Executive presence: how to carry yourself like a leader

Picture it · 5 examples

• Example The crisis meeting

  Three people talk fast and over each other. You wait for a gap, then speak slightly slower than everyone else: “Here’s what we do first.” Everyone turns. You have no more authority on paper than they do. You have more in the room, because you are the one not rushing.

• Drinks & dinners The group deciding

  Everyone is debating where to go. You say, unhurried, “Let’s do the place on the corner.” Six people follow. The slowest voice won.

• Selling The negotiation

  The buyer is talking fast, listing demands. You answer each one a notch slower than it was asked. Within ten minutes the whole conversation is at your speed, and your speed is where the deal gets done.

• In the office The new team lead

  First week leading a team that used to be your peers. You do not try to sound senior. You just walk, speak and answer a half-beat slower than you used to. By Friday they are waiting for you to speak first.

• On a call The escalation call

  The client is angry and fast. You are slow and clear. “I hear you. Here’s what happens today.” Two minutes in, she slows down to match you.

Picture it · 5 examples

• Example The most junior person at the board table

  You walk in without hurrying. You sit back, feet flat, hands on the table. When asked a question you let a second pass before answering. You are the most junior person in the room. Two people later assume you were the most senior.

• Drinks & dinners Arriving late to the dinner

  Even late, you do not hurry. A nod, a quiet “sorry, go on”, sit. The hurry is what signals apology. Its absence signals belonging.

• On a call On video

  Sitting back from the camera, still, taking a second before answering. The client, who you have never met, addresses the hard question to you and not to your manager, who is on the same call. Your manager notices.

• In the office Walking to the front

  You walk to the front of the all-hands at walking pace, not rushing pace. You put your notes down. You look up. Two hundred people have already decided you know what you are doing.

• Selling Taking your space at the table

  Notebook, pen and forearms on the table. Not everything clutched in your lap. The buyer treats you as a peer because you are sitting like one.

Picture it · 5 examples

• Example Talked over in the meeting

  Mid-sentence, a louder colleague cuts in. You do not stop. You finish the sentence at exactly the same volume, pause, and say “Let me finish the thought.” Then you do. Nobody interrupts you again that meeting, and he apologises afterwards.

• On a call The conference call

  Three people start talking at once. You say, at the same volume, “I’ll finish this point and then come to you, Mark.” Then you finish. The call runs in order from then on.

• Drinks & dinners The dinner table

  Cut off mid-story by someone louder, you keep your tone light. “Hang on, let me land this.” The table turns back to you.

• Selling The buyer who interrupts

  He cuts across your second point. Same volume, finish the sentence, pause. “And the third one is the one you’ll care about.” He waits for it.

• Hard conversation The heated one

  Interrupted mid-sentence in the argument about the budget, you keep your volume steady, finish the sentence, and pause. He expected louder. He gets a level voice and a finished thought, and his next sentence is quieter than his last.

Picture it · 4 examples

• Example Reception

  “Sam Harper, for Priya at ten.” Your name, given half a beat later and slightly slower than you would have last month. The receptionist straightens and picks up the phone. The man before you rattled his off and was asked to repeat it.

• Drinks & dinners Being introduced

  “Hi. I’m Elias,” slower than feels natural, with a half-beat before it. Three people at the table remember the name. The man introduced after you said his in a rush, and by dessert nobody could recall it.

• On a call Answering

  Pick up, half-beat, “This is Elias.” The caller slows down to match you. It is the regional head, and she opens the call at your pace rather than hers, which has never happened before.

• In the office Turning to the question

  Someone asks you something across the table. You turn, a half-beat slower than you would have last year. The room waits for the answer instead of moving on.

Picture it · 4 examples

• Example The interview chair

  You sit back in the interview chair, both feet flat, hands on the table. A guest, not someone pleading for the job. The panel’s notes say “composed”. The candidate before you perched on the front edge for forty minutes.

• Drinks & dinners The cafe meeting

  You sit back in the cafe, not hunched over your phone. The contact you are waiting for spots you from the door without looking at a photo. Settled people are easy to find in a room.

• On a call Video

  You lean back slightly from the camera for the whole call. Leaning in looks eager. Leaning back looks at home. The client treats you as the senior person on the call. The senior person on the call is leaning in.

• Selling Across the buyer’s desk

  Back in the chair, not perched on the edge of it. The buyer, who has dismissed two salespeople this week in under fifteen minutes, gives you forty. Perched would have said you expected the fifteen.

Picture it · 4 examples

• Example First ninety days?

  One second of nothing. Then the answer. The panel’s feedback: “Thinks before speaking.” You had the answer ready. The second was for them.

• Selling Objection

  “Why are you more expensive?” A one-second hold before you answer. The buyer reads it as a fair question getting a considered answer, and you not being rattled. Then you answer. He does not raise price again.

• Hard conversation Provocation

  “Your team always does this.” You hold one second. The provocation loses most of its force in that second, and your answer comes out at normal volume. He lowers his.

• Drinks & dinners Put on the spot at the table

  “So what do you think?” One second. Then one sentence. The second makes the sentence sound considered, and the table hears someone who was asked, not someone who was caught.

Picture it · 3 examples

• Example At the table

  Notebook and forearms on the table, taking up normal space. It reads as belonging. The colleague beside you has everything in her lap and her elbows in, and the chair asks her twice whether she wants to add anything.

• Drinks & dinners Standing group

  You stand at a normal distance in the circle at the function, not at the edge of it. When the conversation turns, it turns to you. Shrinking to the periphery reads as waiting for permission, and nobody gives it.

• In the office The empty chair next to the director

  You take it. The other three people sat as far from her as they could. She notices who sat where.

Picture it · 4 examples

• Example Meeting

  Cut off mid-sentence in the project review. You finish the sentence at the same volume. Pause. “Let me finish the thought.” Continue. The chair, who had let the interruption happen, says “Go on,” and the point gets minuted.

• On a call On the phone

  The supplier talks over you. You keep going at the same volume to the end of the sentence, then pause. He stops. “Right,” he says, and the rest of the call is one voice at a time.

• Hard conversation Heated

  Your co-founder talks over you for the third time. You do not stop. Same volume to the end of the sentence, pause, and “I’ll finish, then it’s yours.” He waits. It is the first time in the conversation that either of you has.

• Drinks & dinners Drinks

  Cut off by the loud one, you finish the sentence to the person you were talking to, at the same volume. They heard it. That is all that matters.