The 3 Pillars of Presence
Oct 01, 2023
Your presence affects your influence and impact.
When you show up anywhere, others will instinctively react to your presence.
They will unconsciously pass judgment based on their experience and will look to validate or invalidate their assessment based on your continued actions.
Are you showing up as confident, clear, warm, disciplined, and intelligent?
Or, are you showing up as weak, confused, uncaring, undisciplined, and uneducated?
Your presence is not something to be passive about.
It is something to be actively aware of.
And luckily, you can learn to improve your presence.
In this article, I am going to share the 3 pillars of presence and what you can do to level up your game.
When you think of presence as a skill to develop, you become intentional with how you show up for others.
If you take your presence for granted, you are more likely to not be taken seriously.
That is unacceptable for high-performance, and you deserve to be taken seriously.
Let’s get learning.
A Summary on Presence
Presence is not just about how you look, though that does play a part.
It is the sum of 3 parts:
- Actions
- Appearance
- Words
In other words, your presence is a combination of how you act, how you look, and how you speak.
Here is a quick story about 2 engineers to illustrate this point:
For 8 years I worked at a big tech company.
I worked alongside software developers, and they all were intelligent, skilled, and passionate about their work.
I would have conversations with them about their work, and each was an impressive force to work with.
However, their “presence” was not equal.
There was one engineer (let’s call him Greg) who dressed in will-fitted clothes. He did his hair, spoke confidently, asked pointed questions, walked tall, and exuded calm confidence. He had presence!
There was another engineer who did the opposite of Greg. Let’s call this engineer Sam. Sam had unkempt hair. He wore sweatpants every day. He walked with his head down, never spoke up, spoke with a nervous fluster, and lacked brevity.
Both engineers produced great work.
Guess who got promoted more?
Guess who others trusted more?
Yeah… it was Greg.
But shouldn’t the work results be the only thing that matters?
No.
It is about trust.
It is about connection.
It is about confidence in your work.
Everything you say and do should instill trust and confidence in others.
You can be the smartest person in the world, but if nobody will listen to you or take you seriously, what good is it for?
This is why presence matters.
Presence starts with your behaviors.
Let’s talk about the actions that level up your presence.
How you Act
Actions speak louder than words.
So much of communication is non-verbal.
Every action you take, every movement you make, sends a message about your state of mind.
Are you projecting confidence? Intelligence? Weakness?
There are 3 simple behaviors you can incorporate to level up your presence.
- Stand tall
Improve your posture already. Stand tall with your shoulders back. Sit up straight. Hunching over and crossing your arms sends a non-verbal message that you feel threatened and are protecting yourself. When you stand tall with your shoulders back, you project confidence and strength.
Look around you then next time you are around others. Who do you notice with this posture? Who is unconsciously protecting themselves? What signals are you getting?
- Walk with intention
When you walk calmly, you look in control. When you hurry, you look out of control. Which would you rather project? Also, incorporate the first trait as well… walk with a tall posture. With this behavior, you project confidence and control. You should also feel more confident when you do this.
- Smile
Few things project confidence as well as a smile. Smiling lets the world know you are ok. Also, because we have mirror neurons, a smile will trigger a positive reaction in others.
When you walk anywhere, stand tall, walk slowly with your shoulders back, and smile at people.
Now let’s consider your appearance.
How you Look
You do not need movie-star good looks to have presence.
You do need to care about how you look.
That is all.
Also, intention is usually enough to make a dent in this area.
If you don’t intentionally do your hair, or intentionally choose your wardrobe, or intentionally take care of your body, you look like you don’t care.
If you look like you don’t care, you have an additional hurdle to jump in other people’s minds.
Let’s cover 3 basics for appearance and how it impacts your presence:
- Fitness
The more fit you are, the more positive presence you will exude. This article is not meant to address the “rightness” or morality of reacting to someone’s fitness level. But the fact is, the healthier you are the more others will perceive you are hard-working with self-control.
Also, there are so many other benefits to fitness, it is worth prioritizing this.
- Wardrobe choice
Stop it with the sweatpants and sandals. Dress for success. This does not mean you have to wear a suit. This does mean your clothing choice should be intentional and they should fit. There are tons of resources online regarding style and wardrobe improvements. Do yourself a favor and do a YouTube search. Then let me know which creators are your favorite.
- Hair
Do your hair. This small thing also sends a message: you care. Ladies, a ponytail is fine if it looks intentional. Get rid of the messy bun. Gentlemen, get your hair cut, then learn to style it. If you are balding, either own it or shave it. Balding is not a choice. Bald is.
Your looks will create an unconscious reaction in others.
You also project that you care. When you care about your appearance, people will tend to assume you have attention to detail, self-respect, and confidence. These add to your presence!
So now you are walking tall and looking good. What happens when you open your mouth?
Let’s cover a few tips for communication.
How you Speak
“Even a fool is thought wise if he keeps silent, and discerning if he holds his tongue.” - Proverbs 17:28
Have you had this experience: you see an attractive person who walks the walk… they look great, are dressed well, big attractive smile on their face…
But then they open their mouth, and you think, “ugh, that is not what I thought you would be like.”
Your physical presence makes a statement without words. With your appearance, others will assess and attribute their assumptions.
Then your words validate or invalidate their perceptions.
Just as before, there are a few ways to level up your communication to improve your presence.
- Listen more
When you listen, and I mean REALLY listen, you demonstrate you care. You care about the topic, you care about the info, and you respect the person speaking. From a practical standpoint, listening helps you learn more. From an image standpoint, you appear to be taking in as much info as possible. Wise people listen. So by listening, you project wisdom.
- Speak less
Listen more than you speak and say as little as possible while still making your point.
Brevity is impactful.
Practice pausing and thinking before you respond to questions. How short can you make your response?
- Modulate your tone
Your voice is like an instrument. How beautiful is a song with only one note?
When you speak, leverage the range of your voice. From low to high, and high to low, modulating your tone makes your speech more appealing to listen to.
Monotone will kill the mood.
The Wrap Up
Your presence impacts how others perceive you. Your words communicate a message. Your appearance and behaviors also communicate a message.
When you master your presence, you instill confidence and trust in others. You may also instill admiration and belief.
When you are unintentional with your presence, you may be sending the opposite messages.
Start by checking your body language. Then dress with intent. Then listen and speak (in that order).
Presence is a skill. You can master it!
I hope you learned something today. If you found value in this article, please forward it to a friend!
I hope you crush it today,
Clark