Working hard to fix your “flaws” but going backwards? Try flipping the script.
I want to share a quick case study with you today, and share a powerful technique you may like to try. A few years back, I was working with Gina (I have changed names and some other identifying details), a General Manager in a publicly listed financial services company in Melbourne. Gina had been given feedback that she needed work on increasing her “executive presence and influence”.
Despite her technical excellence, Gina had found herself stalling in her career. She was naturally softly spoken. She reported to Tony, an Executive General Manager who in turn reported to the CEO. Tony was a garrulous type. While he was very supportive of Gina and wanted to see her succeed, his naturally loud and outspoken style made it difficult to see her quieter contributions.
Gina was quiet in meetings. She didn’t interrupt, she deferred to others who were more senior or who interrupted her, and when she presented her ideas she was coming across to her colleagues as hesitant and uncertain.
Meaning well, Tony had coached Gina to improve her presence by being louder and more forceful in meetings. She had tried various tips and tricks like RAISING HER VOICE WHEN MAKING KEY POINTS, and LOOKING PEOPLE IN THE EYE WHEN SHE SPOKE TO THEM. This felt inauthentic (because it was), and worse, came across as “techniquey” and jarring to others. It wasn’t working.
Gina began to focus more and more on these tips and tricks. It was draining, and took her energy away from the main game. She found her impact was actually declining even more, and she was exhausted, throwing good energy after bad trying to arrest the decline.
STOP. IT.
When spinning the wheels faster and faster isn’t getting you anywhere other than burnout, it’s time to stop spinning them and try something else.
There seemed to be two main “problems” limiting Gina: her quiet manner, and her deference to authority. So we flipped the script, asking instead:
• How does being quiet help you?
• How does being deferential to authority help you?
Gina told me that when she is quiet, she gains a lot of information that others miss. She told me she found that when people did listen to her (more often in one-to-one situations), she was able to persuade effectively because her respectful style meant that others weren’t put on the defensive and remained open.
These insights might seem obvious when written here after the fact, but they ignited a flame in Gina. Her eyes lit up, her shoulders straightened and there was a strength in her voice as she began to inhabit this possibility that she was not, somehow, fundamentally flawed but in fact the possessor of valuable skills. Where she had seen herself as “a piece of inadequacy taking up space” (her words!), she began to see herself as a quietly humming machine, taking everything in.
Through tapping into the power of her natural style, Gina began to radiate a genuine strength in meetings. Within weeks, she reported back to me that now, when she spoke in a meeting, people stopped speaking and leaned in to hear what she said. She began to command a room through her quiet, still leadership.
In turn, this gave her the confidence to experiment with speaking up in ways that were new, and which would help build her influence, while still being “truly her”.
So if you are working on eliminating elements of your natural style, instead try asking how those elements help you. You may find a key that will allow you to soften up a little, free up your energy and let you get on with succeeding in a way which is both truly you and incredibly effective.
Madeleine Shaw
I work with clients from executive leadership teams to the front line, helping them to make clearer decisions about what they want, and adapt faster and more easily to change and transition. I use deep purpose as a key to unlock powerful thriving in work and life.
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