Coaching, Executive Presence
Ingrid Gudenas
The secret to presenting to leadership as an ...

Being close to Silicon Valley, we have had many senior executives send engineers and other technical leaders from various disciplines, including finance, to us for coaching on their presentations to leadership.  Their biggest complaint is also their top goal for the people they send. They phrase it like this: There’s too many details in their presentations.

What they mean is, too many unnecessary details. It drives executives crazy. And engineers are at a loss as to what to leave out.

There is a big disconnect between “engineering logic” and “executive logic”. I’ll explain what that is.

Coaching, Executive Presence
Ingrid Gudenas
Transforming Leaders into the Dream Team

A team can be good when it has a star, or even two stars. But it’s nothing compared to a unified, seamless team when you are ALL amazing. This kind of team creates a juggernaut of exhilaration as it makes a common purpose real and broadly felt throughout the whole organization.

It’s a joy to be a star. It’s an even greater feeling of elation to be part of a dream team. You walk that much taller, hold your head up that much higher, knowing that to your left and to your right, your compadres are doing the same.

Dream teams are not the product of some mysterious luck or having a few stars. They’re shaped by practice. And they can happen fast.

Coaching, Executive Presence
Ingrid Gudenas
A woman who does the impossible

Today is Administrative Professionals Day when we celebrate the unsung heroes of the corporate world. I’ve been working with them for decades and my admiration for them is boundless.

This article is about an extraordinary one, Debbie Gross, the author of The Office Rockstar Playbook: How I Leveled Up as an Executive Assistant and Helped My CEO Build a Multibillion-Dollar Company.

Coaching, Executive Presence
Ingrid Gudenas
The real cause of stage fright

When you Google, “How to handle stage fright”, you’ll find many strange suggestions, some  from very prestigious sources. I saw a video posted by a respected MBA program where the solution presented is finding a friendly face and only talking to them.  Audiences hate that. Another impressive source posted a video demonstrating “Power Poses” where you have one hand on your hip and another on a chair. Looks ridiculous when you actually do it. Another respected source recommended drinking orange juice. Makes me wonder if he has investments in the orange juice industry.

No mention of a root cause.

Coaching, Executive Presence
Ingrid Gudenas
The CEO dilemma of self vs mask

I’ve been asked to coach the CEO of a major global corporation.  Google his name and an abundance of videos pop up.  I’m watching portions of many of them to assess where I can help him.

This is a man who has been given so much advice on “how you need to come across”, it overwhelmed and finally drowned his soul.  Unfortunately, he listened to it. It led him into crafting this artificial persona. The persona he’s been told Wall Street and a faceless group of investors demands.

I’m seeing the superficial performance of a well-scripted theatrical role: “the successful CEO you should invest in.”

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The tortured life of Senior Leadership

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Senior executives spend their days listening to endless proposals and briefings. They sit through so MANY presentations, it TORTURES them to listen to presenters who don’t get right to the point.

I’m sure you watch YouTube videos. Have you ever watched one that took a long time to get to the point? You know that feeling you got? Did you ever fast-forward hoping they would get to something good? Did you ever skip out before the end?

Senior executives LIVE with that feeling.

It’s torture. There’s no other word for it.

I’m sure they would wish for a remote control that could fast-forward. And they would use it liberally.

This is how to stand out from this crowd in your executive presentations:

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A night of goodness

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I love tomorrow’s holiday, a great tradition born on a chilly November night, exactly 400 years ago.

Dreamed into being in 1621 by a tough people after endless struggle through long periods of great hardship, tremendous hardship, more than we could ever imagine.

They sat down together as community, and enjoyed a moment of peace, for the simplest of purposes: to be grateful. Together.

Their hardships were not over. Far from over. This moment was no more than “a time out.”

It was a, “Let’s stop what we’re doing and create a night of goodness.”

It was also a perspective shift: “Let’s step back and admire what we’ve created amidst the swirling winds of adversity.”

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Executive presence doesn't work with training wheels

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Many executives who come to me for executive coaching come prepared with their word-for-word script.

What’s the problem with speaking from a script when you’re giving a presentation?

Well…what does a script say about your mindset? About your thoughts and feelings about yourself? Your feelings about the audience? About your true power?

Having a script sends out a lot of messaging about you that you might not want to be sending.

Daniel's "crash course" for impressing senior leadership

What Daniel ran into is what all human beings run into: the more you try to impress others, the more you move away from your true self. You get tangled up in knots. The more you do it, the less impressive you become.

People are not impressed by someone who is trying to impress them. It’s a road that leads to anxiety and defeat.

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