How do you become fully confident and in control of your emotions and experience at work? It’s by mastering your own psychology and that of others. On this show, we decode the science of success, exploring how to get out of your own way and advance your career to new levels without becoming someone you’re not.

I’m Melody Wilding, bestselling author, human behavior professor and award winning executive coach. Get ready and let’s put psychology to work for you.

 

Hey, make sure you’re signed up for the free training I’m hosting on January 9th at 3 p. m. Eastern. It’s called From Overlooked to Recognized and Rewarded. Earn 100k more in 2025 without sucking up or selling out. This no fluff actionable event will show you how to speak up in meetings and impress the company’s leaders.

Without offending your colleagues, I’ll give you the magic phrases, how to guarantee your next promotion by doing this one thing daily. And it only takes five minutes, how the highest paid top performers instantly build credibility with higher ups, even if they’re remote. This secret is one psychological trick you can begin using immediately.

I’ll be sharing many of the same strategies. Our clients at top companies like Google, Amazon, and more have used to land a hundred K bonuses and raises head to melodywilding. com slash training to grab your spot. Now it’s 100 percent free and I can’t wait to see you there.

On today’s episode, we’re going to be talking about how to improve your executive presence, even when you are not the loudest, most outgoing person in the room. Because I have seen in my work time and time again, over the past decade plus that being someone who is a deep thinker and feeler, what we call around here, a sensitive striver does not mean you are doomed. It does not mean you are never equipped to command a room. In fact, it actually means

You have assets and innate qualities that can help you create a more powerful presence. Before we go any further, I want to get on the same page about what we mean by executive presence, because you may have heard this idea by a number of other names, whether leadership presence, executive demeanor, gravitas, all of these tend to be used interchangeably to refer to the idea of projecting confidence without arrogance.

And the reason executive presence feels so confusing is that it’s not just a single skill or a single attribute. It can often feel very elusive and abstract because it’s one of those, you know it when you see it kind of things. And that’s because it’s the combination. It’s the amalgamation of many different traits and skills. And what makes it even more challenging is that executive presence can look different across industries, across work or world cultures. The executive presence that’s needed in a creative startup might be very different from what’s going to work and be needed in a traditional banking environment. Now everyone seems to talk about executive presence as this must have quality, you need this for your career advancement, but very few people actually break down what it means in practical terms. And it’s often discussed in these vague, abstracts like commanding a room, having gravitas, which honestly, those things are not very helpful when you are trying to develop this for yourself. So as you’re listening right now, I want you to do a little exercise with me. I want you to think of someone you know who projects executive presence. How does that person show up in situations? How do they carry themselves?

Melody Wilding (02:28.578)
Maybe you’re thinking of a mentor who always seems to know exactly what to say in tough situations. Or maybe it’s a colleague who seems to be able to disagree with your boss in a way that earns them respect rather than creates tension. You might be remembering someone who is able to stay really composed during a crisis or that person who just has a way of making everyone feel heard while they’re still getting things done and driving decisions forward.

So even just this brief exercise, it can shed a lot of insight and light on how you might emulate that person’s actions and mindsets for yourself. It can start to operationalize what does executive presence actually look like in practice. And what’s really fascinating is that when people start doing this exercise, they’re often describing behaviors or qualities that would be pretty easy for them to try out practice or develop for themselves.

This is not about just having natural inborn charisma or just being a outgoing personality. This is about very specific ways of showing up and acting that we can learn and practice. So now I want to demystify executive presence. want to break it down for you into three practical, actionable elements that you can work on yourself. And I want you to think of these a bit like overlapping circles in a Venn diagram. When they align.

at that center point where they all connect, that’s where true executive presence emerges. So these three elements are what you do, what you say, and how you say it. So let’s go through each of those, break those down a little bit further. The first element is what you do. This is about making thoughtful, deliberate choices, taking actions that command respect and show maturity.

So when you are faced with a tight deadline, instead of working yourself to exhaustion, you might make strategic choices about priorities. You may make a judgment call. When there’s team conflict, you may seek out different perspectives before you make a decision. When mistakes happen, you take ownership, you focus on solutions rather than dwelling on setbacks. So in other words, this first element, what you do.

Melody Wilding (04:49.792)
is all about following through consistently on your commitments, no matter how big or small they are, making decisions with appropriate urgency, taking initiative to solve problems instead of waiting to be told what to do, keeping your calm under pressure, showing up prepared, demonstrating good judgment. The second element of executive presence is what you say, your communication skills, being able to get your point across clearly, articulate your ideas,

gain buy-in, influence people, have them listen when you speak and take you seriously. And this goes beyond just being articulate. You do have to be able to quote unquote read the room, which means observing what’s happening and adapting your message accordingly. It means being able to distill a complex topic into a clear, compelling narrative that actually resonates and your audience can grasp and remember. So strong communicators,

They know how to structure their message. They use strategic pauses for emphasis and they know how to make others feel heard and understood in their presence. We’ll talk more about that in just a minute.

 

Hey, make sure you’re signed up for the free training I’m hosting on January 9th at 3 p. m. Eastern. It’s called From Overlooked to Recognized and Rewarded. Earn 100k more in 2025 without sucking up or selling out. This no fluff actionable event will show you how to speak up in meetings and impress the company’s leaders.

Without offending your colleagues, I’ll give you the magic phrases, how to guarantee your next promotion by doing this one thing daily. And it only takes five minutes, how the highest paid top performers instantly build credibility with higher ups, even if they’re remote. This secret is one psychological trick you can begin using immediately.

I’ll be sharing many of the same strategies. Our clients at top companies like Google, Amazon, and more have used to land a hundred K bonuses and raises head to melodywilding. com slash training to grab your spot. Now it’s 100 percent free and I can’t wait to see you there.

 

The third element of executive presence is how you say it. This is all about how you carry yourself. Is there a positive perception that you create a brand you create with everything from the way you dress?

your body language and delivery, the way you package information. You think about your posture, your eye contact, your vocal tone. Those subtle cues can either reinforce or undermine your message. And this also applies in the virtual world. Things matter, your background, your camera angle, your lighting, how you show up on video that contributes to your executive presence in this day and age. So let me repeat those three elements again. What you do.

what you say and how you say it. Now, sensitive strivers often come to me and they say, I don’t have executive presence. This is something I really struggle with that I just don’t think I’ll be that type of person. And of course we all have areas where we need to improve. But the truth is that as someone who is more thoughtful, perceptive, a deeper processor, you have inside of you all of the ingredients for true executive presence.

Melody Wilding (07:15.948)
because what is core to all of this is empathy, which as a sensitive striver, you have in spades. And empathy is not just about, you know, feeling someone else’s emotions. Science shows that sensitive people have more active mirror neurons. That’s called the empathy neuron. And that allows us to pick up on other people’s emotions more keenly to understand what they want, what their needs, their pressures, their pain points are.

to read into dynamics without someone else even saying a word. So it’s probably why you feel like you can read between the lines well, or you can sense when someone needs more support or help or has a question. Your executive presence depends largely on how other people feel around you, how other people feel in your presence. So if you as a leader, as a professional can tap into what a person is feeling.

make them feel good about themselves, make them feel excited about a direction or idea that is going to contribute to your presence more than anything else. Your ability to think and feel deeply can translate into helping others feel hope, optimism, inspiration. You can be the calming influence. You’re someone who may be able to bring order to chaos. hear that a lot. And your encouragement, your willingness to recognize, to praise others can mean higher morale.

People feel more psychologically safe, they speak up more, they’re more creative. All of those things are your strengths. All right, so far we have covered the core elements of executive presence. What you do, what you say, and how you say it. We’ve talked about how your thoughtful nature, your deeper processing actually gives you a competitive edge in this area. But I also know there is one particular challenge when it comes to executive presence that comes up

Again and again. So let’s zero in on that, which is speaking up and being more vocal and visible in meetings. This is an area where frankly, most professionals that we work with struggle with because despite being someone who has a lot of valuable insight and smart ideas to share, your inner critic might kick into overdrive. It’s the voice that says, well, someone else probably has a better idea or

Melody Wilding (09:43.244)
What if what you say is obvious and everyone starts judging you? Or I really need to think about this more before I say something. That inner critic chimes up. So let’s talk about a few simple strategies to deal with this and actually begin exuding more executive presence in your meetings. And these are all very simple. You can put them into practice today. First tip is to speak up early in meetings. And when I say early,

I mean, usually within the first five to 10 minutes, if we’re talking about a 30 to 60 minute meeting. And here’s why speaking up early matters so much because research shows that early speakers tend to be perceived as more confident and influential than those who wait. And more importantly, as someone who maybe tends to be an overthinker, the longer you wait to speak, the more time your brain has to overthink.

and to talk you out of contributing for the fear to build. So 24 hours before your next meeting, I want you to take just a few minutes to review the agenda and really think about where you want to and can add value. Write down just a few bullet points, not a word for word script here. That meeting opening those first few minutes, that is golden real estate. You have the opportunity to…

Frame the discussion to set context, to acknowledge recent wins. This is a perfect low risk moment to speak up. But what I often hear from people is they say, well, that’s great, but what if I freeze up? I’m not great with being put up on the spot. What if I can’t think of anything profound to say? And I get it. That’s why I want you to keep a few conversation entry tips in your back pocket. These are simple phrases like,

You know, I was curious about X or building on what Sarah just said. These might seem simple, but they’re wedges into the conversation and they’re effective because they show you’re engaged without requiring you to take a huge risk. They allow you to speak up and offer value and make connections between what’s happening, which is very useful. But you have to put your perfectionism aside here. Whatever you share does not have to be groundbreaking.

Melody Wilding (12:02.818)
You don’t have to share some earth shattering, uber original insight that has never been heard before. Sometimes just a thoughtful question building on someone else’s point is much more valuable than something that goes unsaid. And please, whatever you do here, do not throw yourself under the bus. Do not start with qualifiers like, well, this may not be relevant or this is a silly question. You can disregard it if it’s not relevant.

Your contributions have value, full stop. Now, the beauty of speaking up early is that it creates a positive cycle. You’re more likely to stay engaged throughout the meeting to contribute more because you’ve already broken the ice for yourself and for others. And when people begin to expect and value your input early, that naturally builds your executive presence over time.

All right, next, let’s talk about the second way to build your executive presence in meetings. This one is very common and one that can really undermine your presence without you even realizing it. And so the tip here is to avoid burying the lead. We tend to have this tendency to bury our main point under layers of context and explanation and background.

And I completely get it. Your thoughtful nature means that you probably see nuance. You want others to understand your complete thought process. But in today’s world, people’s attention spans are very short. And when you lead with all of that background information, the process you followed, every consideration that went into your thinking, you’re essentially asking your audience to do a lot of mental heavy lifting. They’re sitting there wondering, well, where’s this going?

What’s the point here? What am I supposed to do or take away from this? And by the time you get to your main message, they’ve either checked out or the impact has been watered down. So this is where I want you to flip your approach. Instead of beginning with your background and your context, start with your headline. Start with the key point you want people to remember if they remember nothing else. And this can be very counterintuitive because it might feel abrupt.

Melody Wilding (14:20.844)
might even feel a bit rude to just lead with your conclusion, a little blunt, but trust me, it is not. It is actually a gift to your audience. You are respecting their time and their mental energy by giving them the most important information upfront. So before your next meeting or presentation, I want you to ask yourself, if everyone had to leave after two minutes, what would I want them to know? That is your lead. That’s what should come out of your mouth first.

and all of that nuanced thinking that you have that can come after that. That becomes your supporting evidence. So leading with your main point, I wanna be clear, this is not about dumbing down your message or ignoring the fact that there’s complexities. This is about being strategic with how you choose to layer in that information. All right, moving on to tip number three, which builds on what we just talked about, just talked about leading with your main point.

Number three is to underscore your impact. And here’s where your depth of thinking can really become a superpower, but we need to channel it in the right direction. So instead of focusing on the how of your work, I want you to zoom out and focus on the why, the so what. See, when you are deep in the work, it’s very easy to get excited about all the things you’re doing, the process you’re following, the solutions you’re coming up with.

But your audience, whether it is your boss, it’s senior leadership, it’s your stakeholders, it’s clients, they’re concerned about what it means for them. They want to know what is the business outcome here. They’re thinking about results. They’re asking themselves, how does this move us forward? What does this mean, changes, or gets better for me? And that’s where you need to connect the dots for them. Do not leave it up to them because they may not do it at all, or they may make the wrong interpretation.

So I want to give you a concrete tool for this. And I call it the so what ladder before sharing any update or recommendation, ask yourself, so what three times. So for example, let’s say you just streamlined a reporting process. So first ask yourself, so what? Well, it saves two hours per week. Okay. So what that it saves two hours per week. Well, that’s a hundred hours annually across the team. All right.

Melody Wilding (16:49.292)
So what? Well, that’s about $25,000 in recovered productivity that we can reinvest in other client work. So do you see how each so what gets progressively closer to why this matters? Why would someone else or a decision maker care about this? And this approach is so powerful because many of us tend to be very modest. We downplay our achievements. We don’t want to feel like we’re bragging.

But when you frame your work this way, it’s not about bragging. It’s about making the connection for them. You’re not saying like, look at how great I am and all the wonderful things I did. You’re saying, look at how this work contributes to our larger goals. want to give you a word of caution here though. Do not save the impact for the end, like some big reveal, like you’re pulling back the curtain. Remember our previous point or our previous point rather do not bury the lead instead.

start with the business impact, then outline how you got there. So for that example I mentioned a minute ago, you might say, well, we identified a way to recover about $25,000 of productivity each year by streamlining our reporting process. Let me walk you through how we did that. So this approach respects your audience’s time. It positions you as a strategic thinker who understands the bigger picture. Your last tip.

for a powerful presence during meetings is to be concise. More words do not equal more value. It’s actually the opposite. More concise is usually better. Fewer words strengthen your message. More words soften it. So this can be a challenge for us who are sensitive strivers because we often use over explanation as a form of self protection.

We think that if we share every detail, every consideration, every possible angle, it shows we know our stuff. But the most successful communicators, they make their point clearly, and then they get comfortable with silence. They are comfortable with letting their words land, and they know that gives other people time and space to process it and respond. And here’s where we need to do a bit of internal work and reframing, because that urge

Melody Wilding (19:12.13)
to fill the silence, to jump in and just add one more thing, to qualify your statement. That may be coming from a good place, but what you’re really doing is managing your own discomfort because that is your inner critic saying, well, what if they didn’t understand? What if they didn’t think I was thorough enough? But remember, if people need more information, they will ask for it. They’re adults. And when they do ask, that’s actually a huge win because it means they’re engaged with your ideas.

So in this episode today, we covered a lot. We talked about the three elements of executive presence, what you do, what you say, and how you say it. You hopefully now can see how your thoughtful nature is actually a strength when it comes to developing in this area. And we covered four tips for greater presence in meetings. Speak early, don’t bury the lead, focus on impact, and keep it short and concise.

So I would love if you come over to LinkedIn, to Instagram, let me know what you’re going to try. And if you enjoyed today’s episode, then you’re really, really going to want to get yourself into resilient. This is my three month signature group coaching experience that shows sensitive strivers like you exactly how to get your voice heard at work, how to get out of your own way and become more confident, more calm, more in control.

of your career and your reactions at work. So head to melodywilding.com slash resilient for the details. That’s melodywilding.com slash resilient. You can also head to the link in the show notes and I’ll see you on the next episode.