Many leaders look to improve their public speaking skills in order to develop Executive Presence. The successful senior leaders in most organisations have a presence about themselves. When they stand in front of a room, they command respect even before speaking.
How can you obtain that presence? There are three elements that influence the degree of executive presence a person has. These elements are confidence, charisma, and control. These three elements are the guides that audiences use to judge our leaders.
Confidence
The first element requires a person to have confidence in their ability to stand in front of a room full of people and deliver a presentation. If you cannot overcome your fear of speaking and deliver a presentation without excessive nerves, inappropriate gestures, and vocal intrigue your audience will not have confidence in you.
Charisma
Charisma is the ability to deliver a presentation in an entertaining manner. To be a charismatic speaker you need to understand how you can entertain and inspire your audience within the confines of the topic you are presenting.
A charismatic leader incorporates stories into their presentations and relates them back to the idea being discussed. Storytelling is an art form itself and you need to work at your storytelling ability and find sources of stories that you can use in corporate presentations. Often, stories can be found around the workplace – in the complaints department, in manufacturing, or by simply talking to customers. Each area will have a number of anecdotes they can share that you can leverage in your presentations.
Control
The final element of executive presence is control – the ability to managean unexpected situation.
Often when delivering presentations things go wrong – such as a projector failing, microphone problems, or one of hundred other things that could go wrong. How the presenter deals with those unexpected events shape and influence the impression your audience has of you as the presenter. The more confident you are dealing with the unexpected circumstances the better the impression your audience will have of you.
An individual can develop their executive presence. By taking the time to master communication skills in front of a group of people, you can develop the confidence, charisma, and control so that when you stand in front of your colleagues they look at you and see a leader with executive presence.
