Owning the Room

People are drawn to and influenced by leaders who communicate authentically, connect easily with people, and have an immediate impact.

Influence starts with highlighting other people, which allows you to be the most memorable person in the room. The best conversations are not about what you say, they are about what you hear.

When you are interested, when you listen, when you let people talk, they feel pleasure. Being interested is only the first piece of the puzzle.

It is so difficult to own the room especially as a younger person. There may be people that do not want to listen to what you have to say and I experienced this when first starting in the industry. For me, it took some time to build that confidence to be able to share my ideas. I remember when first starting in the industry, I began to own the room once I started to focus on valuing one-on-one interactions with my colleagues and leaders. This allowed people to enable me to own the room because the ideas I had helped improved the work environment for all of our team members and at times made our work easier and efficient.

Alfred Sloan took the reigns of VP of Operations at General Motors during a time the company was struggling. Sloan took the approach by visiting every dealership personally to hear the salesmen’s ideas. His listening-driven management style led the company to having over 52% of the market share compared to the 12% when Sloan first started. His approach definitely worked as he values what his people had to say. He once said, “I prefer to appeal to the intelligence of a man rather than attempt to exercise authority over him.”

Sloan led with what he heard, and not with what he said.

In order to own the room and have that leadership presence, it’s the aggregate of the assumptions, communication strategies, and energy. Your assumptions drive what you say and how you appear to others. And in return, your communication strategies and energy influence your mindset.

Here are five ways on how you can own the room:

1.       Confidence

Before owning any room, you have to feel that you are visible. Visibility comes from having the confidence to stand out and participate in meetings.

 This is an area I struggled with when stepping into my first leadership role. I did not know what I was doing and was afraid of judgment. Over time as I had experiences of making decisions, making mistakes, and receiving coaching, I was able to build my confidence. This definitely does not happen overnight, and it takes time to build up. The key in starting to build confidence is to boldly be present in the room and ensure you boldly participate and speak up when necessary.

 2.       Delivery

Attributes when it comes to delivery: energy, interactivity, eye contact, movement, and dressing the part.

Dressing the part is really important and I learned this from several mentors. You want to dress the part for the environment you are in. You want to make sure you are always looking sharp regardless of the environment. It does not mean you have to wear a suit & tie, but look presentable and look like you own the room. Dressing the part helps build your confidence regardless of your role within the organization. This is something that I focused on throughout growing within the organization I work with. It did not matter what my role was, I ensured that I dressed the part and always had a sharp appearance.

 3.       Storytelling

Telling good stories is key to capturing an audience whether it be your company story, lessons learned.

 I find it very helpful when you use stories from your experience to help others learn from your mistakes and lessons learned. Stories engage people. Whenever I share my growth story within the organization, it gives people hope that they also can grow into a leadership position if they push themselves.

 4.       Structure

You need to ensure you are clear with your messaging. Clarity comes from structure, so make sure the narrative flows and makes logical sense.

 5.       Improvise Well

Charming with your spontaneity and wit is a great way to get and hold people’s attention. This is the hardest way because it takes a lot of practice to be a good improviser. However, working in this area will help all the other areas.

 Improvising can be very difficult especially when someone asks you a tough question or touches on a sensitive topic. One thing that I have learned is to always stay calm and be thorough on your explanations so that others can understand. In order to improvise, you have to have that confidence so you can react and respond appropriately.

I truly hope after reading this blog post, especially if you are a young person, that this helps you learn how to own the room. It can be very challenging to own the room and this will definitely take some time, but the key is to build that confidence that I mentioned earlier. Also do not be afraid to speak up when you have a bright idea or see a way on improving the work environment regardless of your role within the organization. A good resource on owning the room is a book by Amy Jen Su called Own the Room (Discover Your Signature Voice to Master Your Leadership Presence). There will also be an upcoming podcast on The Leadership Download that will discuss the topic further this week.