I have been thinking about leadership presence for a long time.
The more I work with leaders, the less I see it as something connected to confidence, polish or simply being able to command a room.
For me, leadership presence becomes most visible when leadership gets difficult.
When the stakes are high. When there is ambiguity. When a senior stakeholder challenges your thinking. When a business decision has consequences. When you are leading across cultures and do not have the luxury of assuming that what works in one environment will work in another.
That is when I really notice it.
A leader can be highly capable and still struggle to hold their presence when the pressure rises. I have seen leaders become more detailed, more defensive, more cautious or more controlling when they are challenged.
Interestingly, many of them would not behave that way in a normal conversation.
Pressure changes something.
And I think that is where leadership presence becomes a much more important leadership capability than we sometimes recognise.
It is easy to look like a leader when things are going well
When things are going well, most of us can communicate confidently.
We know the agenda. We know the numbers. We have prepared our message. We know what we want to say.
The real test comes when something happens that we did not prepare for.
Someone disagrees strongly.
The question is uncomfortable.
The decision is unpopular.
The information is incomplete.
The room is already tense.
In those moments, there is very little time to reach for a leadership technique.
What comes through is how well you can manage yourself while staying fully engaged with the situation.
For me, that is a big part of leadership presence.
It is not about appearing calm.
It is about being able to stay grounded enough to think clearly when the situation is creating pressure to react.
Recent research supports the importance of this. A 2026 systematic review of 103 peer-reviewed studies on emotion regulation in leadership examined how leaders regulate emotions and the implications for leadership outcomes.
That matters because leadership is rarely experienced in isolation.
Your response affects the people around you.
What I notice in high-stakes conversations
Some of the most useful leadership learning happens for me in the middle of difficult conversations.
I notice things like:
- how quickly a leader reacts to challenge
- whether they can listen without immediately defending their position
- whether they can disagree without making the conversation adversarial
- whether they can acknowledge uncertainty without losing credibility
- whether they stay connected to the bigger issue or get pulled into proving a point
These moments tell me much more than whether someone can deliver a polished presentation.
A leader might have an excellent argument and still lose influence because of how they respond when that argument is questioned.
The content may be right.
The way it is being carried may not be.
Research into leader communication reinforces this connection. A major review of 260 studies examining leaders’ actual communication found that what leaders communicate, and how they communicate through words, voice and non-verbal behaviour, can influence stakeholders’ perceptions, motivation, behaviour and performance.
For me, that is an important distinction.
Communication is not separate from leadership presence. It is one of the ways people experience it.
Staying calm does not mean having no emotion
I am also careful about the way we talk about “staying calm under pressure.”
It can sometimes sound as though a good leader should never show emotion.
I don’t believe that.
Leadership is not about becoming detached from what is happening.
A leader can be concerned. Frustrated. Disappointed. Even angry.
The question is what happens next.
Can you recognise what is happening internally without allowing it to take over the conversation?
Can you create enough space between the pressure you are experiencing and the response you choose?
That small space can make a significant difference.
It can be the difference between reacting and responding.
And at senior levels, that difference can have consequences far beyond the individual leader.
Global leadership adds another layer
I see this becoming even more important for leaders working across countries and cultures.
The way leadership is interpreted is not universal.
Research into cross-cultural leadership has shown that societal culture influences which leadership characteristics and behaviours are valued, and can moderate the relationship between leadership style and outcomes.
So a leader working across global stakeholders cannot simply rely on one preferred way of showing up.
Directness may create confidence with one stakeholder and resistance with another.
Silence may be interpreted as thoughtful in one environment and uncertain in another.
Challenge may be seen as constructive in one culture and disrespectful in another.
This does not mean constantly changing who you are.
I think that would create another problem.
It means developing enough range and cultural awareness to understand what the situation requires without losing your own centre.
That balance is important to me.
I often describe it as being anchored while remaining adaptable.
Why I think this matters at every leadership level
Leadership presence is sometimes positioned as something senior executives need to develop.
I think that is too narrow.
The context changes as you progress, but the need for presence starts much earlier.
A first-time manager needs it when giving difficult feedback.
A mid-level leader needs it when influencing peers and navigating competing priorities.
A senior leader needs it when dealing with ambiguity, enterprise decisions and complex stakeholders.
At the executive level, the stakes may be greater, but the underlying capability is the same.
People are constantly forming an assessment of whether they can trust your judgement, particularly when circumstances are uncertain.
That trust does not come from always having the right answer.
Sometimes it comes from how you handle not having one.
I have seen leaders create considerable confidence simply by being able to say, “I don’t know yet,” or “I need to think about this,” without becoming smaller in the room.
There is strength in that.
What leadership presence means to me
My thinking about leadership presence has changed through the work.
I no longer see it primarily as how a leader appears.
I see it as how effectively a leader can hold themselves, the conversation and the complexity of the situation at the same time.
That requires self-awareness.
It requires clarity.
It requires emotional regulation.
It requires communication.
It requires the ability to adapt across people and cultures.
And it requires enough internal grounding that pressure does not completely determine your behaviour.
This is central to my work around Anchored Leadership Presence.
The goal is not to create leaders who appear composed in every situation.
It is to help leaders build the capacity to remain centred, clear and influential when the situation itself is anything but.
Because ultimately, I think leadership presence is easiest to recognise when things are difficult.
You don’t really see a leader’s presence when the room agrees with them. You see it when the room doesn’t.