For a leader to have impact, authentic presence is an essential quality. Combine it with practiced storytelling skills and you have the ability to influence and set the agenda.
This session will give you practical tools to cultivate your presence and storytelling to have a material impact on your ability to influence to support your leadership growth.
As an attendee, you can expect to leave this session with:
· Practical strategies for cultivating your authentic presence
· A framework for enriching your storytelling skills
· Inspiration of how to use your you newly sharpened qualities and skills to contribute to the world recovery for the good of community and to elevate joy
2. 2
3
Outcomes for Today
Understanding authentic Presence
Practical strategies for cultivating authentic
presence
Inspiration to use these skills to contribute as
the world emerges from the COVID quagmire
A framework to support your storytelling skills
4. “Storytelling changes lives,
it changes the world and we need it;
It teaches and shifts peoples’ perspectives.
It is the totality of all the things I am that
gives the value”
- America Ferrera
5. Mike Anderson Amanda Fleming Simon Sinek
S W O
tealium.com amandafleming.co.nz simonsinek.com
#INFLUENCERTRIADE
11. “As we let our own light shine, we
unconsciously give other people
permission to do the same.”
Nelson Mandela
12. Three Focus Areas
Be in the moment
STATE
Connect
INDIVIDUALS
Find the fun
PLACES TO PLAY
13. Conscious Intentionality
How do you want to show up?
What kind of leader do you want to be?
How do you want your audience to feel?
How do you make sure your actions align
with that intention?
State
17. The most powerful person in the world is
the storyteller.
The storyteller sets the vision, values and
agenda of an entire generation that is to
come …”
- Steve Jobs, 1994
18. Origin/Why
1
Vision/Just Cause
2
Technical Heritage Story
3
Case for Technological Change
4
What I believe as a technologist
6
Professional Motivation
7
Customer Story
5
7 stories every
technologist
should be able
to tell
19. Origin/Why Story
#ORIGINSTORY
Reduce your
memories to 3-4 of
the most significant
Discover
1
2
4
3
Draft and refine
your Origin Story
What are your
most significant
memories
How do these
memories connect?
What are the
recurring themes?
Where you come from and how that influences your motivation
Draft
20. Old
World
New
World
Choosing a Framework
Point of
inflexion
Trigger
WHAT disrupts?
Problem
WHAT needs to
happen?
Resolution
HOW it happens?
Quest
Something
happens
Purpose
WHY it matters?
21. #GROWTHZONE
Create your own personal
story. Keep it to 2-3mins
Step One
Present to someone you
report to or you respect.
Get feedback
Step Four
Deliver it to someone you
trust.
Get feedback
Step Two
Record it.
Give yourself feedback
Step Three
Practice, Practice, Practice
“ ”
“ ”
Get comfortable
with being
uncomfortable
23. 23
“I’ve learned that
people will forget what you said,
people will forget what you did,
but people will never forget
how you made them feel.“
- Maya Angelou
25. 25
?
Actions to Take Away
Identify you influence tirade
Put your desired state to paper
Put another story in your brief case
Craft a Joy story and find a playful
place to deliver it
1min
In the spirit of reconcilation I begin by acknowledging I am hosting this session from the lands of the Gadigal people of the Eora nation,
Traditional Custodians of the land on which I stand today,
and I pay my respects to their Elders past, present and emerging.
Always Was, Always Will Be Aboriginal Land
I also acknowledge the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people participating in this session.
Given the global nature of the conference, I respectful acknowledge the Traditional Custodians of the various lands on which you all gather today.
Welcome to this session on
cultivating authentic presence
through Storytelling
Shoutout to all the sessions delivered so far. What an exciting and inspirational day
Get you pen out or your Evernote ready.
Expect to take home some actions from this session
1-130
We will start by exploring what authentic presence is and how to develop your use of storytelling to support it
You can expect to leave this session with
• Motivation for cultivating your authentic presence
• Three practical strategies for doing so• A framework to enrich your storytelling• Some inspiration for how to contribute joy to our world recovery by leveraging your newly sharpened skills for the good of community
1:3-3mins
For me I became aware of the power my own authentic presence in my 20s when I was introduced to it through a course. 30years on I remember the impact of that weekend vividly, it was a revelation that I could have the most influence by simply being present and myself
Even with this knowledge, in my early years I orphaned parts of myself from the process. Choosing to deliver the parts I knew were most recognizable to my audience which meant core aspects of who I was, were left unseen. My orphaned selves were quite simply left outside the room.
Throughout my life I have continued to explore the application of presence and with it I have integrated my multifaceted self. One of the things I have learnt along the way is the more of myself I bring to the presentation, the stage or the room the more powerful I become. People want to see themselves reflected in a leader so the more I bring my integrate self into the room the more likely this is to happen
As I became responsible for teams it has been about passing on these skills but also building an environment where the team feels safe enough to bring their vulnerable and still integrating selves to the table
3-330
Telling stories that matter with your wholeself has the power to shift perspectives and make a difference in the world
You have permission to be yourself.
It doesn’t need to be presented in a prescribed style to be meaningful, to be impactful
As technologists, being able to bring technology to life for all is a valuable skill and responsibility that we should all cultivate
330-5min
Much of what I talk about today is not original thought
What we are discussing should be attributed to three people who greatly influenced my understanding and application of authentic presence and spinning a yarn.
I am simply passing on what they generous taught me.
Amanda Fleming first introduced me to valuing and cultivating an authentic presence in my 20s. It was her course I first attended and her insight forms the basis for all that I know today
Mike Anderson is the technical founder of the last organisation I worked for, Tealium, his ability to translate complex technological advances into easy to consume stories is amazing
Then finally, Simon Sinek probably a much more recognisable character to everybody here, Simon's work on Start from Why and the Infinite Game has highly influenced my philosophy since I was introduced to his golden circle video 8years ago
Each of us has fundamental influencers in our history. They help form how we show up today and remembering what they taught us can be highly valuable especially in times of stress such as presentations
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So first action of the day, identify your own Influencer Triade
I urge you to
contemplate who you would call out as the people who have most significantly impacted your ability to be present and bring stories to life and why
Hold this, it can be a useful reference point when you have the state wobbles and are unsure of how to proceed
Presence – we know when we see it, when we feel it but its something that is hard to define.
It is often described as charisma, confidence, being compelling. Sometimes people with presence also have these characteristics but not always.
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Presence is about the ability to connect with people and have influence
For a leader to have impact, presence is essential
It is both a quality and a skill and as such can be developed and cultivated.
So if it about connection there are a lot of ways we can have presence.
We can be an introvert, extrovert, we can be a senior leader, an emerging leader, we can not class ourselves as a leader at all and still project a strong and powerful presence.
You will find I use the word leader throughout this presentation because by cultivating presence you will be one by default
This is not about fake it till you make it.
This is about knowing who you are and bring this to surface, authentically.
When the things you say and the things you do align with what you believe
you are congruent and as humans we innately sense congruence or authenticity
I don’t know about you, but I am drawn to it.
When you hold a position of alignment of belief with what you say and how you act
trust emerges
and trust is the ultimate lubricant in teams and across partnerships.
You will find plenty of tools, tips and trick about how to model authenticity,
I believe you exhibit the most authenticity when you are in integrity with yourself
But when we are under stress that is where we struggle most to be present – presenting to a group, job interview, talking to someone you admire, dealing with someone who is in a position of power
How do we find a way to be present in our most challenging situations?
I want you to think about a situation where you are most challenged to be present
Did You approach it with dread,
while in it were you distracted ?
worried about what people were thinking of you.
What you should have just said
or what you should say next
did you leave with a sense of regret where you felt as though you had been unseen.
What you want is to
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approach with composure
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Execute with confidence
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And leave with satisfaction
When you are present you are inviting others to be present with you.
You can create and hold space for all
As you find your presence and with it your voice, you display integrated leadership.
The more we can integrate and display our wholeselves the more we enable others to do the same
So once you have decided presence is important and you have established it is something you can cultivate
there are three areas to focus on:
Being aware of your state and how you want to control it
Connection with individuals within the audience
Finding places to play – places you can play with presenting and storytelling
Your state is your way of being in the moment. If you are conscious of it, it is something you can intentionally guide.
To be in control of your state you need to be clear on
What kind of leader do you want to be?
How do you want to show up?
How do you want your audience to feel?
Once
Make sure your actions align with that intention
So your next action to complete is committing to paper
What kind of leader do you want to be? Me I would say authentic, brave,
How do you want to show up? Here I think about energy, movement, it is why I stand to present
Then
And finally, but most importantly how do you want your audience to feel. For me I want my audience to feel seen, to find belonging
I then use my physicality to then bring action into alignment with intent
I come from New Zealand where there is a Maori proverb that many kiwis including myself hold dear to our heart
hey aha may nui oh teow
He Tangata He Tangata He Tangata
Ask me what is important thing? It is people, it is people, it is people
The same is true when you are present it is about staying connected to your audience, to the people
For me this is about looking out and seeing the people – a little hard to do on Zoom I know
I like to get read on how people are responding leaning in? Leaning out? Sound
I will acknowledge A lot of these connections are better live but it is probably why most speakers like cameras on
There are two ways to think of our third focus area: Place to Play
The first is the most obvious, always be on the look out for places where you can practice presence and tell stories.
Taking it outside of your formal business context is a great way to do this – recently at work they organized storytelling round a virtual campfire, of course I signed up
I put my hand up for WT2 because it represented another place to play
This means when a big work presentation comes along its less daunting and you have more skills
The second way to consider this focus point is you want to be playing with presence, playing with the story to find how it fits you best
Never lose the play from the presentation
Steve was renound for being a great storyteller but he wasn’t always that way,
I understand his original pitch on the Lisa computer was a flop
Storytelling is a strategic business skill that comes from practise not from birth
Great stories build relationships and make people care because our brains actively participate during storytelling.
One of the challenges
Is knowing where to start
and the stories to tell
Most storytellers carry a virtual briefcase of some standard stories that they need to be able to call up on demand.
First there are the personal stories
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Where you came from
Where you are going or your just cause
And your technical heritage story
Then there are work specific stories
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Be able to present the case for why change is needed …. Cause ins’t it always
about at least one customer,
What I believe as a technologist
And lastly your professional motivation
This isn’t definitive list,
your briefcase will grow well past this but these a good selection to start with
Your Why or Origin story is where you come from and how that influences your motivation.
It is your foundation and it doesn’t change though how you tell the story may.
To get the best outcome from this process for defining your Origin story,
it is good if you can pair up with someone you trust who asks good questions to help you.
If you don’t have someone you can still do it on your own.
Start by looking into your past and find the standout memories. Be specific.
What are the recurring themes or patterns?
look for the connections. How did one standout memory influence the next?
You will have way more content than you need so the next step is to reduce down to 3-4
of the most significatant stories and use these to draft you origin story
Once you have the content it is often useful to choose a structure or framework to help you craft it.
I have 2 simple ones here, but you will find plenty of frameworks on the internet.
It doesn’t need to be complex,
it simply needs to provide you with a framework to structure your story
There are two keys to delivering great stories
Crafting the story
Playing with its delivery
Now you have the content and you have it in a structure get comfortable delivering it when you are uncomfortable and get some feedback.
Start by delivering to someone you trust,
move on to getting feedback from yourself(which is actually the round I find toughest )
and finish by delivering to someone who you respect
– expect this round to make you uncomfortable. It suppose to.
If you can do this you should be ready to take your story out into the world.
Once you do, expect it to naturally evolve
Make a commitment now that you will take these steps to capture an Origin story for your self and deliver it three times before the end of the weekend..
If you already have an origin story pick another for your briefcase
Maya Angelou was a very wise woman
All this preparation and what people remember is how you made them feel
As storytellers we have remarkable privilege to use our skills to bring joy.
This is a great exercise to add another story to your briefcase while playing.
Craft another story
This one, has only one purpose- to bring joy.
USe the same process we have just been through and then find somewhere special to deliver it
An example of what you could do here is make it a story for children and go tell it in a children’s hospital
or deliver your Joy story at an Age Care home
We started today by exploring what authentic presence is and we are coming away with four actions
Identify the people in your history that have modelled presence and storytelling for you. ALso identify why you selected them
For your next presence challenge
write down how you want to show up.
how do you want your state to be
How do you want the audience to feel
How will your actions align with your intention
Add one more story to your storytelling briefcase.
If you don’t have any, start by defining your ‘why’/origin
Find a place to play where you can use your skills to bring joy to the world
Thank you for listening.
I happy to take any questions