Emerging Leaders: 4 ways to lead when you’re not the leader

If you view meetings as a necessary evil to merely suffer through, you might just be neglecting to take advantage of an ideal setting to showcase your leadership skills.

'Meetings are your greatest opportunity to be visible and show your organization what you bring to the table,” said Luann Pendy when I interviewed her for a recent webinar I hosted on the topic of leading meetings.

Pendy should know. As vice president of global quality with Medtronic in suburban Minneapolis, she oversees quality operations and is charged with ensuring that medical devices for patients worldwide are of the highest quality and reliability.

'Meetings are how we get work done,” she continued. 'Achieving business goals quickly requires that we use meeting time efficiently.”

Here are Luann Pendy's top four tips for how to lead in meetings when you're not the meeting leader:

1. The Power of Participation

To become competent at leading meetings, Pendy insists that it also pays to be skilled at participating in meetings - even when you're not the person in charge.

'I spend most of my time participating in meetings rather than leading meetings,” she explained. 'I make it my objective to be a good meeting participant because then leaders want me to come to their meetings to help them.

'It allows us to achieve our objectives that much faster.”

2. Be prepared

Study the agenda and know what your role is for the meeting. Pendy recommends considering several critical questions, such as, Why have you been invited to the meeting? What is the purpose of the meeting? and What is expected of you?

Make sure to deliver and go beyond those expectations.

'It's very important to make sure that you fulfill the role that's expected of you,” she added.

3. Be present

'Be present and participate,” she said. 'Don't wait to be invited. If you're included in the meeting, it's expected that you're there to contribute.”

An important part of being present is to sit at the table.

'Oftentimes, I see women come into a room where there's a big, long conference table and they try to find the chair in the corner away from the table,” Pendy noted. 'That doesn't come across as being positive, confident, engaged and enthused.”

4. Speak up

Several years ago, Pendy received feedback that she was perceived as 'hard to read” and, as a result, people found it difficult to work with her.

Co-workers believed she was not interested in what was going on in the meeting and that she appeared to 'not be engaged.” The feedback was eye-opening for Pendy.

'I'd go the meetings and be very courteous and respectful. I was listening to what everyone was saying, processing it and learning,” she said.

'So I changed,” she recounted. 'I received immediate feedback once I started speaking up in meetings. Employees said, ‘Thanks for supporting me.' My peers said, ‘Thanks for sharing your thoughts and your ideas.' And the management said, ‘Thanks for leading.'”

Pendy added that she would not be where she is today had she not taken action - and spoken up.

Jo Miller is CEO of Women's Leadership Coaching Inc., www.womensleadershipcoaching.com. Twitter handle: @womensleadershp