Stuck at Work? Here's Why Executive Presence Advice is Making It Worse

Stuck at work despite doing everything "right"? You're Googling this at 3am because you've tried all the executive presence advice—speak up more, lean in harder, command the room—and you're still invisible. Here's the truth no one's telling you: Traditional executive presence advice is designed for functional workplaces. But you're not working in one.

The Executive Presence Lie That's Stealing Your Sanity

Let me tell you about the moment I realized executive presence advice is complete bullshit for women in finance and tech.

Two years before I retired from banking, our institution announced "We're going Agile!" Like every other corporate buzzword rollout, this came with zero planning, no training, and impossible expectations. I was already managing a development onboarding project with set budgets and timelines, working 70+ hour weeks, when I got the directive: "Your teams must be Agile. Immediately."

Being the responsible leader I was, I reached out to the Agile initiative leaders asking for transition processes, training schedules, methodology documentation—you know, the basics you need to actually implement something successfully.

Their response? "We don't know how we're transitioning to this methodology or what our processes will be."

I pushed back: "But you're requiring me to follow this methodology."

"We'll share everything once we figure out what we're doing."

"That makes no sense. If I set up teams now without knowing the actual methodology, I'll have to retrain everyone later, causing delays and budget overruns. Shouldn't I continue with our current proven processes until you have the training ready?"

"NO! You must set up your teams to be Agile. Now."

Why Every Executive Presence Expert Would Have Given You Useless Advice

Every leadership coach would have told me to "influence up," "build strategic alliances," or "communicate my concerns more effectively." They would have suggested I needed better executive presence to "command respect" and "drive alignment."

Here's what actually happened: Despite having 30 years of finance and technology experience, despite being the most prepared person in every room, despite doing everything the executive presence gurus teach—I was still expected to perform miracles with no resources while leadership made decisions that defied basic logic.

Sound familiar, Brave One?

The Real Problem: You're Trying to Have Executive Presence in a Broken System

After coaching and mentoring hundreds of women through similar corporate insanity, here's what I've discovered: The reason you feel stuck isn't because you lack executive presence. It's because you're trying to have executive presence in environments designed to undermine competence.

Finance and tech companies love to talk about "leadership" and "innovation" while systematically punishing anyone who points out that the emperor has no clothes. They want you to have "executive presence" as long as you don't actually execute anything that challenges their dysfunction.

As I explored in "Feeling Stuck in Career? I'll Tell You Why (And It's Not What Your HR Department Says)," the traditional career advancement model is fundamentally broken for women who actually know what they're doing.

Truth Bomb #1: Your Industry Rewards Compliance, Not Competence

In my Agile disaster, I ended up doing what competent women always do: I figured it out myself. I researched best practices, worked with our newly hired scrum master (thankfully a pro), documented processes, and somehow made it work with two teams instead of the planned five.

Traditional executive presence advice would say I "succeeded."

The truth? I succeeded despite the system actively working against logic, not because I had better "presence."

Truth Bomb #2: "Lean In" is Terrible Advice for Broken Organizations

How do I know this? I was the firefighter brought in to fix broken projects and programs.

Sheryl Sandberg's "lean in" advice assumes you're working in functional environments where merit matters, where speaking up gets heard, and where competence gets rewarded.

But what do you do when leaning in means leaning into a system that's fundamentally illogical?

In finance and tech, "leaning in" often means volunteering to clean up messes created by poor planning, accepting impossible timelines because "that's what leaders do," and absorbing the stress of organizational dysfunction while maintaining a professional smile.

When you're constantly the one called in to fix other people's disasters, "leaning in" becomes a trap that ensures you'll always be the one absorbing organizational incompetence.

That's not leadership. That's enabling.

Truth Bomb #3: Executive Presence Can't Fix Structural Stupidity

In the Agile story I shared earlier, I didn't just accept the illogical directive. I went up the ladder to the head of technology. And was basically ignored.

Here's what no executive presence coach will tell you: Sometimes the reason you can't "influence up" isn't because you lack gravitas—it's because the people above you are making decisions that don't make sense.

Sometimes the reason your brilliant ideas get ignored isn't because you need better communication skills—it's because implementing your ideas would expose how poorly planned everything else is.

Sometimes the reason you feel invisible isn't because you lack presence—it's because your competence is inconvenient.

The Strategic Authenticity Difference: Presence WITH Boundaries

Real executive presence in dysfunctional environments isn't about commanding respect—it's about maintaining your sanity and effectiveness while protecting yourself from organizational insanity.

This is what I call Strategic Authenticity: showing up powerfully while refusing to absorb dysfunction as if it's your fault to fix.

In my Agile situation, Strategic Authenticity looked like:

• Documenting every request and response to protect myself
• Doing excellent work within the constraints given, without trying to fix the entire broken system
• Maintaining professional relationships while internally recognizing the absurdity
• Planning my exit strategy while delivering results

Truth Bomb #4: Your Real Problem Isn't Presence—It's Believing You Can Fix Everything

Throughout my career, I was the fixer—brought in to problem-solve, constantly documenting and sharing proposals for better ways to work. And you know what I learned? The system doesn't want to be fixed.

Women in finance and tech get stuck because we're conditioned to believe that if something isn't working, we must not be leading well enough. We think if we just had better executive presence, we could make unreasonable situations reasonable.

This is the trap that keeps you spinning your wheels.

You don't need better executive presence. You need better boundaries around what you're willing to absorb as "your problem to solve."

The Three Questions That Actually Matter

Instead of asking "How can I have better executive presence?" start asking:

1. "Is this dysfunction I'm trying to navigate, or incompetence I'm trying to fix?"
2. "Am I being measured by my ability to perform miracles, or my ability to deliver results with adequate resources?"
3. "Is this organization functional enough to reward the kind of leadership I want to provide?"

These questions will tell you more about your career trajectory than any executive presence assessment ever will.

What Real Executive Presence Looks Like in Broken Systems

Real executive presence in finance and tech means:

• Delivering excellent work without trying to fix systemic dysfunction
• Maintaining your standards without absorbing organizational anxiety
• Being strategic about what battles are worth fighting
• Recognizing when environments are too broken for your gifts

This isn't about "giving up" or "playing small." It's about being strategic enough to preserve your energy for environments that can actually utilize your talents.

As I detailed in "How Women Lead: 4 Natural Patterns from Exhausted to Influential," women often have natural leadership gifts that get suppressed when we try to lead in fundamentally dysfunctional systems instead of finding or creating functional ones.

The Integration That Actually Works

My SoulFire Method teaches something no traditional executive presence training covers: how to maintain your power in powerless situations.

Because here's what I learned from 30 years in corporate finance and technology: The most powerful thing you can do is refuse to make other people's poor planning your emergency, while still being impeccably professional.

You can have incredible executive presence and still work in environments where logic goes to die. The key is knowing the difference between problems you can solve with better leadership and problems that require you to find better environments.

Ready for the Real Conversation?

If you're tired of trying to have executive presence in environments designed to exhaust you, if you're ready to stop believing that every organizational dysfunction is your leadership problem to solve, then let's talk.

The women I work with in my Aligned Leadership Mastermind learn how to show up powerfully without absorbing corporate insanity as their fault to fix. They develop what I call Strategic Authenticity—the ability to deliver excellent results while maintaining clear boundaries around organizational dysfunction.

Your competence isn't the problem. Your work ethic isn't the problem. Your leadership potential isn't the problem.

The problem is believing that if you just had better "executive presence," you could make broken systems work.

Ready to stop trying to fix environments that are designed to exhaust you? Let's explore what becomes possible when you learn to lead powerfully within realistic constraints.

Ready to stop trying to fix environments that are designed to exhaust you? Book a complimentary Strategy Call and let's explore what becomes possible when you learn to lead powerfully within realistic constraints. Because you deserve to work in environments that can actually handle your level of competence.