I get nervous when talking to senior people. Help!

I have been promoted to a more senior role that requires me to regularly present to the board of my company. I am struggling with this. I get so nervous when talking to senior people, whether it’s just bumping into them, presenting or at company social events. I am not enjoying my work due to the anxiety I am feeling.  What can I do? It’s damaging my career.

Congratulations on your promotion.

A lot of people get nervous when talking to senior business people, people who are in the public eye and media personalities so you are certainly not alone in this.  The problem comes when it is affecting you on a personal and professional level as seems to be the case for you.

Take some time to notice what is going on for you (What’s at the heart of the issue for you?) when you are in situations where you are talking to or presenting to senior executives in your organisation.

What are you saying to yourself?
What are the messages, self talk?

Check out the validity of these comments, are they true? Do you know for absolute certain that what you are thinking is fact? Or are these thoughts self sabotaging messages that are undermining your confidence and self esteem?

You were recently promoted which shows a belief and confidence in your abilities by your employer. What are the skills and attributes that you bring that resulted in your promotion? Focus on your strengths as a way of building your confidence. There is a great website that offers an online questionnaire to discover your strengths. Go to  https://www.authentichappiness.sas.upenn.edu/Default.aspx, this is Dr Martin Seligman’s website, author of Authentic Happiness and the Director of the University of Pennsylvania Positive Psychology Centre.

What is your relationship like with your manager? Is he/she someone that you can talk to? They could have some useful tips on how they manage presentations and interactions with senior executives in your company and other experiences they have had outside your company.  They could also be an ally, someone who can support and mentor you. If you don’t have someone that you report to between yourself and the Board, look for other mentors that you can speak to.

Develop your presentation and public speaking skills there are many groups such as Toast Masters (https://www.toastmasters.org.au/) that provide a forum to build skills and confidence.

An important thing to remember is that people are people, a title, role or position doesn’t make a person more senior to others. I was at a presentation recently where Adam Bennett, the CIO of National Australia Bank was talking to some emerging leaders, he summed it up very well with his comment: ‘People are not senior, positions are’ He went on to say that his advice when talking to senior leaders is to remember that they are just people and to talk to them as you would normally speak to others’. Of course he was not referring to the times when you may be chatting to your mates in a bar!

Think back over your career and life, there have probably been many hurdles, times where you may have thought that you would not be able to do something, when you lacked confidence and self belief. Think back now to the times when you did overcome these hurdles, you did move on to do something (be it a new skill or even a social situation) with confidence that you may not have thought possible earlier on. How did you do this? Write it down, there are strategies that you have for overcoming these hurdles, strategies that you have used successfully over the years, use them now. Copy strategies used by others, talk to people in your network, read biographies of people who have overcome fears, how have they done this? What can you learn/ copy to help you?

Ask for help / support from those around you and if you are still struggling take advantage of EAP programs in your company. If your company doesn’t provide coaching or counselling services to their employees then think about arranging a few sessions with someone to help you with strategies to help you move forward and overcome this current hurdle you face.

I came across a great quote recently by Ambrose Redmoon.  ‘Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the judgement that something else is more important than fear’. What is more important to you? Something that is more important that the fear you have? Tap into this for strength and motivation.

Also, there is a great book that provides strategies for dealing with self sabotaging behaviours called Taming your Gremlins by Richard D Carson which you may find a great resource.

Good luck, I wish you every success.