5 Powerful Tips For How To Be Confident in Business Meetings

I wanted to share with you five ways you can be more confident in business meetings, in dates, in relationships, and in anything that you do. Let’s get right into it.

• Number one: Have good posture and body language

Now let's do a little experiment. Imagine you walk into the meeting, I'm at the table and I'm seated slouched in my seat. What do you think about me? What are the thoughts or judgements you make? Lazy, uninterested, maybe confident. It could be a lot of different things.

What if I'm seated up straight and rigid and greet you with a plain hello? Now what do you think about me? Stiff, boring, nervous? The things we don't want. What we want is good high status body language, shoulders up, spine up.

Imagine there's a string that's connected from the top of the crown of your head to the ceiling and it's pulling you up so that your body language is good. Not too good because you don't want to be seen as rigid or unapproachable but you don't want to be slouched over because then you look like a pushover. Somewhere in the middle, nice and relaxed works best. When it comes to body language, it's more about avoiding the leaks of low status body language as opposed to getting it right.

• Number two: Speak early and often in the meeting to use role theory in your favor.

You’re probably thinking, Jason, what the hell is role theory? Role theory is a psychological term, let me put it in simple terms.

Have you ever realized that around certain friends you act one way but with other people, different group of friends, you act a different way. Maybe you have your friends where you goof around more and then you have friends where you know it's more serious so you straighten up more.

Maybe you have family members who you joke around with a lot and you're very humorous and fun when you hang out with them, then you have other family members where it's very formal and you’re on your best behavior. Why is this? It's because of role theory.

The expectations these people have for who we are actually influences who we are. So think about this. You're hanging out with friends. They expect you to be confident and outgoing for whatever reason. That's just their impression of you. So you go out with them and they're all looking at you like you're the confident guy. He's awesome, he's funny, he tells great stories, etc.

They look at you this way, they encourage you to be this way and they want you to be this way. So guess what? You're going to be that way. It's much easier for you to fit into that role because everyone around you just wants you to be there and you don't want to let them down.

Now imagine you go out with friends and they expect you to be kind of quiet. They expect you not to speak up that much because that's the expectation. That’s the role they've placed on you and you actually won't say that much. You will fit that role. Now as you evolve as a human being, none of these roles should have an effect on you, but for the time being, they probably do.

So here's what we do. Make sure that in the first minute when you meet the other people in the meeting, you act a little bit more confident than you’re used to. That doesn't mean you stick your chest out and say, “Hey what’s up. I’m the boss”. I mean, be warm and be present, make good eye contact and express yourself. Maybe you crack a joke so that everyone’s first impression around you is "He/she is a really confident guy/ girl". Then the rest of the meeting, because they are expecting you to act this way, will be easier for you to act this way. It's almost like you're using psychology in your favor.

• Number three: You want to dress better than everyone else in the room or in the meeting.

This just gives you a little leg up and a little bit higher status, which gives a little more confidence, a little more oomph in the meeting.

Let me tell you about the first time I went to Dan Pena's Castle Seminar, the billionaire, the $50 Billion Man. For starters, the seminar is in Scotland and you get one hour with him alone. So I get my one hour with him and I have no idea what to expect. I'm on this couch and his two giant dogs are on the couch with me. The first thing he'll ask you if you go to the seminar is, "How can I help you?" and then it's on you to make the most of the next 60 minutes because that's what you got.

So he says, "How can I help you?" and I told him, “I'm here, I'm stuck on this. I had these plans but I'm not sure what to do, etc”. Then he tells me “Let me just stop you there. Is that how you dress?" Now note, to go to the castle seminar, you have to be wearing a suit the whole time. It's one of his rules now.

I'm not a suit guy. I don't like suits. I'm like a freedom nerd. I just want to be free. So I didn't own a suit before the event. Two days before the event, I went to Nordstroms and I bought what I thought was a really nice suit, a $2,500 Hugo Boss suit. The guy at the Nordstrom store said I looked good. I thought I looked good.

So I go to the seminar and Pena goes, "Is that what you're wearing? That's the ugliest suit I ever seen. You look poor." I instantly thought, "What?" and he goes, "Listen, if you want to sell to a more affluent market, whatever… You can’t dress this way. You need a Tom Ford suit. Because that's what the kids are wearing these days”.

So he tells me to go to Tom Ford, get a nice suit and get rid of this crap. This stuck with me but he said, “You only get one shot at a first impression". That was the first thing of the many different things that he told me.

Yeah, I may still wear shorts and a t-shirt because I’m a freedom nerd, I'm all about freedom. I want to do what I want, when I want, with who I want. And I want you to do the same, and if that means not wear a suit, I'm not going to wear a suit. But if I'm going into a really important business meeting and I know that suits are the norm in that scenario, then I will wear a suit.

This can also apply in non-business scenarios like when you go out with your friends. If you're going out to bars, this one rule can have a huge effect on how other people see you.

• Number four: Using a time constraint due to social proof - but you do it in a friendly, caring way.

Number four is powerful. It's also based on deep psychological principles so use it in the way that your moral code wants you to use it.

One of my good friends Dan Fleyshman is the most connected guy on Instagram. He advises the Kardashians, Cardi B and all these different people on their Instagram. Before he did that, Dan started an energy drink company and he would drive around America to all these different stores, gas stations, Costco, etc. to try to get his energy drinks sold in all these places.

He would sit down at the meeting with Costco, for example, and he'd say, "Hey guys, so excited to meet with you here today. By the way, just so we're all clear, I have to go in an hour. I have another meeting with Sam's Club right after. Hope that's okay. Let's get started." And just like that, how much more does his status increase? He's more in demand. Now, Costco is competing with Sam's Club. It's an instant way to use psychology to become more confident or appear more confident in all of your business meetings.

• Number five: Win before.

This is an old Zen saying and what it means is that before the battle begins, you should have already won. You shouldn’t be entering into battles that you're not going to win. So what I mean by this is before business meetings, all this stuff I'm giving you is great. But do your research! Just know what's going on. What are they thinking? What are your prospect's needs? What are their challenges? What are their goals? What have they tried that hasn't worked so far?

The more you can understand about where they're at, the more confident you will be in the meeting. You’ll actually know what you're talking about when you talk about them, like their problems, their challenges, and their opportunities. So make sure you do your research and if you stack that up with the body language tips, dress for success advice, psychology insight and all the other stuff I gave you here, you're going to do great in all of your business meetings and frankly in your entire life.

Talk soon.

-  Jason Capital

Recognized Top 100 Entrepreneur By The White House

Best-Selling Author, Guest Contributor To Forbes, CNBC, Entrepreneur