The Art of Leadership
A live meeting or virtual conference is the perfect showcase to enhance your audience’s perception of their leaders and organization. The purpose of the meeting should be clear to your audience and it should roll out with style, class and personality–while being budget appropriate. One time a member of a hotel staff asked my client at a pre-conference meeting what the theme of the meeting was and what would make this meeting special. The answer he received was, ‘a well-run meeting reflects a well-run organization. That’s our theme!”’
How to Act Like a Leader
Admired leaders are accessible and outgoing. A meeting leader, especially in a virtual setting needs screen presence. A leader should display the four C’s — competence, confidence, calmness and control to the audience. These qualities can be learned through practice and can make you a more effective leader.
- Competence
Nothing helps a leader’s image more than a demonstrated sense of competence. Wise meeting leaders never attempt to step in front of a meeting without being well-versed on the subjects to be covered. They prepare by knowing what they should accomplish and what is needed to drive that accomplishment. They understand, in advance, what problems, questions and comments might arise and they are prepared to handle them should they come up.
- Confidence
Confidence is in large part a by-product of competence. The leader who knows the subject matter and their company objectives has reason to be confident. Confidence is essentially, an outward expression of an inner sense of security.
Confidence and a sense of competence come from feeling secure about the subject at hand. Confidence creates charisma, and that’s what people look for in a strong leader. When participants spot it, they, too, feel confident about the outcome of the meeting and that helps improve the quality of their participation.
- Calmness
Nervousness before a group stems from two sources. One is the adrenaline that automatically pumps into the bloodstream–it’s nature’s way of preparing the body to react quickly in a stressful situation. Most speakers feel an anticipatory rush of adrenaline a few minutes before they go on stage. Experience teaches them the adrenaline surge is short lived and typically subsides once they begin. Nervousness in front of a group is not a physical or psychological deficiency. It is a normal, healthy reaction to what is perceived as a stress filled situation.
The second source of nervousness is uncertainty. A leader who does not know their material, or their audience well, may not convey their messages effectively. The obvious antidote is to know the subject thoroughly, take the time to prepare a solid presentation and practice it as many times as necessary.
- Control
Leadership, according to President Dwight Eisenhower, is “the art of getting someone else to do something you want done because he wants to do it.” In practical terms, this means that a leader must know how to inspire and motivate their people. The meeting leader has two important roles: moderator and facilitator. The leader controls the meeting’s pace and direction. Ideally, the leader keeps things on course, maintains an orderly progression and steers the ship if it encounters any shoals or sandbars. In mission-oriented meetings, where problems are to be solved, or policies hammered out, the leader’s job is to generate discussion, drive the group towards a resolution and pull everything together in a final summary.
Good presenters and speakers approach the podium, or the screen, in a calm fashion and take a few seconds to let the audience settle in. They look at the audience, or camera, and hold that gaze for a few seconds. All of this gives the adrenaline a little time to subside and reduces any nervousness. It also gives the audience an opportunity to prepare to listen.
During the talk, good presenters consciously strive to keep their speech slow, recognizing that most people talk too fast when speaking in public. The best speech is made at a pace about half that of normal conversation. The slow pace permits good enunciation, enabling the audience to hear and understand every word. This is especially true for audiences that include members for whom English is not their primary language.
As the MC, the leader acts as a coordinator and introduces the presenters, manages the time of the meeting, interprets, explains and summarizes content for the audience.
The leader must know how to run the meeting and the participants must be aware of this control. Sometimes the control is exercised in subtle ways, sometimes it needs to be made abundantly clear. Take a look at these examples.
Leadership Cautions
Control can be subtle. Little things can affect the tenor of a meeting, especially if it is virtual, and cause it to come apart or lose its momentum. Little things also can destroy the respect the participants have for the leader. Examples include:
- The leader resents a question from the audience and shows it…questions, even unwanted ones, should be encouraged.
- The leader jumps into the discussion and monopolizes it.
- The leader plays the role of a comic–while some humor is welcome at most meetings, a leader with aspirations to be a stand-up comic can quickly reduce a serious meeting to an amateur vaudeville show
- A comment from the leader comes across as a smack down to a participant, especially a remark of a personal nature…there will always be problem attendees, but a public put-down is never the right way to manage it, take the participant aside during a break and discuss the situation.
- The leader looks confused, unprepared or unknowledgeable…coming to a meeting unprepared is worse than not attending…if there has not been time to prepare, the best course is to postpone the meeting until the preparations can be completed
Racing Ahead
A deceptive kind of inattention occurs when participants are so involved in a meeting discussion that their minds race ahead of the speaker to new ideas. On one hand, racing ahead is a good sign, an indication that participants want to contribute. But it needs to be controlled or much may be missed. The best solution is to listen attentively and jot down one or two word reminders of fresh ideas as they occur.
Leadership Tips
- Strive to be known as a rainmaker, people developer, decision-maker or something else of value
- The old model said that managers did not do anything but “manage…” the new model says lead by example
- If you have nothing constructive to say, say nothing–you will command much more attention when you have something of value to say
- Do not automatically look at change as bad
- Do not micromanage your people, your projects or your own life
- Never say, “That’s not my job”
- Never appear stressed in front of a client, a customer or your boss…take a deep breath and ask yourself, how important is this really
- Never correct a co-worker in front of a customer or client — or anyone else
- Do not tell people their idea isn’t very good–just work at coming up with a better one
- Be more results-driven than methodology-driven
- Gather all available data to support your positions
- Make decisions in a timely fashion, even if you are not 100% certain that it is the right decision…not deciding is a decision as well
- Send thank you notes.
- Always strive for a deeper level of trust and truthfulness with associates
Summary: The Face Value of The Art of Leadership is that becoming an effective leader today is more complex than ever before as you now need to be effective and persuasive in person, on-line and on-camera.
Chapter VII
Impactful Virtual Conferences
Virtual conferences and webcasting have been around for over a decade. With the pandemic came a major increase in the use of these types of meetings. Like live meetings, there are many different types of virtual meetings. To help clarify all of your options a recently published paper entitled Virtual Conferences – A Guide to Best Practices by the Association for Computing Machinery states, “it’s not just about the technology that supports them, but about rethinking and retargeting the things that organizers and participants normally do with new media and new forms of interaction.” In this detailed guide you will learn about the variety of virtual events you can host, from straightforward conference calls, Zoom and WebEx video conferences to professionally produced day long conferences or events.
Our production team at Esprit Productions has worked on many hybrid events with a live audience, and a world-wide virtual audience over the past 10 years. Here’s what we produced at a Nielsen Customer Conference hybrid event. http://espritproductions.com/events-university/stand-out/
Today’s pandemic has created the need to change the way you produce major virtual events or conferences with impact. Take a look at how you can turn your next webcast into a show.
Summary: The Face Value of Virtual Conferences is that in the near term it will be our main means of directly communicating with our core audiences. Try these ideas. Be strategic. Be bold. Good luck and good meetings!
