You gotta love TED! This talk by Amy Cuddy re: her research on body language is worth a few minutes if you are an entrepreneur, speaker, or think you’ll ever be interviewed for a job again…
For those of you who don’t want to watch the video, it’s about high power posture vs. low power postures and how they can actually affect your hormone levels and performance in stressful situations. It’s known that your posture follows your thoughts, so if you feel small and defeated you will show it by curling in and looking down, for example.
Cuddy and her partners wanted to see if doing it the other way would work. Can changing the posture change your mind? They found that it can.
The science is interesting. Just two minutes in a “power pose” (examples in video) can increase testosterone levels to boost confidence and decrease cortisol levels to reduce stress. Two minutes in a ‘low power pose’ (also in video) does just the opposite… less testosterone and more cortisol = less confidence and more stress.
If this is true it has all kinds of practical applications. Training yourself to always use a more open, confident posture would be awesome… but you could also make it a bit more intentional prior to specific events like a job interview, presentation, or business meeting.
As a marketer, I know that little things can make a BIG difference to outcomes. Could a bit of privacy and two minutes in a power pose make a little difference to an important meeting or interview and change the course of your entire life?
I don’t want to make those kind of claims based on one TED talk, but whether it changes your physiology or not, making some postural changes to appear more confident and successful can’t hurt!
Maybe it will help you in negotiating with Done4ULocal to get some great marketing services and take your business to the next level… you’ll have to call us to find out 😉 506-847-4025