Settle in as Nancy Fraze, the Live Event Reporter In The Field, brings you the play-by-play of the conference for administrative excellence sessions you may or may not have missed. Photos by Brian Burge.

Does your leadership team speak a different language?

First, Joan discussed, “Executive Speak”.

Executives have certain words and phrases they use, and in order to communicate better with them, we need to understand and use them too.

Why? There are three important reasons.

1. Synergy / Partnership. It builds synergy and partnership. We speak their language to build rapport with managers. We create energy and synergy. 
2. Rapport. Building rapport builds a better overall relationship. It “greases the wheels” for success.
3. Persuasion. Persuasion means you can build a case and present it convincingly. You want speak to them in a way so that they will listen. You want to be open to what they have to say. Great leaders are conceptual, and they will communicate conceptually.

Joan shared a quote: “Great minds talk about ideas, average minds talk about events, small minds talk about people.” “What do you talk about?” she asked the crowd.

Joan discussed The Mirror Affect.

The Mirror Affect is to be precise and concise in communication. She urged us to be direct and a straight talker. In order to communicate well, we need to echo their words and phrases, which often are sports analogies. We need to speak with intelligence, thought and clarity. We must be confident and not become rattled in a conversation. We should remain focused, and use pace and pause to engage an executive early on in the conversation.

We did some activities to analyze the phrases and words used within our own organizations

For Executive Presence, we learned it is to project gravitas (confidence, poise under pressure, decisiveness and assertiveness.) We were urged to have good communication including speaking skills, assertiveness, the ability to read an audience or a situation, and an appearance to contribute to a person’s perceived executive presence.

We were taught to:

1. Exude a wow! factor or magnetism.
2. Speak up, use strong and clear language.
3. Communicate with passion and energy.
4. Display positive body language by standing tall, making eye contact and offering a firm handshake.
5. Use an authoritative tone.

“Your workplace is your stage. Show passion!”