Are you visible?

Does anyone beyond your own team know what you stand for or what you do?

I was recently working with a Financial Controller who was being asked to step up to the CFO role and one of the key challenges for her was that the CEO was questioning whether she had the executive presence for the role. His concern was that she would not be assertive enough and that she was not well known amongst other senior leaders.

If you are seeking to climb the ranks within your organisation it is essential that people know who you are. The third domain of my executive presence model is Connection because unless you are connected beyond your immediate boss or team members you will go unnoticed.

And when you do have the opportunity to present to or engage with more senior leaders or external stakeholders you need to be able to connect the work you do with the broader purpose of the organisation so that you can speak to their primary concerns.

The truth about my client is that she is very confident about her technical abilities and very capable of asserting her opinions, the challenge for her lay with the fact that she needed to cultivate the relationships necessary for her to be an integral part of the leadership team so that her peers could recognise what she was bringing to the table.

A great strategy can be to create a stakeholder map, laying out who your key stakeholders are and how strong your connections with each of them are, then assessing how you can build those relationships where you can see gaps. I know some of you will be scared off by this idea as you may see it as political game playing but knowing who is influential and understanding the kind of relationship you need to have in order to be heard by them is critical to your ability to influence decision making.

You are unlikely to be given the opportunities to step up if you are invisible so building these relationships needs to start NOW, rather than waiting to be invited to the top table.

You may not have access to all the players right now but where could you start building those relationships?

with love

Sue

PS. If you'd like to set yourself up for the next level of leadership, or you're in a top role and frustrated at the lack of cut-through you are achieving, let's have a chat about how executive coaching can support you to build your executive presence. You can book a call here.

And if you have not read it yet then please download my white paper on Cultivating Your Executive Presence here.