Executive Presence Can Be Learned Quickly, But Only When Precisely Defined
Many of my clients get promoted to a C-level, VP, or Head of Function role much faster than their peers due to their intelligence and ability to get things done. When moving up quickly in a company, you have to evolve how you lead to be successful at each level. The same goes for founders whose title stays the same but their organization grows rapidly.
In many of these cases one of the areas my clients are told they could improve in is executive presence (or less commonly maturity). When my clients are told this, they are usually confused on how they can improve in this area. And rightfully so. The terms "executive presence” and “maturity” themselves don’t convey any meaning without additional context on the particular environment they are operating in and what behaviors they specifically could benefit by doing more of or less of.
How to successfully operate as an executive at United Airlines is going to be very different from a 10,000 person tech company from a 200 person tech company. Even two different tech companies of the same size can have very different cultures and expectations about how to be a successful executive.
So while the terms “executive presence” or “maturity” aren’t actionable in themselves, they provide a direction to explore. The first step is to get more specific information. The best way to do this is to have an expert conduct an interview-based 360 feedback process where the feedback is anonymous and the results are shown only to the leader and not their boss. This is the process I run with all of my new clients. If you’re not able to hire someone to run a process like this, you can still use some of the techniques I use to help yourself or someone on your team.
In the interviews I conduct in my 360 feedback process, when a coworker mentions executive presence or maturity as something my client could improve, I dig deeper into what they mean by that. Often the person I am interviewing says they aren’t sure how the person can improve in that area or that “it’ll come with time” or “it’ll come when they settle into the role.” But that’s not necessarily true (I bet you can think of a leader you’ve worked with or seen in a prominent position who has the maturity or presence of a really smart 14-year-old). Even if executive and presence or maturity did always come with time, it can still be accelerated greatly when focused on in the right way.
I then ask questions like “what specific 1-2 behaviors could this person be doing more of that would increase their executive presence?,” “what behaviors could this person be doing less of?,” “how will you know when this person is a more mature leader?” The key is to get into behaviors. How the person behaves (i.e. acts) is what directly affects how they manage upward, partner with peers, and lead their team. When asked specific questions about behaviors, the interviewers I speak with are often surprised how much they can actually define what it would look like for my client to improve.
Once feedback on specific behaviors is collected, then improving becomes actually actionable. Examples of key behavioral changes to improve executive presence or maturity are: speak more concisely, share more opinions in executive team meetings about topics not related to the team they lead, listen more, reduce ambiguity by making decisions, say “no” more often, and reduce angry outbursts. You may notice that some of these behaviors are nearly complete opposites (some people need to speak more, some need to listen more), which is a reminder that there is no set playbook for executive presence or maturity; you have to get context on the specific person (yourself or someone on your team) in their environment at this particular stage of the company.
Once behaviors are identified, you can begin to work on these. Some behavioral change can be achieved by just focusing on behavior itself. For example, if someone could be more concise while making their point in a meeting, pausing for 3 seconds before they speak while gathering their thoughts can be very effective to reduce rambling (also people that pause to think before talking can appear more wise). For someone who needs to listen more, asking genuine open-ended questions is a remarkable way for a leader to become a more effective listener (among other things).
Some other behavioral changes require deeper work. For example, someone who overextends themselves or their team by saying “yes” too often resulting in missed deadlines and/or burnout may feel a deep need to please people. This need is usually established in early childhood because that behavior was necessary in the context of the family system that they grew up in. With this kind of change there is no substitute to working with someone with expertise in changing long-held, outdated beliefs about self (e.g. working myself to exhaustion will give me the best chance to succeed, I have to know all the answers myself, if I say “no” I will fail, disagreement means I’m being rejected, pushing back on authority is dangerous, etc.).
You can also apply this same methodology of going from ambiguous phrases (e.g. executive presence) to specific actionable behaviors (e.g. sharing opinions more in meetings) at the team-level. For example, I was working with a client where several people at his company said his team needed to have more of a “sense of urgency.” As I dug into this during the 360 feedback process, I found that each person who used that phrase meant something very (and actually mindblowingly) different by it. Once my client and I understood exactly what each person meant, we were able to come up with very specific actions he and the team could take, which resulted in such a noticeable improvement in just six weeks that his colleagues couldn’t believe how fast it improved.
Action Questions
Here are some questions to ask yourself to help you take action on this:
What high level, ambiguous feedback have I gotten that I would like to improve on but haven’t figured out how?
What questions can I ask people who’ve given me that feedback to better understand the specific behaviors surrounding that feedback?
What resources inside or outside the company can help me improve on these specific behaviors?
Who is someone on my team that would benefit by coming off with more executive presence or maturity as a leader?
What feedback have I given them that was ambiguous or unactionable?
What feedback have I held back on giving them because I know it’d be ambiguous or unactionable?
How can I be of service to their growth by helping them understand the specifics of what behaviors they could improve?
What resources inside or outside the company can help them improve on these specific behaviors?
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