When you demonstrate poise under pressure,
you stop being a service or product,
that people will commoditize
and instead become a person
they will want esteem from.
That is the leverage of “personal authority.”

The following is excerpted from Chapter 3: Move Yourself from “Oh F#@&” to OK from my upcoming book, ““Just Listen” – Discover the Secret to Getting Through to Absolutely Anyone (which you can pre-order).

The best example of coolness under fire I’ve ever seen involved former Secretary of State Colin Powell. In 1996, Powell was the keynote speaker at a national conference for a leading residential real estate company’s top producers. By that point, he’d achieved tremendous popularity with the American public and was being considered as a presidential nominee.

I happened to be in the audience that day, and General Powell had me (and everyone else) in the palm of his hand. He urged the audience to give back to their communities. He spoke passionately of his gratitude for his family, childhood, and friends. And he exhorted us all to “do well by doing good.”

At the end of his talk, he called for questions. Still feeling the warm glow of his inspiring words, we were totally unprepared for what happened next.

“General Powell,” the first questioner said, “I understand that your wife once suffered from depression, had to take medicine, and was even in a mental hospital. Do you want to comment on that?”

You could hear all 8,000 people in the auditorium gasp at the inappropriateness—not to mention the cruelty—of the question. In the silence that followed, we all wondered how Powell would react to being blindsided. Edmund Muskie had thrown away his presidential hopes years earlier, when a reporter asked about his wife’s sanity, and he started to cry. What would Powell do under similar circumstances?

Here’s exactly what he did. He looked at the questioner. He paused for a moment. And then he simply responded: ”Excuse me—the person you love more than anyone is living in hell, and you don’t do whatever you can to get her out. Do you have a problem with that, sir?”

I was in awe. His response was brilliant. It was calm. It was perfect.

And believe me: it wasn’t the first thing General Powell wanted to do. For a split second, he probably wanted to walk down from the podium, grab the idiot who asked the question, and knock his teeth through the back of his head. Because that’s what every one of us would want to do in his place.

But he didn’t give in to anger (even though he had every right to). And he didn’t cry, like Senator Muskie. Instead, he went from “Oh F#@&” to “OK” faster than I’ve ever seen anyone do it.

As a result, he reached me even more deeply than he had with his speech. He reached everyone in the audience and touched them to their core. And I have no doubt he reached the questioner just as powerfully as a fist in the face would have—without having to lift a finger to do it.

That’s poise under pressure. And if you can achieve that same poise, it’ll get you successfully through any stressful, high-stakes encounters that life hands you.

To demonstrate YOUR personal authority, please sign up for the FREE RESOURCES above to learn “Two Questions to Gain People’s Respect and Have Them Treat You Better.” Please leave a comment on this blog post to let me know how it works out for you.

President Obama was recently chosen as the most popular leader in the world. It may not be a matter of popularity, but a matter of respect..

Trustworthiness and Competence will get you a nod of approval, but only being Respectworthy will gain you sustained loyalty. There are three key components to earning Respect: Clarity, Preparation, Integrity. Together they form your CPI Index™. When perception of these qualities goes down, so too do other’s respect for you.

Individuals who have Clarity are neither confused nor confusing when it comes to who they are and what they want. They are very clear in the goals they have set for themselves and understand what they need to do in order to make those goals a reality. If you have ever had the chance to work for or under an individual who has that clarity, you would probably agree that they are self-assured, exude positive energy and make great leaders. On the other hand, if you’ve had the misfortune to work for an individual who is confused and/or confusing in terms of what they envision, they exasperate or at the very least frustrate you and as a result command little if no respect. Typically, that type of person stands for nothing and when you discovered it, you lost respect for them that you never got back. People who possess clarity trigger our admiration.

Individuals who properly Prepare do not shoot from the hip. They think long and hard about what they want to accomplish and how they will get it done. They have a plan and they execute. By doing their due diligence on the front end, they are better prepared to leads others to a positive result. By being properly prepared, they understand that even if they get knocked off course they will be able to get back on track and pick up where they left off. People who are prepared have experience, but more importantly learn from it and develop judgment. Those that are not prepared have no idea what their course might be and as a result when they get knocked off, they simply cannot come back because there is no plan to climb back on to. Prepared individuals bring solutions to problems. Unprepared individuals seemingly make excuses, blame or “whine” without a constructive solution. Individuals who are prepared are self-assured, exude energy and are the people that most people want to be around. People who are prepared inspire confidence.

Individuals who have Integrity are the type of individuals we all want to be around! These are the individuals who do what they say they are going to do. They are the leaders who stay the course no matter what the circumstances might be because they are committed to a vision that rests soundly or core values dedicated to serving and enriching the common good. We all have come across those who talk a good game but when the “rubber meets the road,” we find that their substance is weak or nonexistent. In contrast, high integrity individuals have the judgment to know the right thing to do, the character to stand up to those who don’t do it and the courage to stop those who won’t do it. In life, we all have opportunities and challenges. It is easy to stay the course when things are going well. It is when we hit a pothole in the road that throws us off course that really tests our mettle and our commitment to ourselves and to those around us. Most people want to know that a leader will be there when the chips are down. Integrity is everything! You can spend a lifetime building it and it only takes one situation where you did not live up to your commitment to tear it down. On the other hand, people with integrity are not perfect and do make honest mistakes. But when they do, they don’t lie or pass the buck. Rather they take full responsibility for them and then take corrective action to not repeat them (think J.F.K. and theBay of Pigs). Reputation and integrity are the foundation of the good leadership. Those, who hold that dear, will not tolerate anyone who lacks integrity. People with integrity engender trust.

A person who is universally respected, that best embodies these qualities and that to me has the highest CPI Index™ is former UCLA basketball coach John Wooden. His high level of clarity, preparation and integrity engender deep admiration, confidence and trust. For example, with regard to integrity there is the story of how he wanted to coach for Indiana and they had told him that they would call him to let him know by 6:00 PM on a particular day their decision. On that day, Wooden waited and did not hear from them by that time and was called at 6:05 by UCLA who offered him the job which he accepted. At 6:15 Indiana called to say they had tried to call him, but couldn’t get through. Wooden responded that he had already accepted the UCLA offer and he would not go back on his word.

Now that we have defined clarity, preparation and integrity and hopefully agree on their importance to effective leadership, how do Presidents and how did recent candidates stack up? What is their “CPI Index™“? On a scale of one to 10 measure each on these values — 1 being” negligible” with 10 being “outstanding” – how do they measure up?

If we look at prior elections and prior candidates, the ones who were elected were perceived to have a high CPI index™. Those with a low index fell by the wayside. Bill Clinton was perceived as being high in clarity and preparation and his (personal vs. professional) integrity mainly came into question after he had one and half terms under his belt. Al Gore was perceived as being prepared and having integrity, but alas, he just didn’t come off as clear as George Bush in 2000. John Kerry was perceived as being somewhat prepared on issues, but lacked clarity and was perceived as having “flip flop” integrity issues. Howard Dean seemed clear and to have integrity, but in lacking self-awareness of how he could turn off people, he was unprepared. George Bush possibly prevailed in both 2000 and 2004 because he was perceived as being clear and in having integrity (especially with regard to doing what he said he was going to do). And if he was perceived as being unprepared, he was perceived as being advised by people with a lot of experience and expertise (a la Ronald Reagan another high in clarity, high in integrity president).

Part of the reason for the incredible enmity toward him now is for his perceived lack of integrity as more and more information comes forth regarding decisions and policies.

As we consider the cast of candidates from the 2008 election, it was difficult viewing them as possessing a sustained John Wooden level CPI index. On any given day any one of the qualities can appear to be lacking.

Compared to Obama, Hilary Clinton was perceived as off the charts in preparation especially with her husband as confidante and advisor at her side and given her experience as a Senator. However she lacked clarity and integrity in the eyes of voters. And her integrity was deeply marred by her appearing to be more about maneuvering to get elected, than what she would do once in office. Also, she didn’t seem to know who she was (as if she had been listening too much to her advisors). In the end, her ambition to win seemed more apparent than an aspiration to make the world better, which ironically we are now perceiving her as doing in her capacity as Secretary of State.

McCain’s CPI index was probably the most consistently high of all candidates, both Republican and Democrat. However his insistence on reacting negatively towards Obama instead of focusing on solutions may have done him in.

Obama was perceived as high in clarity and integrity and lower in preparation. And it was that lower score in preparation, i.e. lack of experience that Clinton tried to focus on. Also to Obama and his wife’s benefited from seeming to know who they are and aspiring to work with us to create a better world. And also what worked and still works in his favor is that Obama comes off as more aspirational (i.e. aspiring to create a better world) than ambitious.

Presently Obama enjoys continuing high ratings (except by the far politically Right, whose Integrity in terms of caring about the common good is highly suspect) because he has a high CPI Index™. He is actually becoming Clearer, is becoming experienced and using that experience to become increasingly Prepared, and his Integrity is also growing as he appears to be doing or giving his best effort to doing what he says he will do as well as taking responsibility for his actions and “messups.”

What’s your CPI Index™?

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