You mention public speaking to anyone and nine times out of ten they’ll groan: ‘Hate it’ or ’Scares me to death’. If you’re a business leader, or an aspiring leader, at some stage you’ll need to speak in public. But that’s not all you’ll need. Learning to lead better is where Oxford Professional Consulting’s Alison Haill comes in and, from personal experience, I know she has a massively positive impact. B4’s Richard Rosser reports.
Written by: Richard Rosser
Speaking at B4 events had always been a necessary evil. It was something I hated. I didn’t prepare, I rushed it and I didn’t maximise the opportunity…..what’s worse, it showed! As part of the process of learning to improve your public speaking, Alison Haill may ask you if she can contact those who have seen you in action and get their opinion. It may hurt but it’s valuable. As with any exercise, ‘no pain, no gain’!
Public speaking was my Achilles Heel, but in addressing that weakness I realised there were plenty of other things I could do better. It’s nice to see your contacts on LinkedIn praise you for certain business attributes, more often than not attributes you wouldn’t normally admit to having mastered yourself. Perhaps LinkedIn should have a weaknesses button too! Because without addressing weaknesses, your strengths will suffer and you’ll never improve.
Getting to the heart of it
Alison Haill has an undoubted skill in getting to the heart of the matter. As she reminded me when we were speaking for this interview, I wanted to practise public speaking, not answer questions about how I worked, how I dealt with my staff or how I felt when speaking in public. But by going through that process, Alison learned what made me tick, where my weaknesses were….most importantly, she found a way in and she could train me in public speaking using terminology which resonated with me.
She’ll never throw a text book at you and say ‘do it this way’. She’ll build your own text book and teach you in your language. That care, that attention, that detail will help you improve and turn a weakness into a strength and along the way address other weaknesses that you thought were lost causes.
Double the impact
Alison aims to ‘double the impact’ of the clients she works with and in my case, she’s clearly achieved that goal. Listening to me speak in public now you might not notice much difference but I feel different and in time I know my new foundation will help me to improve and develop, not stay at the same level I was at previously. Not only do I feel different, I act differently with my staff, approaching tasks and ordering my workload. I have more structure and more confidence. All round, I feel more the leader of my team than I have ever done.
So if you’re a manager and an aspiring leader, just starting out or perhaps the CEO of a successful organisation, Alison will help you to improve the way you manage, lead and communicate with your team, your customers and your market. She’ll boost your confidence, make you think like a leader, act like a leader. She’ll make you believe you’re a leader and that’s half the battle.
“I work with people whose aim is to get ahead, who want to improve. I might work with a seasoned CEO who wants someone to discuss decisions with or content for a presentation. It might be someone from abroad who has perfect English but who doesn’t sound authoritative enough in front of stakeholders and at events. It might be a younger manager, a “high potential” who must attain gravitas fast.
Focus on the Impact Gap
“Some of us find it hard to feel at ease when we are the focus of attention, just like you used to,” she told me. “You admitted to me that you felt unworthy of being the focus at your events and that inhibited you from being your natural self. Your natural self is charming and articulate – you lost that when you had to perform on stage. That’s how I help my clients to be more impactful – I focus on the Impact Gap, the situation where they feel they aren’t making an impact, whatever it may be.
Lead it badly and your team will be mediocre
“A key priority of any business is to make money, so leadership matters. Led well, a team performing at 70% can leap to 90%. Led badly, they’ll be mediocre or worse. If you’re more confident in that role, you can be stronger and more impactful with your team. You’ll inspire them with how you communicate. My role is to enable you to improve that communication and it’s often about confidence.
“A client of mine approached me recently who, on the surface, had no issues. She was bright, charming, articulate and confident, but she admitted that when she was presenting, the very thought of standing up in front of people frightened her. She thought she was being judged. It was my job to find ways around that fear, help her overcome it and gain new confidence.”
Physically we know that if something isn’t operating at 100%, the rest of the body is impacted. A broken toe will stop us from running, even though our legs might be fine and the rest of the body is fit enough to run. The same is true of mindset and confidence. If there’s a lack of confidence in one area that will impact total performance. A good leader will never be great if he or she knows they can’t galvanise the team to perform at their best. In a more public arena, a football manager who can’t get his team to perform loses his job because of bad results and a week later, with the same team, a different manager gets a win.
“Good people who want to be great, must have the courage to identify their weaknesses and get help to improve them – be they business owners, managers or executives,” Alison continues.
Get spin-off benefits too
“I do find that often the people who work with me don’t just achieve the transformation they are looking for, they uncover unexpected spin-off potential too and when that happens it means they are able to perform at a much higher level. Like when I worked with you, Richard – you began to understand that there is a different side to you that you hadn’t noticed and it surprised you. We’re all good at something, often something we are overlooking – I help you find that something and use that strength to draw out other strengths and eliminate weaknesses. Tap into the strengths in the difficult moments and it enables you to grow – it helps you discover new enthusiasm and energy too.
“What you’re good at might be completely unrelated to work – for example one client was very shy at work but had a scratch handicap at golf. Use that positive fact: apply it to the work environment. If you are good at something at work, focus on that and delegate some of the things that you’re not so good at or that you don’t enjoy. Don’t just focus on you either. Look at your team’s strengths and weaknesses, what makes them tick and help them develop that. It will energise them and that will help to energise the whole team.”
Working with Alison has helped me to help my team. It’s helped me to learn how to enthuse them and make them more motivated but also when to draw the line, when to bring them in check if things aren’t going in the right direction. Previously I might have avoided confrontation with a member of my team for fear of de-motivating them but now I address it confidently and move on. I’ve realized that letting something fester in me doesn’t make me effective in leading my team. Asserting myself when things aren’t quite as they should be, reinforces my position as the one in charge and gains their respect because it gets things back on course.
I’ll also give my team more time, not rush them and allow them to enjoy what they like doing and, without doubt, the office is a more unified and more focused place. I now share more with the team, ask their opinions, get them to suggest different ways of doing things, spend more time throwing ideas around and give them time to express themselves. I won’t say I’ve cracked it but I now think more as a leader and I have certainly realised that if something isn’t quite right, the only person who is going to change it is me so I act a lot quicker than I used to. Leading – not just managing – is becoming more natural and that’s all down to Alison.
“You did hate the early sessions, that was obvious – and you worried about the time you were taking out of work! But that changed in our third session. You started to embrace the process and clearly see the benefits, and the “building blocks” we’d put in place, “ says Alison. “I haven’t done this with you yet, Richard, but I often bring in an image consultant to work with my clients because it makes a difference too. We all know that first impressions count so wearing the right colours and style of clothes, to enhance your own colouring and role, is a good move. It makes you look less tired, healthier, younger – for men as much as for women. And it gives my clients added confidence.
“We are all different so we all have different aims and objectives. Whether you feel sick at the thought of public speaking, would rather stay home than go networking, or just want to deal more effectively with under-performing staff, I can help. I’ll help you communicate with confidence in any of these situations and the spin off is you will be more effective in other aspects of work too.”
Manage your thoughts
Alison is very keen on exercises for the brain, conditioning yourself to think positively so you notice your incremental successes as you learn new skills and habits. You might not have hit the sales targets but you might have had a first positive meeting with a member of staff who you haven’t previously hit it off with; you might have secured a new supplier for your key raw material.
She recommends changing the way you talk to yourself – don’t convince yourself you can’t sell: tell yourself you’re getting better at selling. Her advice is to list achievements at the end of each day: do it diligently until it becomes second nature. “I do this myself, “ she says, “And if I stop for a spell, I find I get rather disenchanted with work, so I start again.”
There’s a better leader in all of us…..just ask Alison to find it.
Join Alison at her Coaching Skills for Managers course from 5th to 6th November at Oxford Spires Four Pillars Hotel. See the website for more details.
A big thank you also to The Oxford Playhouse for allowing us to use their venue.
