Anyone can be charismatic

Good Morning. For the next 5 minutes, your career is the most important thing.

In today’s email:

• Anyone can be charismatic with this formula

• How to be more charismatic in conversation

• Little victories are available to us every day

• Give colleagues the benefit of the doubt

• Lee Kwan Yew as career coach

ON YOUR CAREER

Anyone can be charismatic

Charismatic people have the capacity to draw us to them. When used positively, charisma is a galvanizing force to create things. The INSEAD leadership professor, Manfred Kets de Vries, found that charismatic leaders possess the ‘teddy bear factor’: they make people feel comfortable. Susan Fiske, the Princeton psychology professor, found that charismatic people had a blend of warmth and competence.

In the second edition of CareerCoacha we discussed how behaving with warmth could initiate the release of oxytocin in others, predisposing them to trust us and reciprocating positive behavior. In our coaching work, we also see that leaders build trust by being competent in their jobs.

Being warm and being competent is within the reach of all of us. Warmth and competence are the foundations of any of us being charismatic.

Warmth + Competence = Charisma

COMMUNICATION

How to be more charismatic in conversation

Vanessa Van Edwards, in her book Cues: Master the Secret Language of Charismatic Communication, identified simple things we can do to be more charismatic in conversation:

• When first meeting someone, share some positive news

• Angle your body slightly towards the speaker (do this across the table or on video)

• Provide a slow, triple nod to the speaker

• Provide smiles that slowly build

• Relax your shoulders

These tips are about slowing down. To create a relaxed, warm atmosphere where the speaker feels we are interested in what they have to say. This draws people to us.

PRODUCTIVITY

Little victories are available to us every day

Danica Patrick was the first woman driver to win an IndyCar Series race and achieve pole position in a NASCAR Cup Series. Her driving career was built on a series of process goals. Built on a series of ‘little victories’ that she referenced.

In our careers, we can’t control large outcome goals. We can’t make a customer buy from us;.we can’t make our manager promote us. We can, however, make our value compelling by completing process goals with discipline. Process goals are within our control: we can deliver on our commitments to customers and colleagues. Process goals build productivity. Little victories are available to us every day.

1 MINUTE TO HAPPINESS

Give colleagues the benefit of the doubt

Perceived problems with colleagues often have a silver-lining or could be positively re-framed:

Give colleagues the benefit of the doubt - most people, most of the time, wish us no harm. We reduce negative emotions by assuming that our colleagues are well-intentioned. This makes it easier to ask colleagues to change their behavior toward us. An optimistic outlook on people is a happier way to live.

GET SMARTER

Lee Kuan Yew as career coach

Lee Kuan Yew was the founding father of the modern Singaporean state. He served as Prime Minister from 1959 to 1990. Preceding this, Lee had business interests and graduated with a law degree from Cambridge University. As Prime Minister, Lee oversaw Singapore becoming a high-income, multi-racial, diverse economy. Lee’s counsel was sought by many political leaders in Asia-Pacific. A sample of his career wisdom:

If you have specific feedback or anything interesting you’d like to share, please let us know by replying to this email.

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