Advice Taken: Perceptions Matter
I recently attended a meeting in CA where I was speaking. Another of the invited speakers was a well known educator. Although I had heard her name lots of times before, we had never met. She was more or less my vintage. I googled her. I learned a fair bit online and had what I thought was at least some sense of who she was and the many issues she had confronted over a long and most successful career.
We met at the pre-event dinner, and as we were in the elevator back at the hotel returning to our respective rooms thereafter, she said to me: “I pictured you as way bigger. From your website, I imagined a “big woman.” I processed her observations as quickly as I could as the elevator moved from floor to floor and answered: “Small in stature; big in ideas” as I exited on the 35th floor.
I was a tad taken aback frankly. She had been honest to be sure. And I thought that would be end of her voiced observations about me — to me.
Wrong.
After my two plus hour presentation and accompanying dialogic exchange with attendees the next day, I saw her in the outside corridor. She remarked (and it was just before her remarks): “I thought you would have jazzy PowerPoints and instead you used down to earth table top cards.” Then she added, “That approach made me feel better since my upcoming PowerPoints, which are lacking in color and style.”
So, I said, “How about the substance of what I said?,” figuring that that was the true heart of the matter and what actually mattered. To my substantive query she responded in essence as follows: “Spot on and well done and vastly warmer and more accessible than I anticipated.”
I was taken aback yet again and asked quickly, “What led you to that perception of me?” She answered fast: “Your website. You don’t look warm there; you look unapproachable.”
Yipes. I see myself as warm and approachable. People seriously see something else on my website? My photos are obviously messaging poorly. Or, perhaps this fellow speaker saw something in those photos as to which I was oblivious. I have never been fond of photos of me. Too long a story to share here but she hit a nerve.
Two things struck me right then and there.
First, my fellow speaker seemed oddly aware of me when we are both vastly too old (and successful) to be threatened by each other. To be sure as noted earlier, I had googled her; I was curious as to her background. I was curious as to her looks. She seemed keenly competent. But we surely weren’t competing for anything; we were sharing insights and information with attendees and there’s no shortage of need for both.
Second item. In high school, I was jealous of my big breasted fellow student who wore tight sweaters and pearls and attracted every adolescent boy — I was petite and flat chested and the converse of sexy. She was stunning.
Years later, we were both at an event and I saw her across the room. She had aged of course but she was still stunning. By then, I actually had breasts and confidence and thought to myself: enough of the youthful jealously.
Then, my stunning former classmate she made a quip at the event in front of many others. In response to a suggestion I made there, she retorted: “Easy for you to say, you were Number One in the class.” That was decades ago to be clear.
Wait. All those years I was jealous of her, she was jealous of me and apparently still was? Wow. That was a shocker. I responded: “Actually, I was Number Two in the class; our classmate and my then best friend Nancy was Number One. And, aren’t we old enough now to get over those decade old jealousies?” I am.
Fast forward to my recent LA experience. I kept thinking, after the event and with the benefit of some wine with the event leader after its closure, is my website misinforming folks as to who I am? Is it messaging wrongly? Add in that I talk lots about quality messaging. In the quiet of the night, I kept coming back to the photos of me on my website. They suddenly seemed way wrong. Way off base. Way way bad.
And, as I getting ready to head to the airport at 4:15 am LA time, I emailed my webmaster. I said: the images of me have to change asap. I am messaging wrong. I am not sharing me. In a flash, I sent a handful of substitute photos with brief instructions and off I flew. I said as I departed via email: just fix the website photos so they message warmth.
I had a stop over in Atlanta, long enough to look at email. And just like that, my website was and now is now different. The photos were changed throughout and they did and do message very differently in my perception.
Here is my website with the revised photos:
I am hoping others see that my website messages better. I hope I am perceived as warm and welcoming and not big and overpowering, sucking the air out of rooms.
And I owe a big thank you to my fellow speaker for speaking her mind and sharing her real thoughts. My website is better for her observations. So am I. I care about insuring that folks feel free to engage with me. I don’t want to intimidate anyone.
Yes, and to be blunt, I am small in size but big in ideas and openness and welcomingness (is that even a word?).
To readers and acquaintances and others: Reach out. I hope it is easier now with different photos to message me. (Multiple meanings intended.) And, for the record, while I am PowerPointed out post Pandemic, my actual PowerPoints (when I use them) are filled with color and pizazz. Yup. They mirror me. At least I hope they do. The fellow speaker was spot on about that too.
