Timeout for Leadership-your one-minute leadership idea

Tip Sheet #69

What do people see when they see you?

Last week, I asked you to think about the words that you use.  I hope you thought about this and perhaps stopped yourself before you said something to a colleague, gathered your thoughts, and re-phrased your message using different words.  Yes, we know that words matter.

Today, I want you to forget about your words and concentrate on what you look like when you deliver this message.  I need to start out by telling you that people see me as a curmudgeon, Shrek, or if you recall from last week’s post, Statler and Waldorf.  And I know their perceptions are probably accurate.  It is one of my many weaknesses as a leader. A weakness that I continually work on and try to improve.  My body language stinks!

If your body language is like mine, I challenge you to work on these four items.  Namely:

• Your smile-I don’t smile, I scowl.  Sometimes I will be asked if I am angry at something and it could not be the furthest thing from the truth.  I may be in a great mood, yet my face tells everyone something else.  Maybe it tells them just to run away!  As a leader this is not the image you want to send.  You want to be seen as open, transparent and compassionate. I have thought long and hard about why I do this.  I think it is now subconscious and has been reinforced for decades.  You may laugh when I share this, but there is a message here.  I have awful teeth and hence I try to hide them.  I can blame my parents for bypassing the orthodontist but I should have corrected this as young adult.  I would have been much happier and maybe my self-image would have been different.  Who knows?  But the point I am trying to make is that whatever personal quality that you have that impacts you and your idea about your image or confidence, correct it.  It could be a host of what you may see as imperfections.  Others might not see them the same way, but when you are struggling with your self-image you don’t see that. Maybe it is your hair or lack thereof, your weight, your eyesight or whatever else that impacts you.  Suck it up and correct it especially nowadays with the marvels of modern medicine.  At my ripe old age, I still think about getting braces.  Invisalign is waiting and my wife could bury me with a good smile.  I wish I would have, and should have corrected this.
• Your posture– This one could be fairly easy to correct if you work at it.  Maybe you feel too tall and you slouch.  Maybe you feel too short and distort yourself to make you look taller.  You know that people make a lasting impression of you within seconds of meeting you.   These impressions when they are wrong are very hard to change.  So, it is easy: make sure that first impression is right on the money.
• Your voice-Do you mumble?  Do you speak too fast?  Too slow?  Does an accent get in the way?  Once again, if these are important to you, you can work to correct them.  Gather your thoughts before you speak.  Look at the person and work to speak clearly and concisely.  Don’t ramble on forever about nothing.  People do not want to hear it.  If you have an accent that gets in the way, there are people out there to help you.  Although it is not fair, I will turn a person off who I cannot understand.  Students do this with professors all of the time.
• Your attitude-People can sense your attitude when you enter a room.  I think I am good at reading people and just like that dog who can sniff out a treat, I can sniff out a bad attitude.  Although not perfect, I am right more than I am wrong.  This one is probably not the easiest to correct.  Just like my teeth, your perceived negative attitude may have plagued you for years or decades.

When I work with a person who is trying to perfect their interviewing skills, I spend quite a bit of time on the aforementioned four points.  Once you improve these, we can move on to perhaps some of the fine things that make you a great hire. And when I was looking to hire a teacher, these four items, that have really nothing to do with content or pedagogy weighed heavily in my thought processes.

So, tonight after you have had a moment to process this article, what do you see when you look at yourself?  What do you want to change?  Do it.  The only thing holding yourself back is you!  Any small change could well be worth it to your mental well-being and your career.   Good luck.