Speak Up: Develop Your Executive Presence & Leadership Communication Style

Know Your Own Executive Presence Strengths & Opportunities:
Click here to pinpoint the specific area in your executive presence that’s keeping you invisible to senior leadership and guarantees you stay working hard as a pack mule who never gets promoted.

Today you can actually learn how to know if your executive influence is where you think it is. Listen today to learn this life changing skill.

Under pressure, it’s easy to slip into a reactive, defensive, or judgmental mindset. But the questions you ask yourself and others can determine how your team responds, how much information people are willing to share, and whether you make decisions from curiosity or judgment.

In this episode of the Speak Up podcast, Laura welcomes Marilee Adams, CEO of the Inquiry Institute, to explore how leaders can use questions to improve their communication, executive presence, decision-making, and relationships.

In today’s episode you’ll discover:

💡Why powerful inquiry actually begins with the questions you silently ask yourself—and how changing those questions can change how you show up as a leader

🔎How to recognize when you’ve slipped into a “judger” mindset and intentionally shift back into a curious, open-minded “learner” mindset.

🎯The exact question you need to ask yourself to help you design better questions that invite conversation instead of triggering defensiveness.

Play the episode to discover how asking better questions can help you stay present under pressure, empower the people around you, and become a more effective leader.

Access the Executive Presence Scorecard assessment here.

To learn more visit www.speakupwithlaura.com. New Speak Up podcast episodes come out every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday early in the morning.

About our guest:
Meet Marilee Adams, an award-winning author, leadership expert, and pioneer of inquiry-based coaching. Through her work as founder and CEO of The Inquiry Institute, Adams has helped leaders, coaches, and organizations transform how they think, decide, and lead.

To uncover her proven approach, readers can turn to her bestselling book, Change Your Questions, Change Your Life, Fifth Edition. With more than half a million copies sold in twenty-two languages, this refreshed edition shows how a simple shift in questioning can unlock clarity, confidence, and lasting results, at work and at home.

The book is a powerful fable that follows Ben Knight on a transformative journey, guided by fourteen practical tools for Question Thinking. Along the way, readers learn to use the Choice Map, a powerful visual tool that reveals how everyday questions shape our mindset.

The Speak Up Podcast helps high-performing professionals develop executive presence through strategic communication, executive confidence, and leadership influence. Each episode provides practical strategies to help you speak up in meetings, communicate with senior leaders, present ideas with clarity, build executive visibility, strengthen your leadership presence, influence without authority, stop overexplaining, answer difficult questions with confidence, and become a trusted executive leader.

Whether you're preparing for your next Vice President promotion or looking to communicate with greater credibility and gravitas, you'll learn actionable executive communication skills that accelerate career growth.

Topics covered in this episode:
Executive presence and leadership communication
How leaders can ask better questions
Learner mindset vs. judger mindset
Building trust and psychological safety on teams
Getting employees to tell leaders the truth
Emotional self-regulation for leaders
Communicating and influencing under pressure
Handling difficult questions in high-stakes meetings
Using curiosity to improve leadership and decision-making
How executive leaders build influence and trust
Preparing for board meetings and executive presentations
Active listening and understanding others
Avoiding defensive communication as a leader
Asking questions that empower employees and teams
Improving executive decision-making through better questions
Executive presence during conflict and tension
How leadership behavior affects employee communication
Developing emotional and social intelligence as a leader

Are you Director or Above Who Wants Faster Promotions, More Influence, and Stronger Executive Presence?

Book a confidential Executive Presence Strategy Call to discover the communication patterns that help high performers get seen as senior leaders.
👉 Book Your Executive Strategy Call here

If you’re highly respected everywhere else, but one relationship at work has you second-guessing everything you say and do, your expertise may not be the problem.

You can have decades of experience, a strong track record, and complete confidence in your expertise—and still find yourself struggling with a boss whose expectations and communication style seem impossible to read.

You give more context, and they think you're overexplaining. You ask for guidance, and they question your independence. You make a recommendation, and it barely seems to land.

In this episode, you'll discover:

🧩Why trying harder to prove your competence can unintentionally decrease your boss's confidence in your leadership.

🔬How to identify what your boss actually needs to experience from you to build trust, from greater autonomy and speed to clearer, more concise recommendations.

🤸🏿‍♂️How to adapt your communication without shrinking yourself, abandoning your expertise, or becoming a more cautious version of the leader you were hired to be.

Play the episode to learn how to stop managing your boss's reactions and start communicating your expertise in a way that builds trust, confidence, and stronger leadership relationships.

If you find yourself stuck in that one leadership relationship you just can't seem to get right—your boss, a senior executive, or a critical stakeholder—and it's gotten to the point where you're replaying meetings, second-guessing emails, and wondering why 20 years of experience suddenly don't seem to be enough, you don't have to spend the next six months walking on eggshells.

Because the harder you try to prove your competence by explaining more, checking more, or preparing more, the more you can accidentally reinforce the very perception you're trying to change.

That's exactly why I created the Executive Presence Mastery System. We help accomplished leaders understand what's really happening in these high-stakes relationships, identify what the other person needs to experience in order to trust their leadership, and communicate their expertise with greater clarity, confidence, and authority—without becoming a smaller version of themselves.

If this episode felt a little too familiar, click here and book a discovery call with me. We'll talk about what's happening in your specific situation and whether the Executive Presence Mastery System can help you become the trusted, influential leader you know you're capable of being.

To learn more visit www.speakupwithlaura.com. New Speak Up podcast episodes come out every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday early in the morning.

The Speak Up Podcast helps high-performing professionals develop executive presence through strategic communication, executive confidence, and leadership influence. Each episode provides practical strategies to help you speak up in meetings, communicate with senior leaders, present ideas with clarity, build executive visibility, strengthen your leadership presence, influence without authority, stop overexplaining, answer difficult questions with confidence, and become a trusted executive leader.

Whether you're preparing for your next Vice President promotion or looking to communicate with greater credibility and gravitas, you'll learn actionable executive communication skills that accelerate career growth.

Topics covered in this episode include:
Navigating difficult relationships with your boss or senior leaders
Why highly experienced executives can suddenly lose confidence at work
How communication style affects executive presence and leadership perception
Balancing independence with asking for guidance in a new role
How overexplaining can unintentionally undermine leadership credibility
Adapting to a boss who wants concise, recommendation-first communication
Building trust with senior executives and critical stakeholders
Managing conflicting or confusing leadership feedback
Communicating expertise with clarity, confidence, and authority
Avoiding the cycle of overthinking, second-guessing, and walking on eggshells
Understanding what senior leaders need to experience to trust your leadership
Protecting your professional reputation when a key relationship breaks down
Knowing when to adapt your leadership style—and when a workplace relationship may be unsalvageable
Using executive presence to increase influence, visibility, and strategic credibility

Know Your Own Executive Presence Strengths & Opportunities:
Click here to pinpoint the specific area in your executive presence that’s keeping you invisible to senior leadership and guarantees you stay working hard as a pack mule who never gets promoted.

Are you waiting until your performance review to make the case for a bigger 2027 raise? By then, the decision may already be taking shape.

With merit raises making a comeback and average performance-based increases expected to hover around 3.5%, organizations have more reason to differentiate between their highest-value leaders and everyone else. For directors, VPs, and executive-track leaders, getting more isn't simply about working harder or compiling a longer list of accomplishments. It's about making your strategic value unmistakably clear to the people making compensation decisions.

By the end of this episode, you'll know how to:

🎯Shift from reporting activity to communicating enterprise-level impact that senior executives understand and remember.

🧩Build a simple impact portfolio and compensation narrative that gives your manager compelling evidence to advocate for you.

🧲Use your 1:1s and relationships across the organization to calibrate your value, strengthen your executive reputation, and build advocates before compensation decisions are made.

Play the episode now to learn the four moves you can start making today to position yourself for more than the average 2027 merit raise—and make your strategic value impossible to overlook.

Doing exceptional work and being perceived as an exceptionally valuable executive are not always the same thing. Access the Executive Presence Scorecard assessment here.

To learn more visit www.speakupwithlaura.com. New Speak Up podcast episodes come out every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday early in the morning.

The Speak Up Podcast helps high-performing professionals develop executive presence through strategic communication, executive confidence, and leadership influence. Each episode provides practical strategies to help you speak up in meetings, communicate with senior leaders, present ideas with clarity, build executive visibility, strengthen your leadership presence, influence without authority, stop overexplaining, answer difficult questions with confidence, and become a trusted executive leader.

Whether you're preparing for your next Vice President promotion or looking to communicate with greater credibility and gravitas, you'll learn actionable executive communication skills that accelerate career growth.

Topics covered in this episode:
2027 merit raise and salary increase projections
How to get more than the average 3.5% merit raise
How to ask for a bigger raise at work
Salary negotiation strategies for high performers
How to document your accomplishments and business impact
How executive presence affects compensation and career advancement
How to position yourself for a higher performance rating
What to do before annual performance and compensation reviews
How to advocate for your value with your manager
Strategies to increase your salary without changing jobs

Know Your Own Executive Presence Strengths & Opportunities:
Click here to pinpoint the specific area in your executive presence that’s keeping you invisible to senior leadership and guarantees you stay working hard as a pack mule who never gets promoted.

What if the self-doubt you’ve been trying to eliminate is actually one of your greatest advantages in high-stakes meetings?

When you’re presenting to the C-suite, defending a proposal, or answering an unexpected question, it’s easy to become consumed by how you’re being perceived. But Avi Liran offers a different approach: stop trying to perform confidence and start focusing on contribution, preparation, curiosity, and trust. In this episode, you’ll discover how to reframe imposter syndrome, prepare for challenging questions, and stay grounded when the stakes—and your nerves—are high.

By the end of Laura’s conversation with the delightful Avi Liran you’ll know how to:

🎉Turn imposter syndrome into something productive instead of letting it undermine your confidence

🧲Handle difficult C-suite questions with curiosity, humility, and the powerful phrase you can rinse and repeat to build rapport with anyone

🧩Build the mindset that helps you stay grounded when presentations, meetings, and workplace relationships don’t go as planned

Play the episode to learn how to transform self-doubt, tough questions, and high-pressure leadership moments into opportunities to build trust, credibility, and confidence.

Access the Executive Presence Scorecard assessment here.

To learn more visit www.speakupwithlaura.com. New Speak Up podcast episodes come out every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday early in the morning.

About our guest:
Avi Liran (CSP) is Global Chief Delighting Officer and an energetic motivational speaker who goes above and beyond to deliver tangible results to organizations. As the embodiment of Contagious Positivity, he’s celebrated for leading businesses toward profitability with a smile. Avi’s approach is a masterclass in how to reshape the very core of a business with delightful mindsets, particularly through joy and appreciation in the workplace. This transformation creates the contagious positivity that leads to significant improvements in performance, employee well-being, and customer satisfaction.
Having helped many Fortune 500 companies achieve profound transformations, Avi’s philosophy is simple: delight your people, and they will delight your customers. This contagious wave of positivity is the secret ingredient to a thriving business environment, one that Avi has successfully instilled in organizations worldwide. Through his engaging, heartfelt, and dynamic speaking style, Avi ignites long-lasting change, one keynote, one workshop at a time.
With Avi, you don’t just gain a motivational speaker; you gain a transformational leader and partner in building a business that champions employee and customer delight as the pathway to greater profits and sustained growth. Engage Avi and spark Contagious Positivity in your organization today.

Develop your executive presence through strategic communication, executive confidence, and leadership influence. Each episode provides practical strategies to help you speak up in meetings, communicate with senior leaders, present ideas with clarity, build executive visibility, strengthen your leadership presence, influence without authority, stop overexplaining, answer difficult questions with confidence, and become a trusted executive leader.

Whether you're preparing for your next Vice President promotion or looking to communicate with greater credibility and gravitas, you'll learn actionable executive communication skills that accelerate career growth.

Topics covered in this episode:
Executive presence and influence in high-stakes leadership situations
Building trust through contribution, kindness, and appreciation
Using imposter syndrome to improve preparation and performance
Handling difficult questions and challenges from senior leaders
Using “Tell me more” to demonstrate curiosity and confidence
Preparing for C-suite presentations and executive Q&A
Staying composed and credible when you don’t know the answer
Leading with humility without diminishing your authority
Turning your inner critic into a “Chief Risk Officer”
Using gratitude and positive reframing to manage stress and self-doubt
Creating engagement and buy-in by inviting challenge
Why appreciation and positivity can strengthen leadership influence

Are you Director or Above Who Wants Faster Promotions, More Influence, and Stronger Executive Presence?

Book a confidential Executive Presence Strategy Call to discover the communication patterns that help high performers get seen as senior leaders.
👉 Book Your Executive Strategy Call here

Are you doing executive-level thinking behind the scenes—only to watch your boss get recognized as the strategic leader in the room?

If you’re a Director, Senior Director, VP, partner, or executive, doing excellent work isn’t always enough to move your career forward. You may already be filtering complexity, anticipating executive concerns, identifying risks, and making strategic recommendations—but if senior leadership only experiences you as the person who knows the details and gets the work done, they may never see the judgment you’re already capable of bringing to the next level.

In this episode, Laura Camacho, PhD, reveals how high performers can accidentally train leadership to see them as brilliant operators rather than strategic executives—and what to pay attention to if you want your executive presence to match your actual capabilities.

In this episode, you’ll discover:

💡Why giving your boss the executive version of your thinking while giving senior leadership all the details can quietly undermine your executive presence.

🔬How to recognize the difference between being known as a dependable expert and being trusted as someone leadership wants in the room for important decisions.

🔑 THE question to ask before your next senior-level meeting so you communicate your judgment instead of simply proving how prepared you are.

Play this episode to learn how to stop giving away your best executive thinking and start helping senior leadership experience the judgment that can position you for your next level.
👉 Book Your Executive Strategy Call here

To learn more visit www.speakupwithlaura.com. New Speak Up podcast episodes come out every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday early in the morning.

If you’re already a director, senior director, VP, partner, or executive and this episode made you slightly uncomfortable because you’re thinking, “Oh my gosh. I do this,” good.

It probably means the capability is already there.

The problem is that the way senior leadership experiences you hasn’t caught up with the level at which you’re capable of operating.

That’s exactly the kind of gap we close inside the Executive Presence Mastery System.

We work with your real meetings, actual executive stakeholders, and high-stakes presentations. We strengthen how you position your ideas, answer questions, communicate your judgment, and become known as someone senior leadership wants in the room when important decisions are being made.

If you’re interested in exploring the Executive Presence Mastery System, you’ll find the application link here.

And I’ll leave you with this:
You did the work.
You developed the judgment.
Make sure you’re not giving someone else all the opportunities to demonstrate it.

The Speak Up Podcast helps high-performing professionals develop executive presence through strategic communication, executive confidence, and leadership influence. Each episode provides practical strategies to help you speak up in meetings, communicate with senior leaders, present ideas with clarity, build executive visibility, strengthen your leadership presence, influence without authority, stop overexplaining, answer difficult questions with confidence, and become a trusted executive leader.

Whether you're preparing for your next Vice President promotion or looking to communicate with greater credibility and gravitas, you'll learn actionable executive communication skills that accelerate career growth.

Topics covered in this episode:
Executive presence for senior leaders
Executive communication skills
How to demonstrate executive judgment
Strategic thinking vs. execution
How to communicate with senior leadership
Career advancement for Directors and VPs
Why high performers get overlooked for promotions
Building visibility with executive leadership
How to communicate strategically at work
Moving from subject matter expert to executive
How overexplaining hurts executive presence
Communicating recommendations to executives
How to be seen as a strategic leader
Leadership perception and career growth
Making your executive thinking visible