Practical Eloquence Blog

Max Cred Factor #7: Professional Look and Feel

By Jack Malcolm / 3.7.2014 / 1 Comment

Can’t wait to hear what he’s got to say

It’s a tiny bit ironic that this post is appearing on a Friday, which is a day when sharply-dressed, professional-looking people suddenly become casual and appear in the office looking like they just rolled out of bed at camp.

Although I haven’t seen hard evidence, I firmly believe that how you look and dress can affect how you feel about yourself and therefore how you perform. But evidence certainly exists that shows how you look and dress can affect how others perceive your competence and credibility.

Your appearance actually works in the same way as credentials do, in that they form others’ impressions in advance of anything you do or say; people generally see you and begin making judgments about your credibility even before you open your mouth. Ideally, your credibility should be judged by the quality of your content and your communication skill, not your appearance or dress, but the reality is that your appearance does make a difference, sometimes so much so that it will determine whether you even get heard (or interviewed).

A professional appearance shows pride, authority, and respect for others. Without even saying a word, what you wear can have a significant effect on how others see you. In a study cited in Joe Navarro’s excellent book, Louder Than Words: Take Your Career from Average to Exceptional with the Hidden Power of Nonverbal Intelligence, experimenters had an associate “lose” his wallet where others could see it. When the associate was well dressed, people returned it 83% of the time. When poorly or casually dressed, they got their wallet back 48% of the time.

Remember, credibility is not something you have, it’s something that others give or withhold, depending on what you do, say, and how you look. So you can decide to “be yourself” and not care what others think, but as Navarro says, “If your attire says you don’t care, trust me, others won’t care, either.”

Appearance is like an effective slide: it should support your communication goals without calling undue attention to itself. That’s why it’s a good idea to dress up or down to your audience’s expectations.

The way you sound also affects your credibility. Part of professional look and feel is how you sound. Avoid verbal typos, such as using words like “irregardless”, or mispronouncing words that you’ve picked up only through reading. If you’re not sure about your wording, ask others to point them out to you. I also note an increasing tendency to use profanity; Guy Kawasaki tells us in one of his books that it makes you more influential. I think he’s full of—stuff.

I began with appearance and sound because they are the most immediately apparent to someone else, but probably the most important factor in maintaining a credible look and feel over time is your professional demeanor. Are you always outwardly in control of your emotions and actions? Losing your temper, appearing frazzled all the time, or bringing your bad mood into the office can be a serious drain on your credibility.

So, now that you’ve read this, get on with your Friday. But tuck your shirt in first.

Persuasive communication

Max Cred Factor #6: How to Ruin Your Credibility

By Jack Malcolm / 3.6.2014 / No Comment

The self-inflicted ones are the worst.

So far in this series we’ve focused on the positive steps you can take to build credibility, but credibility can be a very fragile asset, which can blow up in an instant or lose power over time if you don’t guard it carefully. There are probably an unlimited number of ways to ruin your credibility, but here are some of the most common. Blow-outs are the instant credibility destroyers; leaks take a long time.

Credibility Blow-outs:

When you’re in a hole, keep digging. The conundrum of credibility is that you want to be known as the person who is always right and has all the answers, but that can also get you into trouble. You will be wrong sometimes. It’s inevitable but survivable. As Richard Nixon showed us, it’s often not the initial mistake that brings them down, it’s the cover-up attempt. You have to know when to fold ‘em. It’s OK to fake confidence but never to fake knowledge.

Pretend to be someone you’re not. Joseph Ellis is a respected historian who has written some fine books on American history—none of which I will buy since I found out that he lied for years, claiming in his classes that he had served as a platoon leader in Vietnam. Jonah Lehrer, who was one of my favorite writers, committed a related blow-out: making stuff up, by fabricating some Bob Dylan quotes to spice up his book, Imagine: How Creativity Works.

Get complacent. This happens a lot with people as they rise through the ranks and benefit from the Matthew Effect. Those who have earned a reputation for credibility get questioned less, and since we all have more important uses for our time, we may tend to cut corners on preparation and fact-checking. It’s also easy to stop learning…

Have more than two drinks at the office Christmas party. That’s just a representative example to make the point that everything you do can affect your credibility, even if it has no immediate relevance to the issue at hand. David Petraeus found out about that in 2012. Note: Eisenhower never had that problem, which shows that it’s just about impossible to keep a secret for very long nowadays.

Don’t eat your own dog food. That’s just a colloquial way of saying you should practice what you preach. I’ve had competitors of mine who sell training related to sales call planning but haven’t been able to produce their own call plan when challenged by the prospect.

Credibility leaks:

Passion. A lot of people will disagree with me on this one. It’s all the rage to talk about passion as being the most important factor in persuasion and success in general. The problem is that in a business environment, passion is viewed with suspicion. They will automatically question you to make sure your passion is based on more than emotion. Passion is also one-sided, so it can make it easy for you to ignore others’ points of view, and business audiences appreciate speakers who show they have seen both sides of a question.

Get the minor things wrong. Small mistakes are easy to make because when we’re pressed for time we might only fact-check the important bits. But getting a small item wrong is like leaving a loose thread on a sweater—it can unravel your entire credibility. I just read a book which has good sense and excellent stories, but early in the book it had one glaring error in a very minor story about Churchill, and that unfortunately tainted my perception of all the others. Even typos can sap your credibility, if you have enough of them.

Verbal leaks. It seems unfair that you have to worry about all these threats to your credibility and also have to ensure that you don’t have too many “ums”, “likes” and “you knows”, but that’s an unfortunate fact. Don’t obsess about zero tolerance, because that’s not realistic or even desirable in normal conversation, but be aware if it gets to be too much.

Related articles:

Max Cred: How to Build and Preserve Personal Credibility

Max Cred Factor #1: Credentials

Max Cred Factor #2: Lighthouse Content

Max Cred Factor #3: Clarity

Max Cred Factor #4: Confidence

Max Cred Factor #5: The Strategic Approach

Persuasive communication

Max Cred Factor #5: The Strategic Approach

By Jack Malcolm / 3.5.2014 / No Comment

It’s not that complicated

So far in this series we’ve examined the factors that make you credible during the moment of communication. This article is about all the things you can do over time to strategically build and preserve your credibility over time.

As an organizing principle let’s revisit Aristotle’s definition of credibility as a positive answer to these three questions:

Does the speaker have good sense?
Does the speaker have good character?
Does the speaker have goodwill?

Good sense

Aristotle’s good sense is measured by listeners’ perceptions of your knowledge (know what) and competence (know how). They’ll believe you when they know you have knowledge that they don’t, or a successful track record of accomplishment. An established record of competence is especially valuable when you face a situation no one has seen before; in this case people will rely heavily on established leaders.

Specialize. Better not to try to be a generalist at least at first. If you’re just starting out, develop a core strength or expertise, and build from there. While it certainly helps to have specialized training or academic credentials, you can also develop expertise in an area that might be specific to your own company, such as an in-house computer application, or a specific project.

Continuous learning. You get credibility by knowing more about the topic at hand than anyone else in the room, but the world isn’t standing still. Every day generates new information, new research, and people working at least as hard as you are. Stay up to date on your industry and your organization. Think one or two levels above your job.

Maintain a winning record. When you develop a reputation for getting your ideas and projects approved, it builds on itself to the point it can become almost a self-fulfilling prophecy. Develop the habit of preparing carefully and pressure-testing your ideas before you present them. Ask and answer all possible questions and objections, and then ask and answer the follow-up questions. Prepare in plenty of time so that if you discover holes in your idea you might have time to do something about them. Also, pick your battles—best not to lose if you can help it.

Good character

Listeners want to know that you are honest—not only that you’re telling the truth but that you practice what you preach.

Promise and deliver. The best way to develop a reputation for reliability is to be reliable. The standard advice in this area is to “underpromise and overdeliver”, but there are some problems with this approach. First, it’s very easy to overpromise and bite off more than you can chew, either through an eagerness to please, overestimating of your own capabilities, or the planning fallacy. Second, once others catch on to the practice, they will expect more than you promise. It’s best in the long run to make honest, realistic promises and then deliver exactly what you say you will.

Walk the talk. Set the example. It’s all about integrity: don’t preach about thrift and then take a helicopter to the company party (that’s not a made-up example, by the way). There should be no air between your statements and your actions.

Be professional. Character is not only judged by integrity but also by your demeanor and behavior. Keep your temper and composure: remember Howard Dean? He was a credible front-runner for the 2004 Democratic presidential nomination who harpooned his own campaign with one overly emotional moment in Iowa.

Goodwill

This goes back to the old saw that “people don’t care how much you now until they know how much you care”. The deepest expertise and solid character won’t help if they don’t trust your motives.

Have motives that go beyond pure self-interest. Be seen as a team player, someone who supports the organization, who is willing to give up personal advantage for the good of the group. One study showed that the top skill shared by strong business leaders such as Welch and Gates was the ability to convince others that corporate interests came ahead of all others’ including their own.[1] One of the best ways to be seen as credible is to support something that goes against your own interests.

Outside-in thinking. Cultivate the habit of understanding and connecting your messages to the needs of the audience. Make it about them, not you.

Build goodwill. People tend to believe people they like, so rapport is very useful. In addition, the familiar is more credible than the unfamiliar, so the more people know you, the likelier they are to trust you. Network; make friends; help others; listen.

Finally, be vigilant. Never forget that it takes a long time to build a reputation and a short time to destroy one, which is the topic of the next article in this series.

Related articles:

Max Cred: How to Build and Preserve Personal Credibility

Max Cred Factor #1: Credentials

Max Cred Factor #2: Lighthouse Content

Max Cred Factor #3: Clarity

Max Cred Factor #4: Confidence

[1] The study was cited in The Art of Woo, by G. Richard Shell and Mario Moussa. I didn’t read the study, but if you want to: Harrison and Clough, “Characteristics of ‘State of the Art’ Leaders: Productive Narcissism versus Emotional Intelligence and Level 5 Capabilities.

Expression - Persuasive communication

Max Cred Factor #4: Confidence

By Jack Malcolm / 3.4.2014 / No Comment

The two aggressive males face each other, each puffing himself up, roaring and stamping the ground. As they get ready to fight for the prize, each is probably secretly hoping to intimidate the other and avoid a costly fight.

You can see this on a nature show any time, or just check out your boardroom.

Research has shown what most of us take for granted, that confident speakers are perceived as more credible and more persuasive. Listeners are very adept at picking up subtle signals that indicate how much confidence speakers have in their message, and gravitate toward the leadership of people who sound confident.

People respond to confidence. Confidence is credible. Confidence is a survival mechanism. Lacking any objective measure to gauge someone’s competence, we read clues in their behavior. When we see them acting confident we assume they have a good reason to be, and we are less likely to challenge or test their confidence. So confidence can become a self-fulfilling factor in credibility.

How do you achieve the confidence that leads to max cred?

In one sense, this article is almost unnecessary, because the easiest way to show confidence is to feel it, and if you’ve lined up the max cred factors discussed in this series: credentials, content and clarity, there is a good chance you will feel it, and it will show through naturally.

But the mind is funny sometimes, and there is no guarantee that you’ll be able to cash the confidence check you’ve earned. You can have every reason in the world to be confident and still have your knees shake and your voice quake when presenting your idea; maybe you’re in front of a large group, or the stakes are so high that doubt seeps in anyway. If that’s the case, you can take a lesson from those people who are able to project confidence even when they have every reason to be extremely nervous.

If you have the first three elements in place, you can add even more power by consciously cultivating confident speaking habits and behaviors. You have two principal tools to express confidence for maximum credibility: your body and your words.

A Confident Body

Stand up straight and take up space. Even the animals on the nature shows know this one. Make yourself look taller and act as if you own the space around you, and you will look more confident. Interestingly, research has shown that it works in both directions, so you can actually “fake it ‘til you make it”. It’s called embodied cognition: when you act confident, your brain infers that you must have a reason for it, and adjusts its attitude accordingly.

Look people in the eye. In the movie, “Get Shorty”, mob enforcer Chili Palmer says, “Look at me” when he wants to make a point. By forcing his listener to look him directly in the eye, he establishes a dominant position. You won’t want to take it so far in most of your communications, but you should maintain frequent and direct eye contact with your listeners. Although it’s not always true, we believe in Western culture that people who don’t look at us when they speak are concealing something.[1]

Confident Words

Your speaking habits can insidiously subtract power from the persuasiveness of your message, without you being aware of them. You may unconsciously undermine your own message by expressing it tentatively, or by using hedges and hesitations.

Tentative expression. Confidence is largely about relative status between individuals, and we often betray our sense of where we stand by the words we choose. We may “mitigate” our speech by saying things indirectly to avoid upsetting the higher-status person. In a famous example, Malcolm Gladwell provided the transcript of a cockpit communication in which a co-pilot danced around the fact that he was concerned about ice buildup on the wings—leading to the fatal Air Florida crash in Washington DC in 1982. Mitigated speech isn’t always bad—if you never use it you can come across as domineering—but it can be dangerous when your message absolutely and positively has to get through.

Power leaks. Power leaks sap the strength of our words. They include hedges such as “I think that…” and “kinda”; filler words such as “um” and “like”; and the now almost-ubiquitous-among-the-young “uptalk”, in which you end your sentences with a rising intonation so that everything you say sounds like a question.

If you use any of these forms of powerless speech, they’re probably deeply ingrained into the way you normally talk, so it’s not an easy matter to change. The first step is to practice awareness, so that you notice when you catch yourself using them. The best way is to enlist your peers to help; ask them to let you know when they hear them.

When to “dial it down”

It’s possible to overdo the confidence thing. You don’t always have to be forceful and direct to be persuasive; we all know people who are very persuasive and soft-spoken at the same time. Quiet speech may actually convey confidence by showing that someone has enough faith in themselves or in their stance on an issue that they don’t feel the need to force it across. In such cases, being too forceful may make you look defensive or shrill. It may also reduce your credibility, as indicated by the results of a study of jurors who rated the credibility of experts.[2]

Related articles:

Max Cred: How to Build and Preserve Personal Credibility

Max Cred Factor #1: Credentials

Max Cred Factor #2: Lighthouse Content

Max Cred Factor #3: Clarity

[1] It’s not true in all cultures, but that’s beyond the scope of this article.

[2] “Jurors Reveal Which Experts They’re Most Apt to Believe,” Psychiatric News, June 19, 2009.

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