Umgeni Toastmasters Blog

Your body might be sabotaging your career. Not on purpose; your heart’s in the right place. In fact, you’ve mastered the basics. As a Toastmaster, you’re way past avoiding eye contact, wussy handshakes and the proverbial fig leaf arms. Beware of three more subtle nonverbal cues that can seriously damage your credibility as a leader.

Making Yourself Small
When it comes to confidence, I’m in agreement with social psychologist Amy Cuddy: “Don’t fake it until you make it. Fake it until you BECOME it.” Her well-known TED talk provides important evidence that our body language shapes our own confidence, not just our credibility. Her research shows that closed arms, slouched postures, neck-rubbing and other self-protecting poses actually impact our hormones, making us feel less confident. Those feelings then further shape our non-verbal behavior, and the cycle continues.

If you want to become more confident, open up your arms and stance and take up more space in the room. Being more aware and deliberate about your body language will not only help you look strong; it will actually help you feel more confident.

When you’re in a meeting, check your posture every 15 minutes. Notice what your body does when you’re not paying attention to it. Do you have a tendency to make yourself larger, or smaller? Try doing yoga, and take note of how poses like the Warrior and the back bend make you feel.

Choosing the Wrong Seat
I’m not talking about the power dynamics of working your way to the head of the table. It’s about choosing to sit on the sidelines rather than pulling a chair to the table. If you don’t belong at the table, you shouldn’t be in the room. If you’re running a meeting and there aren’t enough chairs at the table for everyone, get a bigger room or find a different approach. You won’t build confidence or create engagement by casting people to the sidelines.

Letting Your Stress Show
This takes many forms, from coming in late and disheveled, to fidgety impatient behavior or chronic multitasking in meetings. “You look stressed” is not a compliment or a badge of honor for how hard you’re working, or how much you’re taking on. Calm and collected breeds confidence.

As celebrated dancer and choreographer Martha Graham says, “the body never lies.” Paying close attention to what your body is telling you and others will go a long way in bolstering your credibility.

This article is from the March 2016 edition of the Toastmaster magazine.

What are the 10 qualities that make a great leader, and a more human one too? What are the attitudes and attributes of those who step into the arena and lead their teams to achieve the success trifecta—a great business, a happy team and a fulfilled leader? In my view, it boils down to having all of the following.

1. Positivity—It’s what I call “looking at the literal world in a favorable way.” You are certainly not a Pollyanna, but the arrow must always stay pointing up.
2. Purpose—You must have a place to which you want to lead someone, or a group (or yourself), that goes beyond just profit.
3. Empathy—You have to be able to walk a mile in the other person’s shoes, and apply the Golden Rule.
4. Humility—You want to make your team better than you. You shine the light on them. It’s not about you.
5. Will—You have to really want to get there, somehow, some way. And that needs to be right on your sleeve for all of your team to see, and feel.
6. Relentlessness—Your positive tone, message, vision, values and expectations are out there, constantly, week after week, day after day, hour by hour.
7. Persistence—You are never satisfied. The bar can always be raised.
8. Curiosity—You don’t know everything, so first you need to admit it. You want to keep learning, and learning and learning.
9. Trust—It’s the sacred bond between you and your team that must be earned, not just be freely given or taken.
10. Positivity—You have to love leading your team, and not be afraid to talk about it, or express it.

The 8 Principles of More Human Leadership

• Crossing the bridge from “I” to “We”—It can’t be about you. It’s about a team.
• Asking for trust and keeping your promises—Integrity is an absolute must.
• Establishing a mantra of key values—It’s the glue that holds all of us together.
• Finding and teaching more human leaders—The legacy must be passed on; we can’t do it ourselves.
• Building a culture of accountability—It’s all about fair- ness and shared responsibility.
• Measuring, monitoring and managing with the right metrics—The team needs to know where they stand, and what they are aiming for.
• Fighting complacency and the naysayers—Inertia is a momentum killer. So are those who still desire the old ways.
• Connecting it all to a higher purpose— Humans want to be part of a meaningful cause that’s bigger than themselves.

This article is from the May 2016 edition of the Toastmaster magazine.

TERRY “STARBUCKER” ST. MARIE is a writer, consultant, entrepreneur and startup investor living in Portland, Oregon. He’s also the co-founder and publisher of the media platform focused on Oregon entrepreneurs, BuiltOregon.com. He has been named one of the Top 100 Leadership and Management Experts by Inc. magazine. Read more at www.terrystarbucker.com.