leadership body language with Carol Kinsey Goman

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You may have a leadership title – or tremendous leadership potential — but do you look like a leader? Influencing people’s perception of you is called impression management, and body language plays a key role.

Here are five body language hacks that make you look like a leader:

1. Start With Your Posture

Try this: Raise your shoulders toward your ears. Now roll them back. Now drop them down. Keeping this erect posture with your shoulders back and your head straight makes you look very sure of yourself.

Power and authority are nonverbally expressed by expanding into height and space. When you want to project leadership presence at a meeting, sit tall and claim your territory. Uncross your legs and place your feet firmly on the floor. Bring your elbows away from your body and widen your arm position. Your expanded body language will not only change the way people perceive you – it will influence the way you feel about yourself.

When you stand, be aware that if your feet are close together, you can look hesitant or unsure. But when you widen your stance, relax your knees, and center your weight in your lower body, you look more “solid” and credible.  

2. Make Sure You’re Present

An up-and-coming manager was being groomed for a leadership position, but after attending a staff meeting, her boss took her aside. “Never do that again,” he said. “You didn’t look like you were fully present. You didn’t make eye contact with the speaker, you didn’t join the discussion, and you certainly didn’t look like a leader.”

Her boss made a valid point. You can’t project leadership presence if you aren’t perceived as being present.

At every meeting you attend, make sure you stay engaged by actively participating, making eye contact with, and orienting your body toward, whomever is speaking,

3. Use Gestures That Signal Leadership

Leadership presence is enhanced by using smooth, controlled gestures between your waist and your shoulders. Warmth and openness are demonstrated by rotating hands with palms up at about a 45-degree angle, a way of indicating that you have nothing to hide.  Moving your hands and arms away from the front of your torso is another way of indicating sincerity and security. The more you cover your body with folded arms or tightly-held hands, the more it appears you need to protect or defend yourself.

Authority is shown by rotating your hands palms-down, a nonverbal way of saying, “Hold that thought.” The steeple gesture (where the tips of your fingers touch, but your palms are separated) is a sign that you’re sure of what you’re saying. As such, it can be very effective when you want to emphasize a certain point.

Gestures to avoid include the “fig leaf.” Most people unconsciously clasp their hands in front of their lower body, creating a protective fig leaf effect. Whenever you use this gesture, especially during a formal presentation, it indicates that you’re insecure or uncomfortable. A better choice would be to clasp your hands at waist level.

Gestures are a key part of how people perceive you. Using a variety of gestures helps you connect with your audience. You’re more compelling and convincing when you talk with your hands – as long as you know what they are saying.

4. Sound Like a Leader

As a leader you can be sure that people will not only be listening to your words, they’ll be evaluating how you say what you say.

Speaking loudly and quickly makes you sound confident – unless, of course, you are shouting, which makes you seem rude and insensitive. Speaking softly can be effective for signaling a confidential or very important message. But always make sure you are speaking with enough volume to be heard. And remember to enunciate and speak clearly.

Put enough emotion in your voice to avoid a monotone delivery that sounds as if you’re bored or detached. I’ve heard leaders praise people in such a flat tone of voice that none of the recipients felt genuinely appreciated.

By the way, when you’re speaking, don’t be concerned with filling every moment with words. Instead, try pausing. It’s unexpected, it’s attention-getting, and it’s effective . . . very effective.

5. Ace Your Business Handshake

In the workplace, warmth and welcome are transmitted by shaking hands, and this seemingly simple greeting may be what someone remembers most about meeting you. That’s because touch is the most primitive and powerful nonverbal cue.

Be aware that people are personality judgments based on the kind of handshake you have. A weak handshake may mark you as “too timid for leadership.” And the “bone crusher” — where s person squeezes too tightly – almost always gives the impression of being overbearing or insensitive. The perfect handshake is firm, with palm-to-palm contact, so that the web of you hand (the skin between your thumb and first finger) touches the web of the other person’s hand. The more skin you can contact, the more you come across as trustworthy and reliable.

Remember to offer your hand with your palm facing sideways. If you extend your hand with the palm up, it makes you look submissive. When you hold out your hand with the palm down, or if you twist your hand downward during the handshake, it sends the message that you feel superior. But when you offer your hand sideways, it sends a message of equality and self-confidence.

Try these five body language hacks. You may be surprised to find that these simple nonverbal cues can give a powerful boost your leadership presence by positively influencing the way others perceive you.

About Carol Kinsey Goman Ph.D.

Carol Kinsey Goman, Ph.D. is an international keynote speaker on Leadership Presence and Body Language for Leaders for corporations, conventions, universities, and government agencies. She will be doing two IMS programs this November in Kansas City and Los Angeles. You can learn more about the program HERE. Carol can be reached through her website: https://CarolKinseyGoman.com.

leadership body language with Carol Kinsey Goman

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He’s the boss, she’s bossy. He’s assertive, she’s domineering. He strategizes, she schemes.

He’s powerful and likeable, she’s powerful or likeable.

As males rise in rank and status at work, they retain (and often increase) their perceived likeability – so they can be both powerful and likeable. The Double-Bind Paradox states that women must project authority in order to advance in the business world, but the more powerful they appear, the less they are liked. Catalyst, an organization that studies women in leadership, calls this the “dammed if you do, doomed if don’t” dilemma. Their research shows that women in power can be seen as capable or likeable — but rarely both.

Blame it on the stereotypes we hold of women as nurturing, sensitive and collaborative, When their behavior is congruent with these traits, women are liked, although not seen as especially powerful. When their behavior runs counter to the stereotype, they are perceived more negatively. A frequently cited Harvard Business School study, the Heidi/Howard case, shows that when the same highly assertive and successful leader is described to grad students (of both genders), that person is seen as far more appealing when given a male name instead of a female one.

Does that mean that female leaders are indeed “dammed or doomed” as Catalyst suggested? Well, maybe not.

One encouraging possibility that addresses this bias comes from another study at Stanford Graduate School of Business that found businesswomen who are assertive and confident, but who can turn these traits on and off depending on the social circumstances, get more promotions than either men or other women. This research suggests the most successful women have developed a strategic ability to read a situation and alter their behavior accordingly.

Here’s where body language comes in.

When working with a leader, followers continuously and unconsciously assess her nonverbal signals for warmth (empathy, likeability, caring) and authority (power, credibility, status). So knowing how your body language cues are most likely to be perceived can be the first step to being able to move successfully from making one impression to the other.

Take head positions, for example. Head tilting is a signal that someone is listening and involved — and a particularly feminine gesture. As such, head tilts can be very empathetic and warm, but they are also subconsciously processed as submission signals. (Dogs tilt their heads to expose their necks, as a way to show deference to the dominant animal.) Remember to use head tilts when you want to demonstrate your concern for and interest in members of your team or when you want to encourage people to expand on what they are saying. But when you need to project power and confidence — when asking for a job promotion or giving a presentation to senior management — keep your head straight up in a more neutral (and authoritative) position.

Then there is the matter of posture. Status and authority are nonverbally demonstrated through claiming height and space. Watch the high-status males in your organization. They almost always expand into available space and take up room. So, when you want to project status, remember to stand tall, pull your shoulders back, widen your stance, and hold your head held high. On the other hand, when you want to display empathy or increase collaboration, you’ll also want to minimize your power signals, and replace them with warmer ones — forward leans, head nods, and aligned shoulders, torso, legs pointed toward whomever is speaking.

Gestures Send a Message

Gestures, too, send their own messages, and by paying attention, you can make sure they are sending the right message. Since early history, people showed their palms to one another to display the fact that they were unarmed – and therefore friendly. Open arms with palms showing indicate candor and inclusiveness, so they are very effective when you want to proclaim your sincerity or build trust in a group. Projecting confidence and certainty is achieved by “steepling” (finger tips touching, palms separated) or rotating your hands palms-down. Both gestures indicate that you are absolutely sure of your position. (Just watch that you don’t overuse them and weaken the impact.)

It’s a similar issue with physical animation. When you want to pull people into a discussion, stay animated in your facial expressions and use your hands as illustrators to make what you are describing more vivid. But when you want to maximize your authority, maintain more of a “poker face” and minimize your gestures by keeping them smaller and displaying most of them at waist height.

The obvious implication of the Stanford research for women who want to advance in their organizations is to master the ability to display competence and power when the situation requires it, and to signal warmth and empathy when it is most effective to do so. That’s how body language can help you defeat the Double-Bind Paradox.

Carol Kinsey Goman, Ph.D., is the president of Kinsey Consulting Services. She’s an international keynote speaker and an authority on the impact of body language on leadership effectiveness, and her passion is helping talented women build their leadership presence. Carol’s clients include over 200 organizations in 25 countries. Her programs for women leaders have been presented at events including European Women in Technology, Amazon, Women@Google, Expedia – Global Women’s Conference, Executive Women’s Forum, Stanford University, and UNC School of Government – Engaging Women in Public Service.

Carol is a leadership blogger for Forbes and the author of twelve business books including The Silent Language of Leaders: How Body Language Can Help – or Hurt – How You Lead. She has been cited as an authority in media such as Industry Week, Investors’ Business Daily, CNN’s Business Unusual, PBS Marketplace, the Washington Post’s On Leadership column, MarketWatch radio, and the NBC Nightly News.

Dr. Carol Kinsey Goman is presenting two programs for IMS in November in Los Angeles and Kansas City. Sign up to experience these highly interactive sessions.

leadership body language with Carol Kinsey Goman

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I have been speaking on the topic of leadership presence for several years, but only lately created a program designed for women – and the question I get most often is, “Why focus on women?” My answer is, as they say in the commercial, “Because we’re worth it!”

We’re highly educated. According to the National Center for Education Statistics, women make up more than 56% of college students nationwide.

We increase innovation. An economist from Carnegie Mellon found that teams that included at least one female member had a collectively higher IQ than teams that had just men.

We make organizations more profitable. The Anita Borg Institute for Women and Technology, recently published a paper called The Case for Investing in Women detailing the huge difference that women make in the workforce. One of their findings is that in Fortune 500 companies with at least three female directors, the return on invested capital jumped over 66%, return on sales went up 42%, and return on equity increased by 53%.

But here’s the rub. Leadership presence doesn’t automatically come with your education, your talent for innovation, or your business results. Instead, leadership presence is entirely subjective. It depends on how others perceive you. And it’s different for women who face external challenges when it comes to being perceived as leaders.

One of the most pervasive obstacles is Unconscious Bias. Few people would consciously think that a woman can’t be a leader. But Unconscious Bias appears in numerous studies. For example, when researchers ask both men and women to draw a picture of a leader, they’ll almost always draw a male figure.

Women also face unique internal challenges. The Impostor Syndrome is the fear of being exposed as a fraud, of feeling unworthy of your success. While both genders experience it, a female’s self-doubt is more likely to negatively impact her career when she doesn’t exhibit the self-confidence expected in a leader. For example, internal research by Hewlett-Packard found that women only apply for jobs for which they feel they are a 100% match; men apply even when they meet no more than 60% of the requirements.

To complicate matters further, women fall into verbal and nonverbal communication traps that rob them of presence. Here are three of those traps:

Trap #1 – Sending nonverbal submission signals

Sometimes it’s as simple as the tilt of your head. Tilting your head to one side is a warm (“pro-social”) signal that you are listening and involved. As such, head tilts can be very empathetic and inclusive. But they are also subconsciously processed as submission signals. (Dogs tilt their heads to expose their necks, as a way to show deference to the dominant animal.)

Continue using head tilts when you want to demonstrate your concern for and interest in members of your team or when you want to encourage people to expand on what they are saying. But when you need to project power and confidence — asking for a promotion or giving a presentation to the executive team or board of directors — keep your head straight up in a more neutral (and authoritative) position.

Trap #2 – Looking less than you are

Here’s how most women sit around a conference table in a business meeting: Legs are crossed, elbows into waist, hands together on lap, shoulders slightly rounded. In other words, women condense their bodies. If you find yourself in this posture, realize that it could be depleting your leadership presence by making you look less confident, less professional, and less powerful than you really are.

Confidence and authority are nonverbally demonstrated through claiming height and space. If you are sitting, you can still project power by sitting straight with both feet on the floor (which makes you look and feel “grounded”), by hooking one arm over the back of your chair, by making more open arm gestures, or by spreading out your belongings on the conference table to claim more territory.

Remember, also, that if everyone is seated, standing when you speak gives you instant status by becoming — for the moment – the tallest person in the room. And if you move around, the additional space you take up adds to that impression.

Trap #3 – Staying invisible

The head of Human Resources told me that the saddest comment he hears when executives are evaluating potential candidates for high-level positions is, “I have no idea who she is.” I think this happens with female candidates because we are more likely to adopt a “good student” mentality – in which we believe that if we just keep our heads down and do good work, that others are bound to notice and reward us.

Apparently, that’s not the case.

Research with senior leaders in Silicon Valley found that the top criterion for promotion was visibility. One savvy female executive stated it this way: “It’s not enough to be a legend in your own mind. You need to make others aware of your talents and accomplishments.”

Are the executives in your company aware of your talents and accomplishments? If not, you need to increase your visibility by volunteering for key projects, offering to give presentations, publicizing your team’s accomplishments, and taking an active part in your professional associations. You need to broaden and deepen your network and look for mentors and sponsors who will guide and help promote you. Because as gifted as you may be, your leadership presence can only be built by getting out there and letting others see you in action. 

Carol Kinsey Goman, Ph.D., is the president of Kinsey Consulting Services. She’s an international keynote speaker and an authority on the impact of body language on leadership effectiveness, and her passion is helping talented women build their leadership presence. Carol’s clients include over 200 organizations in 25 countries. Her programs for women leaders have been presented at events including European Women in Technology, Amazon, Women@Google, Expedia – Global Women’s Conference, Executive Women’s Forum, Stanford University, and UNC School of Government – Engaging Women in Public Service.

Carol is a leadership blogger for Forbes and the author of twelve business books including The Silent Language of Leaders: How Body Language Can Help – or Hurt – How You Lead. She has been cited as an authority in media such as Industry Week, Investors’ Business Daily, CNN’s Business Unusual, PBS Marketplace, the Washington Post’s On Leadership column, MarketWatch radio, and the NBC Nightly News.