What is Executive Presence?

Executive presence is one of the hottest management topics in the business world. Executive presence features heavily in leadership literature, is a major component of executive coaching and is taught in business schools.

If you google executive presence you will find descriptions that include gravitas, body language, appearance, emotional intelligence (EQ) and integrity. With communications you find pitch, eye contact, speed, vocal range and listening skills. It is often described as how you act, speak and look. All of these are important but are a subset of broader leadership competencies needed to influence and inspire others to achieve great organizational outcomes. The purpose is sustainably impacting people’s lives for the better.

The biggest danger is simply focusing narrowly on improved communication skills. The goal has to be broader motivational skills to lead teams and employee engagement to achieve outstanding business results. It’s being passionate about purpose, performance, and culture to achieve industry leadership results.

Forbes magazine (July30, 2018), said:

“In its simplest terms, executive presence is about your ability to inspire confidence-inspiring confidence in your subordinates that you’re the leader they want to follow, inspiring confidence among peers that you’re capable and reliable and, most importantly, inspiring confidence among senior leaders that you have the potential for great achievements.’’

The good news is that Executive Presence (EP) can be measured, coached, and improved. It starts with using highly reliable, valid personality and 360 assessments and having a return-on-investment approach that understands the causal link between leadership, employee engagement and business results.

This paper shares our research and insights into EP and our approach to building EP competencies.

We can explain the science behind the importance of EP.

Read the full paper here