Project your leader identity

Hello and a very warm welcome to Cultural Communication Confidence with me, Victoria Rennoldson. And a warm welcome back to the podcast. Thank you for joining me again today. And today’s episode is part two of a three part miniseries where we’re really focusing on how to accelerate you achieving your leadership and ambitious career goals in 2025. So last week we started this miniseries with Get Visible, your personal brand opportunity. And if you missed that episode, no problems at all. I’ll put a link to that in the show notes. But do go back and listen to that very valuable episode because that is the foundation for today’s episode. And we’ll be back next week where we’ll talk about your thought leadership, so influence like a thought leader. So I’ve designed this miniseries to work together, so do make sure you listen to all three parts.

Great. So we’re going to today talk about this topic. How do we project like a leader? How do we project our leader identity? And I’m going to go into some really core thoughts around this, some very useful insights. And this is actually going to be quite a practical exercise today. So I’m going to get you to do some exercises with me. So if you’re listening or watching this out and about and you’re in a public space, no problem. You can try some of these exercises in self reflection. But do make sure you try it out when you’ve got the freedom perhaps of being at home and nobody watching you as well. And also I’m going to let you know at the end of today’s episode and I’m going to share with you something really exciting, an exclusive invitation to something new that I have coming up. and I don’t want you to miss it. So make sure you stay until the end of the episode to hear all about this. But coming back to today, we’re talking about your leader identity. So the first part of this is that I want you to imagine a leader. I want you to think of somebody who is real. So it could be somebody that you’ve worked with and you know very well, perhaps you directly reported to them or perhaps even you knew them earlier in your career. It could be a leader that you follow. So it might be somebody whose podcast you’re listening to or videos that you watch, or somebody that you admire and you’ve read their books, but have somebody concrete in mind. So have you got that person? Great. Okay, so I, want you to really think about this person. What are they like? What are their characteristics? What is it that they do that makes them so successful as a leader? How do they represent themselves? How do they turn up and how do they interact with you? Really think about these questions, feel into how that person is being. Got that in mind? Great. Okay, if you need more time, you can always hit the pause button before I continue. But if you’ve got that strong sense now of that person, you’re ready for step two.

Ready? I want you to forget all about that. And the reason I want you to do that is because we’re today talking about projecting YOUR leader identity. And, that person, as much as you admire them, as much as you see them as a great leader, they are doing leader in their own way. So I am a leader and I can only be a leader in my own way. You are a leader listening to this or watching this, you are a leader or a future leader and you can only do it in your own way. So my strong philosophy on this is: you do you. You cannot be a carbon copy of anybody else. If you try and do that, it will feel quite uncomfortable. You will feel like you’re having to try really hard to be like the other person to emulate what they do and, their characteristics. So this is quite counter intuitive. But I want you to, do you to really think about how you are, what influences the way that you show up and the work we did last week in the episode, the first part, this mini series about your personal brand will really help you with this. If you look at your purpose, mission, values, you’ll really understand what makes you unique, how you stand out, how you do that. So that is the first stage of this, recognising you have your own version of leadership. And that is your personal confidence formula. The next step is you have to claim it. You absolutely have to claim that you are a leader. So whether you are like some of the people that I work with and talk to, you’re a leader already. But maybe you have some level of imposter syndrome with that, or maybe you’re not quite there yet. Maybe you’re middle management and, and you really aspire to make it to senior leadership. Or maybe even some of you might be listening and you’re more junior in your career. It doesn’t really matter where your starting point is. You have to claim that you are a leader right now. And, this is an important part of being able to project it. You have to know it for yourself. 

And to help you with that, actually there is something very simple that we can say to ourselves to make that claim. The sentence that you need to say to yourself is: I am a leader. ‘I am’, is a very simple expression, but it’s claiming the identity. It’s stepping into. I’m that person now, even if I’m not actually there. I’m, stepping into the identity of that person right here, right now. So I want you to try this. Whether you’re saying it quietly in your mind right now or you have that freedom to say out loud, I want you to claim your leader identity. You do you. I am a leader. Wow. I can only imagine all of you saying it. And that really resonates with me and gives me goosebumps thinking about that. Fantastic. So you have claimed that identity. I am a leader. Next, we need to know how to project it. And this is where we need to think about our energy. Think about the energy of how we show up in the room, how we project ourselves with others. We don’t often pay much attention to this, but this is really important if you want to be projecting yourself in this way. So I want to come back to the simple sentence, I am a leader. I want you, if it’s safe to do so, you can do this exercise with me here and now, or you feel free to do it. Otherwise, listen along with me now and maybe try this out later. 

But I want you to, if possible, close your eyes and as long as you’re not driving or doing anything unsafe. But I want you to really think into, I am a leader. I am a leader. I want you to show through your way that you’re showing up and you’re sitting and the way that you’re doing things, that you’re projecting that energy. Now, what’s happening to your back, your shoulders? What did you do with your movement with your head? Maybe you moved your feet. How much space are you taking up where you’re sitting or standing? I would like to take a guess that you just shifted your position. You perhaps sat up a little bit taller, you maybe raised your head a little bit. You pushed your shoulders back, you expanded your body, you pointed your feet more forwards and uncrossed, your legs. These are the kinds of things that maybe you might have done. And all of this is about that feeling, that energy of ‘I am a leader’, signalling it to yourself, but also signalling it to others as well. If you felt that energy, felt that buzz of living into that leadership energy that’s unique to you, I want you to move into the more advanced stage of this, and that is about dialing it up. So imagine a really large dial in front of you, and imagine that where you’re at, you can move it one more number, one more notch and I want you to live back into that energy of I’m a leader and just turn it up one more number and live and feel into that energy. Wow, does that feel? This is exciting. And for me, this is how I believe you can project your leader identity. It starts with knowing what your leader identity is for you, your personal confidence formula. Then it’s knowing how to project your energy so that others feel you when you walk into the room, the way you sit, the way you stand when you present. This is a real, mini insight into some of the work I do with leaders and future leaders to help them on this journey.

Now we’re going to be ready now for after this episode to come back next time for episode three. And that’s where it all comes together and we’re going to talk about influence like a thought leader. But before we do, I have some activation questions to share with you today from today’s episode and topic to make sure that you’re making the most from this and you have some practical ways to apply the insights from today when you finish listening to this. But before we do, I want to come back to the invitation I mentioned right at the beginning of today. I said that I would share something very special with you and I will. I am really excited to say that I’m back with my live training, Become a global leader. This is a three step live training which you can join me virtually anywhere around the world so that you can focus on the three big topics you need to achieve your ambitious career goals this year. So I’ve designed it in a way to help you really think about how do you accelerate your progress towards this. The first stage is elevate your personal brand. Step two, we’ll look at amplify your authority. And step three we’ll look at how to speak like the leader. 

Now this live training I’m offering completely free to you, all you need to do is to claim your free ticket to join us for three hours across three days virtually, so you can be anywhere in the world. And to get that your free ticket, all you need to do is go to www.culturecuppa.com/become-leader. Or if it’s easier, feel free to reach out to me on LinkedIn on my personal profile, Victoria Rennoldson and you message me and I’ll send you all of the details. But it’s coming soon. It’s coming in mid February, so make sure that you claim your ticket and join us for these dates. 

But I did also say I would share with you some activation questions. So let’s come back to wrap up today’s topic, today’s episode. Today we talked about your version of leadership. So I want you perhaps to spend some time in the next week really reflecting. What does your version of leadership look like? How is it unique and different? What is your personal confidence formula? Write down your thoughts and understand how you do you, how you do being a leader. I want you to also live into this idea of claiming your leadership identity. So remind yourself regularly. I am a leader. Write it down, say it to yourself. When you’re feeling the doubts and fears, keep it in your mind. And then finally, when are you going to try out your leader energy? When is the next meeting or presentation? Or when are you in front of, say, the senior leadership team and you can try projecting your leader identity? I’d love to know how you get on, so do feel free to message me over on LinkedIn as well to let me know how you get on with implementing this. So that brings us to an end of today’s episode. As a reminder, this was episode two of a three part series. Make sure you join me next time for the last part, influence like a thought leader. And don’t forget to claim your free ticket to join me for live training where you can be part of a group. You can receive my live training and get your questions answered and feedback. But you have to make sure you log on to get your ticket. So I’ll put all the links in the show notes and I look forward to seeing you next time.