What Top Performers Know About Credibility and Persuasion

Maybe you wonder about your credibility and real persuasion when you're presenting to investors, interviewers, customers or your team. After all, credibility leads to persuasion and persuasion leads to action. It's important to get buy-in for your new idea, and being believable is the first step to advancing your career. So, where does credibility really come from?

I was working with an entrepreneur in Austin on his investor presentation. He had immigrated to Texas, from Eastern Europe, to launch his software business. But something wasn't making sense. "Hold on for just a second," I said, after hearing him go through the PowerPoint deck. "What is your pitch really about?"

Without hesitation, he said he wanted to convince investors that his product and his company were viable. In other words, that his company was credible. Believable. Real.

Now I understood why his presentation didn't add up. He was already running a company that was making over 5 million Euros in revenue. But it wasn't just a random venture - this $5.1 million software company was the basis for the company he was launching here in the United States. Basically, the foundations were the same - same technology, same business...different address. Seemed to me like the other company's balance sheet provided the credibility he needed. The software was proven, and profitable. He thought he needed to convince investors of something that was - at least for me and hundreds of customers in the European Union - already quite evident. 

Pitch This

When you present from a place where you have to prove something, you can miss some important evidence in your business case:

• Inviting Suspicion: have you ever seen someone who repeatedly tries to say that he or she didn't do something...and it invites nothing but questions about what they did? If you are constantly advertising your subject matter expertise, track record, or other accomplishments, suspicion becomes the unintended result. Why do you need to overstate your authority - what are you trying to hide? Is that the right direction for your pitch?
• Sidestepping Self-Awareness: what's most important in a big pitch or presentation: proving who you are, or proving value to your client? Focus on what matters most - and, typically, that's not your LinkedIn profile. No matter what you did in 2016, those days are gone - you have to prove your value, every day. Starting right now.
• Past Performance Is No Indication of Future Results: this maxim, from the investment arena, is a good rule of thumb. Daniel Pink pointed out the importance of potential over the past, in his book, To Sell Is Human. Does persuasion come from what you did last year? For insights into authentic persuasion, remember the words of Thoreau, "Never look back, unless you are planning to go that way."

New Math For New Results

Carmen Simon, Ph.D., writes in her book Impossible to Ignore, "The past is only useful when it helps to predict the future." The past is fixed. You can't change it. It is a given. Could your credibility also be a "given"- something that already exists, so you don't need to prove it? Perhaps there's a gift you can give to yourself, and your career, in your next high-stakes presentation.

For my friend the entrepreneur, the pitch deck was transformed when he realized he didn't need to prove what already existed. When he shifted from having something to prove, to having something to offer, the conversation got much more interesting. He saw that the most important person in the conversation was his audience. And he harnessed the power of persuasion in the process.

How would you present your story if your credibility was a given? Like a variable in a math problem: let x=5.  What if  x = your credibility?

You would probably start to solve the equation. Instead of trying to prove what has already been given to you. 

The Worst Question You Can Ask Yourself In A Presentation

Here it is: "Am I credible?" My client was lost in this consideration and his story wasn't coming through. Here's why:

Would you play a game while staring at the scoreboard? Or your navel? Or wondering about your Meyers-Briggs profile? Sure, that kind of introspection can be useful sometimes, but when it comes time to create an impact: play the game. Stop looking at the scoreboard. Your presentation gets better when your credibility is a given. Proof is in the present, not the past.

The Past Reminds Us, It Does Not Define Us

Have you ever met someone who has overcome incredible circumstances to get where they are? Have you ever seen someone who has overcome personal or professional disaster, and achieved great things? Credibility doesn't come from your past experience. Credibility comes from the experience you are creating for others, right now. In spite of your past, or because of it, here you are. And that kind of 'right now' credibility is the source of true and authentic persuasion for your career.

Everyone wants to be believable, and have executive presence. The good news is: credibility is a given, if you choose to see it. Credibility starts with what you know to be true about yourself - not what you're trying to prove. If you've been asked to stand and deliver, there's a reason you're in front of the microphone. Look, you may not be Captain Marvel, but you've got something to offer, and something to say - something that's more important than the past. Every day is an opportunity to overcome the past, or expand upon it - that's something we can all believe in. What if your credibility was a given? Start there, and start discovering how to create a real impact for your audience.

This post originally appeared in Forbes.