Charisma, Attention, and the Future of Executive Presence

Personal Growth

14 Oct

What you will learn: Executive presence is being rewritten. Once shorthand for polish and poise, it's now under scrutiny for bias, conformity, and surface-level theatrics. Yet presence still determines trust, influence, and alignment - it just needs a new definition. This piece reframes presence as directed attention rather than performance: less about how leaders look, more about how they make others feel seen, hopeful, and connected. The next evolution of leadership presence moves from image to depth, from command to coherence and begins with self-awareness.

When I first wrote “Executive Presence Is the Leadership Skill Nobody Talks About,” I aimed to expose the often-overlooked yet powerful force of executive presence in the workplace. By using the Bates model (Character, Substance, and Style), I aimed to make this intangible quality practical and accessible for the executives I support.

Since then, months of reading, fieldwork, and dialogue (notably McCaffree & Bowden's framing of charisma as directed attention) have advanced the conversation. Executive Presence, it turns out, is more than just a skill set; it's also a mirror of how power, attention, and authenticity move through a system.

It's time to rethink executive presence: its importance remains, but developing it now demands a broader, deeper definition and critique.

The Critique: Why “Executive Presence” Makes People Nervous

The phrase has never been more popular or more polarizing. Here's what the current debate reveals:

A gatekeeping mask. Too often, “presence” becomes shorthand for conformity, favoring extroversion and rewarding those who echo the dominant culture's posture, accent, or energy. It risks being less about leadership and more about likeness.
The tyranny of surface. When clothes, tone, or posture take center stage, performance outshines substance. Gravitas without grounding quickly becomes theatre.
A moving target, ripe for bias. Because presence is judged through perception, it is influenced by bias, race, gender, class, accent, and even neurotype. The less defined it is, the more it mirrors those already in power.
Decontextualized myth. Presence is often treated as an individual trait, detached from team dynamics or culture. Yet a leader's presence is only as strong as the psychological safety of the system around them.
A power mirror, not a neutral skill. The concept reinforces existing hierarchies, amplifying those already visible while muting equally capable but less conventional leaders.
Erasure of lived experience. Most playbooks ignore the felt side of presence, the leader's nervous system, identity, and sense of safety. Yet this inner state is the first thing others perceive.
Dark presence. Presence isn't always benevolent. Some leaders project an aura of authority or charisma that draws compliance rather than trust, an influence built on intimidation, not resonance.
Virtual and hybrid distortion. As remote work reshapes how leaders present themselves, presence through a screen has become its own domain, not just a diluted version of the in-person experience. Tone, pacing, and digital attentiveness now carry weight once held by body language. The leaders who adapt fastest are those who learn to project steadiness and connection without proximity.

For all its flaws, executive presence still matters deeply. The question is which version of it we choose to cultivate.

How the “Charisma-as-Attention” Lens Expands the Frame

In their new paper, “Charisma as Directed Attentional Allocation,” researchers John Antonakis, Jochen Menges, and colleagues propose a radical and more empowering way to understand charisma. Rather than seeing it as an innate trait or performative skill, they define charisma as the act of directing and focusing attention, both one's own and that of others, toward meaningful purpose. Charisma, in this view, becomes less a mysterious quality and more a shared attentional process that can be cultivated with awareness and intention.

The theory of charisma as directed attention offers a sharper way to think about presence. It shifts the conversation from performing impact to creating attunement. Presence, through this lens, is less about command. It is more about the quality of attention you generate and direct toward purpose, people, and possibility.

This doesn't replace the Bates model of Character, Substance, and Style; it deepens it. The old frame showed us what to express. The new one shows us how presence works in motion. Presence is a shared state between the leader and the environment.

Here are the core shifts this view introduces:

Attention to ideal selves. Presence arises when a leader helps others glimpse who they might become. This aligns with their inner aspirations and future identities. It's less projection, more invitation.
Perceptive accuracy. True presence depends on attunement. You can't shortcut it with polish or posture. Sensing others' motivations, fears, and hopes requires precision.
Ease over self-monitoring. Those with genuine presence aren't busy watching themselves perform. Their focus rests outward, anchored in intention rather than impression.
Entrainment and coherence. Emotional and physiological rhythms sync between the leader and group. Presence, in this sense, is resonance, a shared tempo that builds trust and focus.
Context as co-author. Presence isn't owned by the individual alone. It's co-created by situation, ritual, timing, and collective meaning. The atmosphere matters as much as the actor.

Bates Meets Charisma: Expanding the Map

The charisma-as-attention frame doesn't discard the Bates model; it stretches it. Where Bates gave us the architecture of presence (Character, Substance, Style), this view shows us the physics behind it: how attention flows, how resonance forms, how trust takes shape in motion.

Instead of beginning with the question “How do I appear present?” this lens asks “How do I make others feel seen, hopeful, and future-oriented?” It moves the emphasis from optics to orientation, from impression management to shared awareness.

Points of Synergy:

Authenticity and integrity remain the core. Both frameworks reject imitation. Presence collapses the moment it becomes performance detached from truth.
Presence as relational exchange. Each model views leadership as occurring in the gaze, in the meeting, and in the moment of connection. It's co-authored, not staged.
Style as vehicle, not destination. In Bates, style refers to how expression conveys meaning. The charisma lens reminds us that those outward signals are simply conduits for attention, not the purpose themselves.

Points of Divergence:

Observable behaviors vs. invisible processes. Bates focuses on what others can see, voice, stance, and expression as developmental levers. The charisma model delves beneath the surface, treating presence as an effect of focused attention rather than a checklist of behaviors.
Teachability vs. depth. Bates remains pragmatic and coachable: you can model it, practice it, measure it. The attention-based theory is more psychologically demanding-requiring perception accuracy, emotional generosity, and contextual fluency that resist easy templates.
Image vs. impact. The charisma framing highlights the emptiness of a “styled” presence. Mastering posture or tone means little if it doesn't anchor others' attention in something meaningful. Bates, as often applied, can tilt toward surface polish; the charisma lens recenters substance.

Why Executive Presence Still Matters - But Must Evolve

Presence continues to act as a gate in leadership, not merely for advancement, but for trust, influence, and alignment. People feel when a leader is with them, they hesitate when that signal is missing.

Yet the version of presence fit for this era must:

Resist inherited norms. Step beyond dominant expectations of gender, culture, or extroversion. Presence should express plurality, not prescription.
Root in relational substance. Style counts only when it transmits empathy, clarity, and steadiness.
Carry ethical weight. Because charisma amplifies whatever it touches, presence must be tethered to purpose and integrity.
Be system-supported. Presence thrives in cultures that reward attentiveness, vulnerability, and psychological safety. It withers where performance eclipses connection.

Executive Presence - What's Next for Leaders

The next stage of presence isn't about learning new tricks; it's about sharpening awareness. What follows are practical ways to move from performing confidence to creating genuine connection, leadership as attention in motion.

Cultivate perceptive curiosity. Don't begin with “How do I look more present?” Begin with “What is this person or group hoping for, fearing, believing?” Let your gestures, tone, and framing emerge from what you notice and not from what you want to project.
Reflect others' ideal selves. Feedback often spotlights deficiencies. Presence grows when you mirror potential: “Here's a future I see in you that you might not see yet.” That kind of attention pulls people forward.
Design for shared moments. Presence can be engineered into the rhythm of work, in openings, transitions, rituals, and closures that align collective attention. When meaning is distributed, presence becomes shared property, not individual performance.
Build structural supports. Make room for cultures where curiosity, reflection, and vulnerability aren't punished but practiced. Psychological safety is the infrastructure that allows presence to appear.
Stay humble, keep tuning. Perceptual error is inevitable. Use playback loops and check what others heard, clarify intent, and invite correction. Presence grows in the repair, not the perfection.
Be deliberate with style; don't worship it. Voice, dress, and posture are useful instruments. They carry weight only when they express something grounded and coherent. Style should serve meaning, never replace it.

Reframing the Ongoing Conversation

The conversation about executive presence stands at a hinge point. We're moving beyond image and performance, toward something more dimensional, presence as resonance rather than mask. The emerging view treats charisma not as a spark of personality but as an economy of focus: influence shaped by where and how we direct our attention.

This shift reframes presence as a shared state, not a solo act. It is less about command and more about coherence, i.e., the quiet alignment that arises when purpose, people, and context move together. True presence doesn't announce itself; it gathers. It forms in the spaces between, through trust, timing, and environment.

At the center of it all lies self-awareness, the leader's ability to stay grounded amid noise. Without inner steadiness, outer presence fractures. What endures is not the performance of confidence, but the practice of attention: noticing, adjusting, and showing up again.

That's where the next evolution of executive presence begins.

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