Timestamps

00:00:00: Introduction

00:01:51: Idea for action 1: face and space

00:03:55: Idea for action 2: rehearse your start

00:05:37: Useful resources

00:06:43: Final thoughts

Interview Transcription

Sarah Ellis: So, we're on skill number 7 and today we are talking about presence.  And we debated whether we even include this one, because I think it can feel very frustrating to get feedback that sounds like, "It'd be helpful if you increased your presence with senior stakeholders or senior people across the company".  And you sort of think, how and what does that look like?  Or Helen and I were saying that sometimes, someone gets pointed to as, "That person has brilliant presence", or you maybe even notice or recognise, "Well, that person has great presence", and then you think, "And I'm nothing like that".

Helen Tupper: Yeah.

Sarah Ellis: I worked for a boss who did have and does have brilliant presence.  People were engaged by her, they listened to her, she brought people with them.  But I was like, "Oh, my personality is dramatically different to her, but I can see how what she does works".  Because, when people do have presence, I think people want to follow you.  I think they want to be part of what you're doing, your ideas have more impact.  And so, I do believe it makes a difference, but I think it can often start from this point of being like, "Oh, but this is not me".  Sometimes, I think we can be quite fixed about our own abilities around presence.

Helen Tupper: Yeah, and I think sometimes it's this idea that you need to have presence all the time, like every minute your day starts, you're like, "Hi, I'm Helen, I've got presence every minute".  But I actually think what is more important is to think about, when is me having presence actually going to make a difference?  In what meetings and moments is my presence most important?  And that's where to put the effort and the ideas we're going to talk about, that's where to put that action in; not be like, "I'm a person with perpetual presence".  That's not the aim.

Sarah Ellis: So, what's your idea for action for this presence idea?

Helen Tupper: I don't know if you'll love this one.

Sarah Ellis: Go on.

Helen Tupper: My idea of action, the thing that I often think about with presence, is face and space.  Now, I can't change that much about my face, it kind of is what it is, but I can smile.  And I often find, in situations where I want to have presence, presence is personal.  But for me, a lot of my presence comes in my energy.  That's what I would bring to the room or at the end of a meeting, at the end of a day, or whatever, I bring that energy.  It's a big part of my personal presence.  And I think a lot of that is in my smile. 

It's a bit in my tone and my pace, but a lot of it is in the smile on my face.  And so, it makes a big difference.  If I smile, you often, like the research proves, it's a bit like yawning, you're more likely to get a smile back.  So, it creates a bit of connection. it always gives me a good start, I get that kind of feedback from someone that makes me feel a bit more confident.  So, face, try smiling.  It sounds random, but just try smiling. The second thing on space is, if you want to have presence, think about your physical presence in a space. 

So, for example, if I'm doing a virtual presentation, I'm on Teams or Zoom or whatever, I will think about, what does my physical presence look like in terms of the space that I'm filling?  So, am I centre?  I know this sounds really geeky and boring, but if it's one of those moments that matters, I will make sure that I'm in the centre of the screen, I'll make sure it is well lit.  Or, those very practical things are taking my presence away.  If there's something distracting, like Sarah gave me feedback on my background the other day, she said, "Oh, the angle of your camera is a bit distracting, because you can see that door and it's making me think --

Sarah Ellis: I was looking outside!

Helen Tupper: -- what's through that door?  I don't want you to think about the door, I want you to be listening to what I've got to say, I want to have presence in this moment.  Probably not with Sarah, but she's given me feedback more for other --

Sarah Ellis: Hey!

Helen Tupper: I'm joking -- more for other people.  But I think, to that point of sometimes you can't always see it, because we so often operate on autopilot, I think getting some feedback on your physical presence like, "How do I come across on camera?  Is there anything that would make my presence even better if next time I'm in that situation?"  Sometimes other people can see what you might not be able to for yourself, so it's useful to get a bit of feedback on it.  So, face and space.

Sarah Ellis: My tip is to rehearse your start.  So, when you want to have presence, I think at the same time you are often nervous or a bit anxious.

Sarah Ellis: Agreed.

Sarah Ellis: Or you're under a bit of pressure.  I feel like pressure and presence kind of go hand in hand, and you are that last person on the agenda, or you've got a lot of people that maybe you don't know, or maybe it's just a high pressure moment, and you perhaps do feel quite stressed.  And I think if you start well, it sets you up for success.  When I say practise your start, I mean rehearse it out loud.  So, if I am doing something where I feel like it's one of those moments that matter, I will practise the first two or three sentences, "How am I going to get into this topic?  How am I going to start confidently and calmly and at the pace that I want to communicate?" and then I'm usually okay. 

You started well, then I know roughly what I'm going to say. Often people will also say ending well is important, but I find the moment where I'm most likely to get wobbly, that you might even hear it in my voice, or get distracted by something presence-wise because, I don't know, I do start twiddling my rings or whatever, it's the start.  And so, really just focusing on that first 90 seconds.  There's also quite a lot of evidence around people make snap judgments, unfortunately, which perhaps we should try not to do, but if in 90 seconds people feel reassured or energised by your presence, or you've kind of drawn people in, and they're like, "Oh, this is good, I'm going to enjoy this, I'm going to listen to what she's got to say", then you've captured people's attention.  So, I think you just don't want to miss the moment in an important moment.  So, I still do that now, I still practise now how I'm going to start.

Helen Tupper: And we think that this is a really good twin episode with the one on presenting, because very often like the presenting and presence, just like the pressure point, they kind of go hand in hand.  So, that was one of the ones we did earlier in the sprint.

Sarah Ellis: So, if you want to watch people with presence, I would encourage you to watch some TED Talks.  Now that might sound counterintuitive because you think, "Yes, but for TED Talks, they've rehearsed 200 plus times".  That is all true, so you should remember that.  But if you watch the TED Talks with the most views, like the top 10 TED Talks, a lot of those were from the early days of TED, and they aren't shiny, and they aren't perfect, but those people all have presence. 

You've got Simon Sinek with a flip chart, old school flip chart; you've got Brené Brown, who shares that she turned up to do her TED Talk, and I think she was late, she'd rushed, she'd written some of it on a flight.  And so, those people all have presence, they're also, very different.  So, it's not like there's this sort of cookie-cutter approach to presence, usually it's people being authentic, kind of bringing themselves as something they care about.  So, I think it's a good place to start for remembering there's no perfect presence.

Helen Tupper: So, that is the end of today's skill, and we'll be back tomorrow with judgment.