3 Effective Tips To Make Your Presence Felt In A Meeting
Summary: Holding a successful meeting is about looking at it as an opportunity to solve the problem at hand, as well as leaving an impression that remains etched in the minds of everyone present in the room. Do not be a time waster; strive to be a risk taker, a dialogue initiator, and an excellent facilitator.
No manager, no executive, no team has ever been able to fully escape the torture of a seriously impactful meeting. Here are 3 simple and effective tips from a star leader to make your next meeting, and your presence there, both memorable ones.Have you ever been a part of a meeting, which more than half the time seemed almost completely off the point, really unproductive, and therefore had nothing concrete to show for all the time everyone invested in it?
As an executive coach, I know that I should sadly expect the answer to this question to be a big yes. No manager, no executive, no team has ever been able to fully escape the torture of a seriously unimpactful meeting.
This HBR Article on Executive Presence1 talks about a certain Amy and how her boss requested the coach to “make her two inches taller” because she was short, occupied as less space as possible intentionally but had great promise and talent. It wasn’t really the actual height which mattered here, what it turned out to be is her cultural and personal inclinations to not take up much space or stand out amongst other people. When she started accepting that her opinions should be conveyed and she doesn’t have to feel embarrassed about how she walks and talks, she started carrying herself with weight and projecting that she knew what she has. At the end, her boss said that they asked for two inches but “got two feet”! Now she could talk in meetings and interactions with weight and confidence which she didn’t feel comfortable playing with before.
As a coach, I would like to give you these 3 simple and effective tips to make your next meeting both memorable ones.
Turn Your Whiteboard into Their Vision Board
Honestly, no vision board does well unless you have a concrete vision to show. So, first have a deeper understanding of what it is that you want. Take ideas from everyone present in the meeting.2 Throw all those ideas on the board, and try to work out all the possible outcomes for the recommendations you get.
Don't Let a Great Idea Pass You By
Keep your listening up throughout the meeting. Because more often than not, the best idea will come from someone who’s not necessarily an influencer. Being a leader, you’d have to be responsible to give a proper structure to the thought process inside the room, connect the dots on all the suggestions coming in, and therefore give a perspective to the meeting.
Don’t Just Answer; Raise Questions As Well
To have your presence felt in a meeting, you will have to do more than answer the questions raised for you; you will have to ask questions too.4 Without being overly anxious of getting judged by your peers, you as a leader, should be able to provoke a more diverse thought process in the room, bringing everyone more and more in the vicinity of the idea or solution.
Impact on Leadership
Information and control used to flow in a top down manner in the earlier days of people working in corporations and offices. What now works is conversational leadership5, getting up close and intimate with those you interact with, not afraid to share deeply impactful stories and let everyone contribute to the table because the manager does not know it all anymore.
Star Mindset
In all kinds of meetings, leaders make their authority and sphere of influence known. To be a leader in a meeting, you don’t need to call it. The ideal situation for you to be a leader is one where you feel it is vital to motivate others to pursue a course you have mapped forth.
3 Immediately Applicable Action Steps
- When you hear someone say something in a meeting which is not fully formed or articulated yet.
- When the discussions seem to get tangential, stop the discussion for 2 minutes and ask everyone: what do we need to do/discuss most urgently right now?
- If you think your presence is not being clearly shown, start noting down what others are saying and then cross question them on blindspots in their arguments.
References
- Ehrlich, J. (2011, December 6). Developing Executive Presence. Harvard Business Review. https://hbr.org/2011/12/developing-the-presence-of-an
- Ashkenas and Moore. (2022, April 8). Keeping Sight of Your Company; Long-Term Vision. Harvard Business Review. Retrieved October 18, 2022, from https://hbr.org/2022/04/keeping-sight-of-your-companys-long-term-vision
- Nawaz. (2017, December 12). Meetings Would Go Faster If People Took the Time to Listen. Harvard Business Review. Retrieved from https://hbr.org/2017/12/meetings-would-go-faster-if-people-took-the-time-to-listen
- Amber Johnson, J. L. (2018, April 11). Run More Effective Meetings With These 9 Questions. Forbes. Retrieved October 18, 2022, from https://www.forbes.com/sites/amberjohnson-jimludema/2018/04/11/run-more-effective-meetings-with-these-9-questions/?sh=783dace85d50
- Groysberg, B., & Slind, M. (2012, June). Leadership Is a Conversation. Harvard Business Review, https://hbr.org/2012/06/leadership-is-a-conversation
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