Executive presence isn’t defined by a title or a position of power. Nor is it about dominating the communication or overplaying your branding – although communication and personal branding are relevant.

What traits constitute executive presence has been researched by the Harvard Business Review for over a decade, and the key traits of communication and confidence have stayed the course, as has a polished look. However, inclusiveness, in all its forms, has now also shot to the top of the list.

Cultivating executive presence is about ensuring you do the work on your internal engine first.

This begs the inevitable question of whether executive presence is something that can be cultivated and if so, how you go about it. The answer to that is yes, but it lies deep within the heart of you as an individual. It is not something that can be achieved at a surface level.

Executive presence is made up of component parts such as: how your personal purpose aligns with your work purpose; how well you have developed your growth mindset; how much meaning you find in your work; how good you are at developing others; how strong your inner and outer boundaries are; your relationship with time, people and high-value activities; as well as how good you are at the consistent qualities, Harvard Business Review observes.

I call these qualities ‘communication and personal branding’; Harvard Business Review refers to them as ‘communication, confidence and a polished look’.

The Internal Engine

The parts in my list that Harvard Business Review doesn’t recognize are like the engine that drives a Lamborghini. These are the parts that people don’t see but that are super-powered, with titanium valves. The car wouldn’t work without them; it would be an empty shell.

Cultivating executive presence is about ensuring you do the work on your internal engine first because the sleek exterior design (the communication and personal branding) becomes more authentic and more confident when it is powered by a strong engine.

Meaningful work positively impacts job satisfaction, career development, work stress, and overall health and wellbeing.

Let’s take being in meaningful work as an example.

The pursuit of meaningful work is an innate human need. As traditional sources of community and social support decline, work has become a crucial source of personal identity and significance.

In 2019, 71 percent of people believed that meaningful work had become more important than it had been five years previously, according to Beaumont People, with its importance reconfirmed by the company’s 2023 ‘Meaningful Work Insights Report’.

Unsurprisingly, 98 percent of surveyed individuals agreed on the importance of having meaningful work. Moreover, meaningful work positively impacts job satisfaction, career development, work stress, and overall health and wellbeing.

Moving Parts

Organizations also reap benefits from creating meaningful work, as employees exhibit higher engagement levels, reduced sick leave and greater commitment to the organization, leading to improved organizational performance – even during challenging times.

As a leader, if you are engaged in meaningful work these benefits you reap for yourself and your organization are like building compression into your engine to increase your horsepower. Nobody will know what you’ve specifically done but they’ll sense the improved performance on the outside.

Those who prioritize their engine performance first, and only then look to their exterior, are the ones who know how to cultivate executive presence.

Over time, if you want to cultivate your executive presence you have to continue to look after your engine. You have to understand how all those parts work together, how each piece depends on the next, ensuring they are well looked after for maximum performance. Then you can look at your exterior design. It does matter.

But leaders who focus too much on their exterior design, at the cost of their engine, run the risk of burnout, engine failure or worse, becoming an empty shell. Those who prioritize their engine performance first, and only then look to their exterior, are the ones who know how to cultivate executive presence.