The remarkable truth about leadership and presence

What is presence and why is it so essential to leadership and beyond?

Presence is in the eye and ear and gut of the beholder. When you are present in a conversation or a meeting, others around you perceive you as entirely focused on the matter at hand and on being of value to them.

When you listen into the eyes of your people, customers and investors with the sole purpose of alleviating pain and assuaging fear and then do both, they will reveal their hopes and dreams, and that is when the magic happens.” – Mark Goulston

One of the most important things you can do for your career—and for your life in general—is to be physically, emotionally, and mentally present, focused on the now. As a society, we reward multitasking. The opportunities for distraction are never-ending. Maintaining a focused connection to the present Is a challenge. However, developing a practice that keeps you coming back to it—returning to a singular focus on the person, idea, or topic at hand—is incredibly rewarding. It is worth the effort. You will improve the quality of your relationships and your work as well as your ability to find deeper meaning in your interactions and, ultimately, your life.

The first step to achieving presence on a more consistent basis is becoming aware of the times when you are not present. Has your mind wandered to something that already happened or thinking about something that might happen? Becoming present is a process—a journey. Keep working toward consistency and gradual improvement. You will reap significant dividends.

A commanding presence

The world’s best leaders have a commanding presence — but that does not mean the right voice or handshake. It is the ability to be fully attentive (which means breaking that multitasking habit).

What is the real key to powerful leadership presence? It is the capacity to be fully present. True leaders are present for a task, for a conversation, for the moment, for an opportunity. Present for their larger purpose in the world.” - Dr. Marshall Goldsmith

Marshall Goldsmith and Sally Helgesen’s new book How Women Rise will be published April 10, 2018. Their work inspired this article.

We live in a distracted culture. How many times have you found yourself in a situation where your body was present, but your mind was elsewhere while you were engaging with someone else? It used to be considered unspeakably rude to not give others your full attention during a conversation, but now it is commonplace. Most of us lead incredibly busy lives, trying to cram an impossible amount of activity into our days, and in the process of trying to take care of everything we have deemed important. We might be losing out on the most important things of all — each other.

What is the real key to powerful leadership?

It is the capacity to be fully present.

True leaders are present for a task, for a conversation, for the moment, for an opportunity.

This is not easy in today’s 24‑7 work environment. You have multiple responsibilities. Every day feels like a marathon you need to get through. Even as the capacity to be present grows more challenging, the benefits of doing so increase. The value of presence increases as you move to higher levels in your organization.

For women, who can notice many things at once, it can make it tough to focus. Our research, Mission Imposter: Myths Female Executives Tell Themselves,  shows that:

• Men and women are equally suited for executive roles. It is the behavioral traits of the individual, not gender that makes the difference,
• There are highly competent women with the equal relevant behavioral qualities to succeed as well as male executive level – but that success will and is exacting a greater emotional price from them.
• There is a greater need to identify women with high executive talent earlier in their managerial career and provide them with coaching that enhances their self-esteem, inner confidence, and optimism about their ability to succeed at the executive level.
• Some highly competent women have executive potential but– are opting out because of the perceived family and lifestyle sacrifice required.

A remarkable leader knows that he or she serves at the will of shareholders, customers, and employees. Fail to serve any of these groups, and they fail as a leader. Lack of presence with is a quick path to failure.

Connecting across cultures

I have travelled internationally extensively. I found that being present is the most powerful way to connect across cultures. People from very different cultures can immediately read whether you are fully available to them because your body language lets them know. In a diverse global environment ensure you are present – you can not fake it.

Fully Present with Another Person

The capacity to be present requires freeing your attention so you can show up.

So, what can you do to free your attention, so you can fully inhabit where you are? You might start by pushing back against compulsive multitasking. The fact is that doing two things at once makes it impossible to be present. Your attention is fragmented. Fragmented attention is a minimizer. Here are seven tips to help you be present:

1. Put down the phone. Better yet, silence the phone. Check it later.
2. Do not multitask. Sit or stand near the person and face them rather than continuing with whatever else you were doing.
3. Make eye contact.
4. Make physical contact. If it is appropriate for the relationship, give a hug, reach over and squeeze their hand, or simply touch their
5. Listen with the intent to hear, not the intent to respond. This allows you to fully take in what the other person is saying.
6. Only speak in ways that improve on silence. Use empathetic and reflective listening to show the other person that you are hearing them and that what they are saying matters to you. Express your feelings, especially love or gratitude.
7. No interruptions.

Multitasking also diminishes you by giving the impression that you are overly responsive to random events. If you see someone constantly checking her phone in a meeting, you do not think, wow, she must be important. Moreover, you certainly do not think, what a strong presence she exudes. Instead, you are likely to conclude that she is not in control of her own time or schedule and is therefore incapable of showing up for what is going on. By demonstrating over-responsiveness, she minimizes both her importance and her presence.

Being fragmented is not a character flaw

It is all too easy to find our minds wandering to whatever we need to get done next when we are in a conversation, or to multitask when we take a phone call, half-listening as we do the dishes or battle rush hour traffic. Even worse, with the ever-present smartphone in our hand, we might be ignoring the person we are standing face to face with as we check Facebook, Instagram, texts, or email.

Would we do this if we knew that we were seeing or speaking with someone for the last time? Treat every professional conversation as if it was the last one. After a conversation, review it.   Were there ways in which you were not fully engaged? If you had a re-do — how would you improve your presence?

The good news is that permitting your attention to be fragmented is not a character flaw. It is just a behavioral trait, one of the 85 traits we measure. For some presence is a strength, for others, it is an area where you must develop a coping strategy. A lack of presence will undermine you as you reach higher by making it impossible for you to manifest—or enjoy—serenity and influence. Know where you stand and learn to be present.

We are human. It is inevitable that at times we will not give someone our full attention or handle a conversation perfectly, but the more we practice presence during the conversation, the easier it becomes. Just like most of our behavioral traits, our degree of presence is habitual. By cultivating presence, we offer each other the gift of being seen and heard, which is what most people desire above all else. By treating every conversation as though it could be your last, you minimize regrets and maximize happy memories, regardless of whether it is.

The first step is to understand your strengths

We all have a unique talent stack. Understanding how that our unique combination of behavior strengthens makes us better at things that require this unique combination that other people.

The most successful among us are walking flaws who have maximized one or two strengths.” —Tim Ferriss

At Allenvision, we start with your behavioral traits and your passions and match you with a career that allows you to thrive. We use powerful talent analytics to determine which of your 85 behavioral traits are strengths and which ones are challenges. Presence is a trait we measure. If you want to be a remarkable leader, drop me an email. We provide our services worldwide.