10 Simple and Powerful Body Language Tips for 2013

image:business.mega.mu
culled from: barbarapease.com

Body language plays a key role in effective leadership communication. From my most-requested program, “The Silent Language of Leaders: How Body Language Can Help – or Hurt – How You Lead,” here are ten tips guaranteed to give you a nonverbal advantage!
1) To boost your confidence before an important meeting, replace your smart phone with a newspaper.
professionals I coach understand the importance of projecting confident body language during an important meeting, a job interview, say, or a key sales pitch, but few realize that how they sit while waiting in the reception area has everything to do with their initial impression.
Research from Harvard and Columbia Business Schools shows that holding your body in expansive “high power” poses (standing tall with shoulders pulled back, widening your stance, spreading your arms to expand into space) raises testosterone (the hormone linked to power and self-confidence) and lowers the levels of the stress hormone, cortisol. This hormonal effect is actually reversed, the researchers discovered, when you contract yourself physically, (hunch your shoulders, tuck your chin down, etc.) assuming postures that make you look defensive and lacking in confidence.
Now picture yourself in the reception area where you are waiting for that important meeting. Are you bent over your smart phone, with your elbows pulled into your waist and your shoulders hunched? Or are you sitting up straight, feet firmly on the floor, arms spread wide holding an open newspaper? And, when you are called into the meeting, which of those two hormones is dominating your body chemistry?
2) To spot a liar, look out for these four “the tell-tale” signals.
Nonverbal cues to all kinds of unconscious giveaways tend to occur in clusters – a group of movements, postures and actions that collectively point to a particular state of mind. This is crucially true of dishonesty, where one specific cluster of nonverbal signals has been proven statistically to be a highly accurate indicator of deception. These are: hand touching, face touching, crossed arms, and leaning away. According to research conducted at Northeastern University, if you see these “Telltale Four” being displayed together, watch out!
3) To make a difficult task seem easier, smile.
Charles Garfield, the author of Peak Performance, once coached the Russian Olympic weight-lifting team. Garfield noticed that when team members lifted to exhaustion, they would invariably grimace at the painful effort. In an experiment, he encouraged the athletes to smile when they got to that point of exhaustion. This seemingly minor difference enabled them to add 2-3 more reps to their performance.
No matter the task, when you grimace or frown while doing it, you are sending your brain the message, “This is really difficult. I should stop.”  The brain then responds by sending stress chemicals into your bloodstream. And this creates a vicious circle: the more stressed you are, the more difficult the task becomes.
Conversely, when you smile, your brain gets the message, “It’s not so bad. I can do this!”
4) To reach an agreement, send early engagement signals.
Over the years, I’ve noticed that parties are more likely to reach an agreement if they begin a negotiation by displaying engaged body language (smiling, nodding, mirroring, open gestures, etc.). Interestingly, that positive result is the same whether the display was the product of an unconscious reaction or a strategic decision.

Image credit: AFP/Getty Images via @daylife.
5) To encourage collaboration, rearrange your office.
Projecting power, authority, and status may be a key part of your nonverbal strategy to impress potential clients, customers, and investors – and if it is, then arranging your office space as a visual symbol of your and your company’s brand can be a crucial part of that strategy.
When it comes to building collaboration within your staff, however, status and authority cues can send conflicting, distinctly unwanted messages. If creating a collaborative culture is essential to meeting your business objectives, then you might want to rearrange your office to reflect this. For example, seating people directly across from your desk (especially if their chair is smaller and lower than yours) places them in a competitive (and disadvantageous) position. Instead, try putting the visitor’s chair at the side of your desk, or creating a conversation area (chairs of equal size set around a small table or at right angles to each other) to encourage a feeling of informality, equality, and partnership.
Body Language

When we communicate with others, we express our thoughts and feelings not only through the words we choose, but also through our tone of voice, facial expression and body language. In fact, many communications experts believe that far more information is communicated non-verbally (without words) than verbally (with words). "Body language" is an important part of non-verbal communication.
Body language includes many different aspects of our every day physical behaviour: the way we greet one another; how we stand, how we sit or walk; the way we position our arms and legs or use our hands and eyes are some of the most basic.
To learn another language is more than just learning words and grammar, it involves learning about another culture, too. We learn much of our own culture's body language before we learn to speak, from the time we are children, usually without even being aware of it.  And that body language varies from culture to culture, so it's something to which second language learners should pay attention.
So, how attuned are you to other people's body language?  Try this little experiment.  Turn the volume on the television right down while you watch people interact on the screen. You may find it is more difficult to understand what's happening between people from unfamiliar cultures.
Sometimes, cultural differences in appropriate body language can cause discomfort or misunderstandings too. For example, there are definite cultural differences in how much distance should be kept between two people who are speaking together. If you are used to people keeping their distance, you will feel very uncomfortable, and probably move away repeatedly, if someone keeps trying to stand closer to you at a party!  We call this the "personal comfort zone".
Another common example of misunderstanding is the use of a smile. In some Asian cultures, a smile can show embarrassment or apology. However, smiling back at a teacher who is unhappy with you, or a stranger whose foot you accidentally stepped upon is probably not a good idea in most English speaking cultures! Also, you should not assume that nodding your head means "yes" or that shaking your head means "no" or vice versa.  Yes, you can even get that wrong, with potentially disastrous consequences.
Even speakers of the same language, such as British, American, or Australian people, may not use the same body language and must adapt if they wish to communicate successfully.  British people are said to be more reserved and formal, in general, and this is reflected in their body language.  Americans are considered more open and outgoing, while Australians are seen as casual and relaxed.
It's worth learning, understanding any underlying cultural or regional attitudes can help you learn how to understand and use body language to improve your communicative abilities.
Just as you should not allow a fear of making language mistakes prevent you from speaking, you should not be overly afraid of using inappropriate body language in an unfamiliar culture. Most people will understand that people from different cultures may not always use body language in the same ways. All the same, it's definitely advisable to learn as much as possible about the body language of a new culture, and to use careful observation to avoid making any mistakes.
To learn more about the topic of body language, you may like to start by looking at the fascinating research of Allan and Barbara Pease and Dr Desmond Morris.