is missing in these examples?
Well, the first thing is that the person
presenting the information, whether it's to
an audience externally or in a meeting
internally, what's missing is getting buy in
from the people there by painting a picture
of the bigger vision, the bigger why?
Also engaging the audience very
intentionally and deliberately throughout
and sharing personal stories, creating an
emotional connection.
And I know for so many of you, when you think
about personal storytelling and business,
they do not go hand in hand.
It feels like oil and water.
But as we're going to talk about a little
bit in this episode, but much more in next
week's episode, sharing personal stories.
Especially in a professional or business or
academic environment, is more important than
ever. As leaders, we have a wealth of
knowledge and we have a wealth of expertise
and insights. And of course we want to share
it. However, too much information can
overwhelm your audience and dilute your
message and therefore lessen your impact.
This idea of the expert trap is when you
focus so much on showcasing your expertise
by delivering an overload of information
that you miss the opportunities to provide
your audience not only with insight, but
also with transformation.
It's not just about the data, it's about
what that data is going to do for them.
After all, your goal as a speaker or as the
person leading the team is to inspire action
and change not just to inform, not just to
pass along information.
Transformation is about creating a
meaningful impact.
It's the difference between knowing
something and actually being motivated to
act on that knowledge.
I know for so many of you who are going out
there speaking to audiences, whether it's at
lunch and learns business conferences or
industry association groups, that not only
do you want your audience to learn
something, but you want them to act on that
knowledge. And that's where this
transformation piece comes in.
If you are in corporate and you're at an
executive or manager level, your ability to
drive transformation through your words can
significantly influence your organization's
and your team's success.
So how can we do this?
How can we escape the expert trap,
especially when we're thinking about
executive presence?
And especially for those of you who do work
in corporate. So here are things that you
can do. The first thing is simplify your
message. Cut, cut and cut some more.
I know it's so hard to think about it
because you and you know, and you're and
you're probably right that all of the things
that you want to convey, all of the
information is really important.
And it probably is really important.
But your audience can only handle so much
information at a time.
So think about can some of this information
be sent as an email or be sent as a
document, something in some other medium,
not just through speaking to them as an
audience or in that team meeting?
So focus on the key points that will
resonate most with your audience.
What do they need to know to understand what
you're sharing with them, to understand that
bigger vision and those ideas that you're
sharing? And not only that, but what do they
need to know to actually act on your
message? I think that's so important to
really think about, not just the
understanding, but also the action.
So simplify your message.
This is why here at Speaking Your Brand, we
love working on those ten minutes Ted style
talks, because it is such a creative
challenge to distill a message into only ten
minutes. But here's the thing.
I find those ten minute talks to be just as
effective, if not more effective, than a 30
minute or 45 minute talk.
That's why one of the things that we do in
our Thought Leader Academy is that the
clients work with us to create their
signature talk in that one on one VIP day,
and then they work to flesh out the talk,
and they actually practice delivering it in
our group zoom calls during the Thought
Leader Academy. And then we have them create
a ten minute version of their talk, and they
deliver it on a LinkedIn live.
And we've done that. Some of these recently.
I'll include links to the show notes, but if
you scroll back in your podcast feed, find
the ones where it says like live signature
talks from our Thought Leader Academy grads,
and you can hear their ten minute versions.
The second thing to do to escape the expert
trap is highlight the impact of your
message. So instead of drowning your
audience in details in a minutia, again,
save that for a document or for an email.
Emphasize the impact of your ideas and the
benefits of your message.
How will your proposal or your insight
change their situation for the better?
I really want you to get into the heads of
the people that you're talking to again,
whether it's your team, its executives that
you're presenting to, or it's a larger
audience, what does that audience want?
Validate what that particular audience wants
and how you can find a common vision.
What are their goals?
What are those obstacles standing in the
way? And how could your proposed idea or the
insight that you're sharing?
How can it change their situation for the
better? Really find that common ground with
them? The third thing is engage with your
audience. And I know you already know this.
Ask questions whether it's show of hands
questions or questions that they can answer
out loud. Invite participation.
It really creates an interactive experience,
but it also shows your audience that you
care. You care about hearing what they
think, what they think about those ideas,
other things that they have to contribute as
well. Instead of them being passive, which
is where they lose focus, they lose
attention and they lose enthusiasm instead,
get their input and their buy in along the
way. The fourth thing to do is to connect
emotionally.
And I know again, it feels very
counterintuitive to do this in a business or
professional or academic environment, but
sharing stories that resonate emotionally
with your audience can make such a huge
difference. When people feel connected to
your message and they find their connection
to your message, that's when they're more
likely to be inspired and motivated to act.
And we're going to talk a lot more about
storytelling for leaders in next week's
episode. So finally, always include a clear
call to action. What do you want your
audience or your team to do?
Make it specific and make it actionable so
that there is no guessing what you want them
to do. Let's recap now what you can do to
escape the expert trap and focus on
transformation rather than just information.
The first thing simplify your message.
Focus on those key points that are going to
get your audience to act.
Highlight the impact.
Validate what that audience wants and how
you can find that common vision.
Number three engage with your audience.
Number four connect emotionally.
And five always include that very specific
call to action.
We recently hosted an in-person speaking
workshop for some women who are running for
office here in the Central Florida Orlando
area. So these are Democratic, pro-choice
women who are running from everywhere, from
U.S. Congress to state House and state
Senate, county Commission, and so on.
And it was so fun to be with them.
We were there for about 2.5 hours, and so we
brought them in. We had our workbooks so
that they could work on some things, but one
of the things that I asked them towards the
very beginning was not only what did they
want to get out of the workshop, but I asked
them how they wanted to feel when they were
speaking to their audiences, whether they
were speaking to warm audiences so people
who were likely to support them, or maybe
they were speaking to mixed audiences and
they weren't sure who was in the audience.
How do they want to feel?
And what was so fascinating was that all of
them talked about.
Stuff in their head.
They talked about information.
They completely missed how they wanted to
feel in their bodies.
And this is why, if you've been listening to
this podcast, especially for the past year
or so, I've been talking a lot more about
not only just the information we're
conveying to our audience.
Again, that expertise and those insights
that are in our head, but how we feel in our
bodies and how we're energetically conveying
that to our audiences.
And at the speaking workshop for these women
political candidates, we also talked about
taking up space.
So literally taking up space.
As women, we are often brought up and
socialized to be smaller, so we kind of
scooch in to have let someone have room to
sit next to us, or we oftentimes get small
also, so that we're not we're not as
visible. Sometimes it's a safety and a
protection mechanism, but these messages get
subconsciously reinforced over all of these
years, so we're less likely to take up
space. So we don't take up space with our
arms or our legs.
We don't move around the room or move around
the stage as much as we should.
So at this workshop and at our in-person
retreats, we always have a dance parties and
half of the women love it.
Half of the women groan about it because,
you know, they feel embarrassed or they feel
self-conscious, and that's why we make them
do it. So we put on some fun music with a
good beat, some popular songs, and we just
dance around and we make everyone dance
around. Use the whole room, use space, use
our arms up above our heads, really get into
it and have fun. This is the same reason we
do improv activities at our in-person
workshops and retreats.
Also, yoga is a really good thing to do to
get more into your body as well.
And also thinking about meditation and
visualization exercises so that you can get
more in touch with your breath and with how
your body is feeling.
So again at the speaking workshop.
So not only did we talk a lot about taking
up space and how we wanted to feel in our
bodies and using our bodies, but we also
talked about those things that I just listed
above, simplifying their message,
highlighting the impact, validating what
that particular audience wants and how you
can find common ground and a common vision.
And of course, leading with story.
Oh my gosh, when we had the women change
their stump speech to lead with a very
specific and very personal and emotional
story. Wow.
You could feel the difference in the energy
of the room once they change that.
And again, we'll talk more about that in
next week's episode.
Executive presence, I hope you can see now
isn't an innate quality.
It's not that, oh, that person was born that
way, or that person is just charismatic.
It's a skill that can be developed and
refined, especially through consistent
public speaking.
By focusing on transformation and not just
information, by understanding your audience
and engaging with them, by using
storytelling and by mastering body language
and taking up space, you can enhance your
executive presence and become the speaker
and the leader you aspire to be.
Don't forget to take our free speaker
Archetype quiz.
You'll discover what your speaker archetype
is so you can leverage your natural
communication strengths and then add to them
to make you an even more dynamic speaker.
You can take that quiz as speaking your
Brand.com slash quiz.
If you've enjoyed this episode, share it
with a friend or colleague who you think
would get a lot of value out of it.
Until next time, thanks for listening.