How To Increase Your Authority And Leadership Skills

In this talk, I break down three powerful ways to convey authority and leadership so your ideas are heard and respected. Communication isn’t just about what we say—it’s how we say it. Even great ideas can fall flat if we don’t project confidence, certainty, and leadership in our delivery.

I cover key strategies such as speaking with conviction, being direct, and using authoritative communication patterns that instantly elevate how others perceive you. Without these skills, we can unintentionally come across as unsure, causing our message to be ignored—or worse, dismissed entirely.

You’ve probably seen situations where someone who is factually wrong is still listened to because they speak with confidence, while someone who’s an expert isn’t taken seriously simply because they sound uncertain. That’s the power of developing your authority and leadership presence, and in this talk, I’ll show you exactly how to build it.

Transcript

Hey this is Ish and in today's talk I'll be going over three different ways that you can increase your level of authority so that your ideas have more of an impact and are more likely to be taken seriously by other people. And these three tips will expand on each other in terms of going from the most practical tips and techniques that you can actually practice to bigger overarching principles that you can implement in your life. So the idea behind this topic is that oftentimes people have very great ideas. They may be very competent in a certain area but the issue is that they get overlooked because of their presentation and how they communicate. It can actually be very frustrating to see and you may have even experienced this yourself when you have really great ideas and you may be expressing that but it doesn't seem to land with your audience. While you may also know someone else who doesn't have the same amount of technical knowledge or competence in that particular field that you know much about but they're able to have more people listen to their ideas and take them more seriously just because of the way they communicate and present themselves. So this is why this topic is very important. And by the end of this talk you will actually begin to see that a lot of our communication is non-verbal and if we learn to speak in a certain way or conduct ourselves in a certain way we can actually flip these certain triggers in other people where they take us more seriously or see us as leaders. And you can also see how this can also go wrong where you may have noticed a lot of leaders who don't have the best intentions for their people but because they're implementing these three tips they have a lot of influence. So we want to obviously use these techniques for good and guide people in a positive direction while also making sure that your message lands effectively. So the first tip is to speak with certainty. Now as human beings we are more inclined to listen to and follow people that seem certain even if their content of what they're saying isn't actually factually accurate. So that's crazy to think about. So let's go over why certainty works. So if we go back thousands of years when we were living in hunter-gatherer tribes for example and we were stuck in let's say a forest and we needed to know how to get out of there. And there were two people that were providing instructions. One person seemed very unsure. Maybe they explained, Oh maybe we go over here and then around the corner we'll go this way and turn out of here to get out of this jungle. Well this person will have a very hard time being listened to because they seem uncertain. Now compare this to a person that seems very confident in what they're saying and what they are saying seems like facts or the truth and they say it in such a way where it is unwavering. So they say okay we're going to go down over here and then once we get to the next tree we're going to make a left. Now people are obviously going to listen to the person that is speaking from a place of conviction and certainty even if they are actually end up being wrong compared to the other person that is wavering in their tone of voice. So this is why learning how to speak with certainty is very important. Now how do we train this? You want to start by speaking in a manner where whatever you're saying seems like a factual statement and when you do this you'll find that your voice naturally goes downwards and it is very clear. Compare this to a tone of voice that is unsure and when you speak in an unsure manner it sounds like your tone of voice goes upwards and you are questioning things. So you may be speaking and saying, Oh we can do this and maybe the path is over there and I think we should do this instead. So you can clearly see that that tone of voice doesn't really inspire a lot of confidence in other people and it makes it sound like you don't really know what you're talking about. So people aren't likely to follow your ideas. Now the next tip is to do more with a lot less effort. So this can be applied for a lot of aspects of your communication style. So it's not really related to one specific technique like the previous one. And again this can encompass a lot of different things you can do. So one can be your posture. So actually doing a lot less with your posture. So what this means is being still and not moving as much and expending unnecessary effort. There are certain things that erode your level of authority and one of the big things is fidgeting or making unnecessary movements. You can see this in people that are very nervous. They tend to fidget a lot and look around the room and dart their eyes back and forth and they are always restless and off-centered. But truly confident people have this air of being grounded and they only make movements when they have to. So when you look at your posture you can actually practice slowing down and being more intentional. Rather than being moved by the world all around you, Can you be proactive in your movements and only move when you have to or want to. The next way we can do a lot more by doing a lot less is to be very direct. So if you have this certain idea that you want to express, Actually just say it directly and flat out as it is. Rather than being around the bush or placating and making a lot of hedging statements like oh maybe if this is sure I don't know if I can bring this up and then you say what you want to say in a very indirect and roundabout way. Instead of doing that just say clearly what you want. I want this, I don't want this, We should do this, We shouldn't do that. So it is very clear and straight to the point. And when you do this your message is a lot more effective and concise. This is something you can practically observe if you are working in a company for example. How the junior employees oftentimes when they're writing emails will write this whole paragraph and use a lot of greetings and placating statements and you know I hope you're doing well blah blah and then they go on to express their message in a very indirect way. Compared to the more senior staff and management where they just say hey team this is what we need this is what we should do and it's very clear and straight to the point. So this is often the reason why the senior leadership have this air of authority is because of their communication style where they're able to get their point across but also at the same time doing a lot less so they're expending less effort. So I've just given two examples here under the category of doing a lot less and achieving more. So you can see that in reducing your movements being still conserving your energy not just randomly expending your energy when you don't need to making less movements and still getting your point across in a very clear and decisive way. Now I want you to start to think about other ways you can do a lot less but still achieve your outcome. And this also leads me to my next point which is a bigger overarching principle and that is being grounded, Being internally validated and unreactive. So I'll break this down for you. Now these are different traits that actually make you seem as more of a leader. So being grounded, Being still, Being unfazed by whatever is happening in the world because you are the anchor in the room rather than the person reacting. Now being internally validated can be this whole other topic but oftentimes what we see in very unconfident or needy behaviors is that a person can think that another person holds the keys to their happiness and they try to seek comfort or acceptance or the approval of other people. And this actually erodes their level of authority by other people. They may be thinking that they are being very nice or polite by people pleasing or trying to get the approval of the other person but in fact that actually will make them be less respected by others. On the other hand when you have your own approval and you don't need things from other people you can actually appear more confident, More stable and you also seem like you have other options so you're not as needy. So this attributes different traits to you when other people are interacting with you. Now I made other videos on being grounded actually quite a few so you can go check that out on this channel but one aspect of being grounded is having the focal point sturdy and steady from within rather than your energy or focal point going outwards to be overly accommodating or to seek the approval of people. So it is firmly rooted within and you need nothing from other people. So you can practically train this by a meditating more and I've obviously talked about that a lot on the channel and also having the focal point of your attention on the lower parts of your body as opposed to higher up and this will actually be an embodied practice where you can physically be more calm more stable and unswayed. The next part which I haven't really talked about in the other talks is looking and seeing the world through your own eyes and perspectives rather than blindly following what is discussed by other people or what other people tell you to do. So this is the practical skill of discernment and this is something you learn to develop. So rather than taking things at face value why not investigate for yourself whether the ideas or perspectives that you hold in the world are really suited for you and think about why you intentionally choose certain perspectives or what do you think about certain issues and topics and come up with your own ideas and own perspectives for things. Now when you do this you will be less swayed by the world and the other people trying to pressure you because again you are firmly rooted from within. And this also leads me to the next point of being unreactive. So one key trait of leadership is strength resilience and not being reactive to the world around you. You are being proactive instead. So we can actually learn practically how to be unreactive and how to be proactive by taking action in the world and being on your own journey in life which is the aspect of being grounded. Now when you are able to be grounded and you are following your own path in life and you are also seeing the world through your own perspective while also being open-minded not being totally rigid or inflexible a few interesting things happen. The first thing is that the volume knob of things that may have pulled you off center actually starts to decrease. So various distractions in the world or things that bring you off center start to fade away because you are grounded from within and you're being proactive. So that naturally fades away and now when you speak and you combine this with the other techniques of being very certain and speaking with the conviction in addition to doing a lot less and achieving more you'll naturally be seen by a leader by other people and if you're also unfazed by setbacks and you are resilient which comes from the grounded aspect of things well then people now start to trust you because you seem like a strong leader that has this authority about them that is unfazed by setbacks and we feel safe around them and they become like the anchor that we can trust and this is in direct contrast to what I was speaking about earlier at the beginning of this talk where when you lack conviction you seem unsure of yourself you are reactive to the world and also your own mind. People are less likely to trust you or want to follow you because you lack the strength and conviction and authority that these other techniques and mindsets tend to bring out even if you did have the technical knowledge or competence in whatever topic that you were speaking about. So this is why the non-verbal aspects of communication can be very important because it can have a bigger impact on what you say sometimes. So I hope you found these tips helpful so again just to recap learn to speak with certainty, Learn to do more by doing a lot less and learn to be grounded internally validated and stable within and unreactive and watch how your impact and authority increases when you communicate. Hope you found this helpful. Thank you.