I was shocked. The woman I was speaking with in our small group said to me, “Well, Brett, I thought you were just a technical geek. I had no idea you actually were involved with mindfulness and communications. You were so quiet, I thought you were stuck up.”
This wasn’t our first meeting as a group. We had been meeting for almost three days in a fairly intensive group dynamics training that I studied for years, Matrix Leadership Training. Incredibly powerful learnings. And for me, this was one of them.
In that moment I realized if you don’t tell people who you are, they will make up a story about you. And it’s probably not the one you want. In this case, “Who is this guy who said he has a technical background, but he doesn’t say anything? Oh, he must think he’s better than us.”
I learned then and there that even if you don’t speak, you have an impact. And in this case, the impact was not positive for me. Now I had to work on re-framing my image and deal with overcoming negative first impressions. That can be done, but first impressions always leave a mark.
The lesson here is that you always have an impact.
And so the question is, what do you want that to be?
Let people know who you are and what you’re about early and often so you have a better chance of being known like you would like to be known. That’s a powerful leadership skill, with or without a title.
When you’re ready to work on your communication skills at work so you can have the success that you deserve, reach out.
