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Last week, a client asked me a question that stopped me mid-sip of chai: “Minal…but what if I don’t look like a leader?” She wasn’t talking about clothes or the accent or the posture. She meant something deeper - that quiet, familiar fear so many of us who grew up straddling cultures know too well:

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A few months ago, I was coaching a senior product manager - let’s call her Neha. She was preparing to present her team’s roadmap to the executive suite, her biggest audience yet.

She told me, “This time, I feel confident. I know my stuff.” And she really did. Her slides were solid, her data was airtight, and she’d practiced her delivery to perfection. But halfway through the meeting, things unraveled. The CTO interrupted; then her director “to add context;” and by the end, Neha was standing off to the side of her own presentation, confident in her content, but no longer commanding the room.

On our call after, she said, “I don’t get it. I wasn’t nervous. I spoke clearly and I was confident.” And she was right. She was confident. But confidence wasn’t what that room needed from her.

The Confidence Illusion

We’re often told that confidence is the magic ingredient, the end goal if you will. We think, “If I just feel more confident, then I’ll speak up, then I’ll lead meetings, then I’ll be taken seriously…” We’re made to believe that if we could just feel confident, everything else will fall into place. But that isn’t true because there is a distinct difference between confidence and executive presence. 

Confidence is an inner feeling while executive presence is an outer experience.

Confidence says, “I believe in myself” while executive presence says, “You can believe in me, too.”

And that’s a powerful distinction because confidence is about you, but presence is about how others feel around you. Confidence might help you speak up but executive presence helps people listen.

When Confidence Falls Short

You’ve seen it before:

• The confident engineer who over explains every detail, when the execs just want a decision.
  

• The confident manager who rushes through updates, not realizing her team feels her anxiety more than her authority.
  

• The confident analyst who’s always right, but sounds defensive when challenged.
  

They’re confident, yes, but they don’t inspire confidence and that’s the difference between confidence and presence. Presence bridges the gap between believing in yourself and helping others believe in you.

What Executive Presence Actually Looks Like

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. Executive presence does not mean louder, flashier or bolder. It’s actually the opposite - quieter and more intentional - because it’s not about proving yourself, it’s about anchoring the room.

It’s the pause before you answer; the way you hold steady eye contact when someone challenges your point; the calm tone when others are stressed; and the clarity you bring when everyone else is spinning in circles.

Executive presence isn’t about proving you can handle it - it’s about showing that you already are.

The Turnaround Moment

When Neha and I unpacked her meeting, she had a lightbulb moment. She said, “I went in trying to sound confident. But I never thought about what would make them feel confident in me.” 

So we did some work and the next time she presented, she shifted her focus. She opened with, “Here’s the problem, here’s my recommendation, and here’s why it matters.” She slowed her pace and didn’t defend every challenge. Instead, she acknowledged, she paused, and then she responded thoughtfully.

By the end, her VP told her, “That’s the most leadership I’ve seen you show yet.”

And the best part is that she had it in her all along. She didn’t feel particularly more confident that day; she just tweaked a few things to create confidence for others.

The Shift and Next Week’s Action Step:

Here’s how you can start creating your own presence:

Stop asking, “How can I sound more confident?” and start asking, “How can I make others feel grounded and clear in my presence? How can I make others feel confident about me?” This is the difference between being impressive and being trusted.

These very small shifts can have very big impacts. 

I’d love to hear how it goes or what questions come up as you try this in real time. Drop me a quick note or reply to this email. I read every message. 

Let’s rise together,

Minal 

👋🏽 Hi! I’m Minal - a Career Success & Leadership Coach for 1st & 2nd gen professionals (the first in your family to build a career here or the child of immigrants balancing two cultures). I help you move past outdated work advice, communicate with confidence and clarity, and show up as a strong, credible leader so that you can earn promotions (and raises) faster without burning out, shrinking yourself, or pretending to be someone you’re not.

🔥 If this hit home, forward it to one person who’s confident on paper but still feels unseen at work. And if you haven’t subscribed yet, join Unmuted here 👇🏽 to get next week’s issue. I’m wrapping up my Executive Presence series with something fun (and a little spooky 👻).

If the last few weeks taught us anything, it’s this: executive presence isn’t about loud voices, perfect English, or staying late at the office. It’s about how people experience you, especially under pressure. 

For first- and second-generation professionals (the first in your family to build a career here or the child of immigrants balancing two cultures), this can feel especially tricky. Many of us grew up hearing: “Work harder, keep quiet, and don’t rock the boat.” But presence isn’t built on overwork, it’s built on intentional, grounded action that you can practice in the everyday moments that make up your workday - not just in boardrooms or during presentations.

Here’s a quick refresher of what we’ve covered in previous newsletters (with links to those newsletter):

1. Make the pause your power move – Use “micro-resets” before meetings or conversations to show up intentionally. (Read more about that here.)

2. Clarity in everyday interactions – Short, clear messages and updates build credibility. (Read more about that here.)

3. Reputation check– Align self-perception with trusted feedback to strengthen how others experience you. (Read more about that here.)

4. Energy management through strategic stillness – Block white space for rest, reflection, and recalibration. (Read more about that here.)

These simple practices are foundational. But let’s take it further. 

Here are four new ways to practice presence that you can start today:

Here’s an example: Anika, a Senior Product Manager at a fast-growing tech company, noticed her team often talked over each other in meetings. Instead of offering solutions immediately, she started asking, “What would be the impact if we tried this approach?” This encouraged dialogue, made her appear measured and thoughtful, and subtly shifted the team to look to her for direction.

Take Luis for example. Luis, an Operations Lead managing cross-functional projects, noticed two colleagues clashing during a client call. Instead of ignoring it, he calmly said, “I see there’s a difference of opinion. Let’s hear both perspectives and see where we can align.” The conversation stayed professional, and people started recognizing him as someone who could navigate tricky situations gracefully.

Meet Mei, a Senior Product Manager at a global SaaS company. Mei just completed a complex project with her team. In a status update, she simply summarized: “We delivered the project ahead of schedule, and client feedback highlighted X, Y, Z results.” By reporting results clearly, she highlighted her leadership without overselling herself, her contributions, or her impact.

Dave, a Finance Manager at a Fortune 500 firm, realized he often zoned out during long meetings. He started straightening out his posture and summarizing points out loud: “So what I’m hearing is…” This small act made others feel heard, and he started to be perceived as calm, engaged, and reliable.

Small, deliberate actions add up. As I’ve said a million times before, building and maintaining executive presence is NOT about being the loudest in the room. Presence is cumulative - pausing, clarifying, asking questions, addressing tension, owning wins, and being super intentional with your body and your words all display confidence without force. 

I’d love to hear how it goes or what questions come up as you try this in real time. Drop me a quick note or reply to this email. I read every message. Let’s rise together. 

See you next week!

Minal 

👋🏽 Hi! I’m Minal - a Career Success & Leadership Coach for 1st & 2nd gen professionals (the first in your family to build a career here or the child of immigrants balancing two cultures). I help you move past outdated work advice, communicate with confidence and clarity, and show up as the strong, credible leader you are so that you can FINALLY earn the promotions and pay you’ve already earned without burning out, switching jobs, or pretending to be someone you’re not.

🔥 If today’s issue hit home, subscribe below and share it with one friend who’s done playing small and ready to rise too. Let’s make this movement bigger - one confident professional at a time. 👇🏽

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If you’ve ever found yourself saying yes to everything, staying late, or checking email at 11 p.m. just to prove you’re dependable… you’re not alone.

For many first- and second-gen professionals (the first in your family to build a career here or the child of immigrants balancing two cultures), “work harder” wasn’t just advice, it was survival. That’s how we were taught to earn respect, build credibility, and show that we belonged.

But here’s the truth: executive presence isn’t built through overworking. It’s built through energy management. Rather than pushing harder, it comes from slowing down long enough for people to actually feel your impact. It’s now powered by performance - it’s powered by regulation, reputation, and rest.

Let’s break that down:

1. Regulation: Stay Grounded, Not Guarded

When pressure hits - conflict in a meeting, pushback from a leader, a high-stakes presentation - your nervous system decides who shows up. If you’re constantly on edge, exhausted, or anxious, your presence reads as defensive or disconnected.

In order to change this, you can start practicing what I call “micro-resets.” Before a big meeting or difficult conversation, pause for 10 seconds. Take 3 deep breaths, where you exhale a little longer than you inhale, drop your shoulders and ask:

“What energy do I want to bring into this room?”

Then breathe again and do just that. This one question alone can shift you from reactive to intentional, allowing you to show up as a whole different person with a whole different energy.

2. Reputation: Confidence Isn’t Built in a Bubble

Executive presence isn’t just about how you feel, it’s also about how others experience you. And you can’t cultivate credibility in isolation. So pick three people you trust, like actually really trust, and ask:

Listen without defending. You asked, they’re not attacking you and this is just information, it’s not personal. Then work to align how you see yourself with how you show up. When how you see yourself starts to match how others experience you, you start to build credibility and a reputation that’s built on confidence as opposed to bravado.

3. Rest: Strategic Stillness Is a Power Move

If you’re always “on,” people don’t feel your power, they only feel your pressure.

High achievers often confuse being busy with being valuable. But real power isn’t being in constant motion, it’s about being in control. The leaders who command a room don’t rush - they pause before they speak, they think before they answer, and they rest before they crash.

Try this: block off one 30-minute “white space” block this week. No meetings, no messages, no multitasking. Just time to think, breathe, or step outside. Protect it like you would your most important call. Ideally, you build this into your day, every day, but start slow. The goal isn’t to fill the space; it’s to feel it. No doom scrolling, no “quick prep” for the next meeting, no check-in phone calls. Just you and ideally some fresh air. The more calm you can cultivate in your daily life, the more calm you’ll be in stressful situations.

The best part about this is that calmness isn’t a personality trait. It’s actually a skill you can learn and practice. And being calm amidst the chaos is the presence people remember long after you’ve left the room. A calm presence leaves an impression, but strategic stillness is what makes it last.

TL;DR:

You got this!

📎 Bonus resource:

💡 Comment “CLEAR” below or DM me on LinkedIn and I’ll send it your way.

👋🏽 Hi! I’m Minal - a Career Success & Leadership Coach for 1st & 2nd gen professionals (the first in your family to build a career here or the child of immigrants balancing two cultures). I help you move past outdated work advice, communicate with confidence and clarity, and show up as a strong, credible leader so that you can earn promotions (and raises) faster without burning out, shrinking yourself, or pretending to be someone you’re not.

If you enjoyed today’s issue, please subscribe 👇🏽 and forward it to one friend who needs to hear this. Because burnout doesn’t have to be the badge of success. Let’s rise together.

Let’s be real - executive presence might be the most overused, under-explained feedback in corporate America. If you've ever been told to "speak up more," "own the room," or "look the part," there's a good chance you walked away wondering: What does that even mean?

And if you're a first- or second-generation professional - especially a woman of color, a first-gen college grad, an immigrant, or someone navigating workplace culture you didn’t grow up in - executive presence can feel like a moving target. One that shifts depending on who’s in the room, what’s trending on LinkedIn, or which manager decides what “leadership material” looks like this quarter.

Too often, executive presence gets packaged as a vibe: charismatic, commanding, a little mysterious, and definitely fluent in corporate buzzwords. Or worse, it’s reduced to surface-level optics: loud voice, strong handshake, expensive shoes. But here’s the thing. That’s not presence. That’s performance. And it’s exhausting.

So WTF is executive presence, really?

At its core, executive presence is how people experience you when you walk into a room, and how they remember you when you leave. It’s the blend of energy, communication, and credibility that signals: I’ve got this and you can trust me to lead.

It has nothing to do with having the most polished accent, the fanciest title, or the loudest voice. In fact, some of the most powerful people in the world speak softly, don’t wear suits, and have zero desire to dominate a room. They lead by being fully themselves - not a watered-down, office-friendly version of who they think they should be.

The real markers of executive presence? Think 3 Cs:

Clarity - You speak with intention. You know what you’re trying to say and why it matters. You don’t just communicate information, you create alignment.

Calm - You hold your ground when things get tense. Not by faking stoicism, but by managing your emotions without suppressing them. You take a breath, respond instead of react, and make others feel safe following your lead.

Credibility - You know your stuff, and it shows, not because you talk over people or rattle off your résumé, but because you speak from your lived experience, not around it. You’re grounded in your value. You don’t overexplain. You don’t shrink. You don’t seek permission to be in the room.

Notice what’s not on this list: perfect grammar; fancy degrees; burning yourself out to prove you belong. Executive presence is not about assimilating to an outdated ideal. It’s about aligning who you are with how you show up.

That’s power. And it’s buildable.

Want to build your version of executive presence? Start here:

Your voice doesn’t have to be loud, but it does need to be clear. Try this filter: Am I saying what I mean, or am I saying what I think they want to hear? If it’s the latter, there’s work to do - not in your vocabulary, but in your self-permission.

👋🏽 Hi! I’m Minal — a Career Success & Leadership Coach for 1st & 2nd generation professionals. I help ambitious folks like you break free from outdated workplace narratives and finally own the room without working harder, code-switching, or playing small.

If no one ever taught you how to build executive presence, that’s not your fault. Most people can’t define it, let alone teach it, especially in a way that includes folks who aren’t already in the room.

But that’s what we’re doing here.

Every issue of Unmuted is about rewriting the rules - on leadership, confidence, and visibility - so that you can rise without burning out, shape-shifting or selling out.

You don’t have to shout to be heard. But you do have to stop whispering your worth.

Presence isn’t about assimilation. It’s about alignment - between your voice, your values, and your vision. Let’s build real presence. The kind that makes people remember your name and not just your résumé.

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If today’s issue made you feel seen, sparked a shift, or gave you something real to work with…

Because presence isn’t performance. It’s power. Let’s build it together.

See you next week!