By the time someone’s career has carried them into an executive role, their judgment, expertise, and performance record are usually well established. What’s less often discussed is how people experience leadership presence within the organization.
Coach and consultant Tania Epremian describes executive presence as how a person’s authority comes across, regardless of their title or position.
“Executives often show up to meet expectations of their title, not their role as leaders,” Epremian says. “They have this idea of what their leadership status is supposed to look like, but they’re not always showing up as authentic versions of themselves.”
Epremian leads Strengthening Your Executive Presence, a full-day Signature Session at the John Molson Executive Centre, designed to help executives align their competence and formal authority with a leadership presence that builds trust and clarity.
Many senior leaders, Epremian says, have learned to let their rank do most of the talking.
Over time, their reliance on seniority and experience can narrow the way they express themselves. Interactions become more formal and controlled, and their presence becomes confined by their role.
Traits leaders see as composure and professionalism can sometimes come across as coldness or even arrogance.
Junior teams and colleagues acknowledge authority but likely stay guarded around the person exercising it. Rapid agreement or reluctant silence replace engagement and meaningful dialogue.
Tania Epremian, leadership development consultant and executive coach
Epremian encourages leaders to pay attention to how the room changes when they enter. If authority fills most of the space, employees will be guarded. If authenticity leads, that changes.
“The best leaders know when to show up firmly wearing their CEO hat, and when to inject their humanity,” she says. “Once a person is seen as human, fear tends to dissipate.”
Leaders may believe they communicate clearly and decisively in a meeting, but their message doesn’t quite land if it feels disconnected from what’s actually happening on the ground.
Questions and confusion only surface later because the audience felt uncertain how to address the disconnect directly. Leadership, in turn, becomes frustrated. From their perspective, when they asked if there were any questions or if their message was understood, and no one spoke up, they thought they’d been clear.
When communication gaps occur, it usually points to the leader’s inability to listen, spot non-verbal cues, and ask direct questions.
“One of the biggest issues is that leaders talk too much and listen too little,” Epremian observes. “Employees don’t feel heard or seen. They don’t understand how leadership consistently fails to realize that the problem isn’t because people aren’t trying to understand, but that they don’t know how to push back on authority that assumes its own clarity.”
When people describe leaders they trust, they don’t cite credentials. They describe how it feels to be listened to, responded to thoughtfully, and taken seriously.
As executives climb higher up the ladder, fewer people around them are positioned to offer honest feedback. People in leadership are rarely asked to look closely at how they’re leading themselves. Many of the executives Epremian coaches struggle to articulate what they value or how they hope to be experienced beyond the role they occupy.
Without reflection, and with greater distance from the operational side of their organization, an otherwise strong presence can become situational and inconsistent.
“High-ranking people tend only to hear the noise coming from the pressure around them,” Epremian says. “They can be very reactive, or very responsive, but have very little time carved out to assess how their presence may or may not impact the operational problems that exist. That lack of self-awareness has a ripple effect.”
When there are fewer and fewer peers who can be called on to provide honest feedback, self-assessment becomes one of the few ways presence can be recalibrated.
“If you can’t lead yourself, you can’t lead a single other person,” Epremian notes. “If you can’t lead one other person, you definitely can’t lead an organization.”
Leadership presence and authenticity won’t change strictly through insight and awareness, Epremian notes. They’re strengthened by attention and an eagerness to examine habits that no longer serve the role or the people it affects.
Making efforts to apply self-reflection techniques won’t instantly enhance one's presence. But over time, slowing down to make deliberate choices will reinforce an executive presence that is both appreciated and respected for the right reasons, Epremian explains.
“Presence-strengthening habits are skills that are practiced and they’re accessible to everyone,” Epremian says. “They start with a choice and are followed by willingness and consistent action. Authenticity builds trust faster than any title ever will.”
© Concordia University
