Leadership Charm Vs Charisma
Jimmy Carr has one of the best explainers of Charm and charisma (see video below)
According to Jimmy, Charm and charisma are two different levers. I’ve been thinking about this a lot in recent times and have heard Jimmy frame it in a few different ways. So, I applied it to leaders and leadership.
C‑suite leaders can pull to get the best from their teams, boards, and external stakeholders, and you are almost certainly wired more toward one than the other.
Charm vs Charisma
Charm is “I come to you”: it’s the ability to make the person in front of you feel seen, heard, and important in one‑to‑one or small‑group settings. Leaders with charm gain good buy-in from their team the more time they spend with them.
Charisma is “you come to me”: it is the ability to command attention, set the emotional tone, and draw people toward your ideas at scale (appearing on large podcasts, speaking and holding town halls, conference talks, and holding big rooms).
How These Show Up In Leadership
A predominantly charming leader builds deep loyalty in close interactions, excels in stakeholder management, and is often the person people confide in off‑stage and behind the scenes. Very often charming leaders are approached by non-team members and have high trust.
A predominantly charismatic leader shapes the narrative in the room quickly, rallies large groups behind a direction, and is often followed before all the details are fully understood. These are often seen as great leaders but can lack the small group and 1-2-1 and 1-2-few skills.
Using Your Natural Bias
If you skew charm: double down on 1‑2-1’s, keep holding skip‑level meetings, and small, high‑trust forums where your strength compounds; many struggle as they want to be the chasrima-driven leader, but this can often backfire, whereas they should design their operating rhythm around more direct touchpoints.
If you skew charisma: you should architect more “big room” moments, concentrating on town halls, all‑hands meetings, appearing on media and internal broadcasts, where your presence sets the pace and conviction for the org. Many charisma based managers can struggle in smaller settings and lose their department’s trust when they aren’t as driven.
Developing The Other Muscle
Charming leaders can consciously practice “owning the room”: clearer openings, stronger framing, and more deliberate use of pause and emphasis in larger forums. Many try to over-index on mimicking previous managers who have the charismatic leadership style and it’s unnatural. If you are looking to develop a charismatic approach, you will want to look external first and manufacture environments where you can pull people into you with a vision, an innovation or a discovery that will pull your audience in.
Charismatic leaders can deliberately slow down in 1-on-1s, ask a second and third question, and signal genuine curiosity so people feel safe bringing you bad news and nuance. This is a muscle you use over and over again; do not cancel or skip 1-2-1 sessions. This is a common and detrimental trait that undermines a lot of the hard work you put in.
Why This Matters Most At The Top
Knowing whether your default is charm or charisma lets you design your calendar, communication cadence, and leadership team composition around your natural edge rather than against it. Leaders who don’t own their calendar and energy often lose
Often CEOs were considered to be only charismatic , but in more recent times and in the tech dominance era, ambiverted and introverted leaders are more skills-based, more personable and lead with interpersonal charm.At the C‑suite level, the goal is not to become someone else, but to be intentional - play your natural card harder (too many over-index on only working on their weaknesses and they do not defend their strengths and that causes friction in your own mind and with your team internally), then selectively train the complementary style so the organisation feels both led and listened to. Exec coaching is critical to many people who struggle with understanding their skillset, where they need to improve as a leader and become the executive they need to become.
