Developing Executive Presence Through Your Wardrobe

In this article, Cassandra Sethi explains how to develop executive presence through your wardrobe using six practical style strategies.

Why Building Executive Presence is Important

Building an executive presence is important because that presence is how others perceive you. If they perceive you as someone confident, smart, trustworthy, and strong, they’re more likely to want to work with you.

After all, it only takes seven seconds to make a first impression. In those seven seconds when someone first meets you, they’ll make judgments about you that could last a lifetime.

If their first impression of you is that you’re sloppy, uncertain, and careless, they’ll take their business elsewhere.

In short: You are your business card. 

When you reach certain levels of success, the small things become big. Others start to notice tiny details about you that they didn’t before– and your style is one of them.

How you dress should align with your personal brand. That way, when people meet you, they see exactly what you’re about and associate that with your work.

That’s why building an executive presence through style is so important. It can convey intentionality, confidence, trust, and so much more. 

Another thing that happens when you reach the top of your professional game? Your time becomes even more valuable. And you tend to have less of it. So you need someone to help you be more efficient.

You don’t have time to guess what clothing will fit your brand or spend days at a shopping center. You want to get it right the first time around. The best way to do that is with advice from an Executive Stylist.

How To Develop Executive Presence Through Your Style in 6 Steps

Wondering how to develop executive presence? We asked our Executive Styling Team for their top tips on boosting your presence:

1. Make it easy for yourself.
2. Organize your closet.
3. Look at your calendar.
4. Invest in high-quality pieces.
5. Get the perfect fit for your body today.
6. Use easy-to-remember formulas.

Let’s take a closer look at each one.

1. Make It Easy for Yourself!

You’re a busy professional who can’t (and doesn’t want to) waste your time figuring out what to wear each morning.

When you open your closet each morning, you shouldn’t feel rushed, panicked, or frustrated. You should feel relaxed and confident knowing you have exactly what you need right in front of you.

There’s a name for what’s happening when that decision drains you before your day even starts: decision fatigue. Every choice made pulls from the same limited pool of mental energy, and the more trivial decisions burned through early, the less discipline and clarity left for the ones that actually matter. For a busy professional, that’s not a minor inconvenience. It’s willpower that’s needed for negotiations, judgment calls, and leadership decisions, spent instead on choosing a tie.

The solution is to systemize your wardrobe so you have style systems in place before you even get ready.

We always work with systems. The first (and most important) one we start with is the Next Level Wardrobe Style System:

1. Focus on Core Colors.
2. Invest in Essential Pieces.
3. Prioritize the Perfect Fit.

Use these guidelines as your north star and the process of getting dressed won’t seem so overwhelming.

2. Organize Your Closet

You can’t have a great CEO style if your closet doesn’t have the right pieces in it.

Start by cleaning out your closet. Take everything out and decide what you’re keeping and what you’re donating.

Be honest with yourself: if you haven’t worn that top you bought on a whim in a year, you’re never going to. Donate it.

Not sure if something still fits? Try it on. 

Once you’ve gotten rid of the pieces you don’t need, you can put your pieces back into your closet. Then you’ll see what gaps exist in your wardrobe, and you can use that information to buy the right pieces.

We recommend conducting a closet edit twice a year, ideally when the weather shifts from cold to warm and vice versa. That way, you keep yourself from falling into the same bad habits and keep your wardrobe seasonal.

3. Look at Your Calendar

With a clean closet and a clean slate, it’s time to go shopping, right?

Not quite yet. 

Before buying new pieces for your executive wardrobe, you need a game plan.

Look at your calendar and identify the different situations you’ll need outfits for.

For example:

• Do you have speaking engagements coming up?
• Any big meetings that you’re leading? 
• Will you be working virtually for a while? 
• What does your life look like outside of work? 
• Any special events, galas, etc. that you’d need a special look for?

Knowing when, where, and why you’ll be wearing your new looks will help you plan what to buy. That, in turn, will make it way easier to end up with outfits you actually love and use.

Don’t have time to list out all the different use cases on your calendar? Hand your schedule over to a stylist. They’ll make sure you’re covered no matter what you’ve got planned.

4. Invest in High-Quality Pieces

At this point in your career, your time is valuable. You don’t want to constantly run to the store or hunt down online orders every few months.

A way to save yourself time, energy, and stress is to invest in high-quality pieces.

Focus on well-made clothing that’s built to last, not pieces you’ll need to replace quickly.

We also recommend buying investment pieces in core colors.

That way, you can stretch your investment further with items that are easy to mix, match, and dress up or down. You simplify your wardrobe while increasing its quality.

5. Get the Perfect Fit for Your Body Today

One of the most common things we see holding people back from developing an executive wardrobe is body changes.

People often tell themselves they can’t have the wardrobe of their dreams until something changes about their body. Instead, they hold onto old items that no longer fit and put off updating their wardrobe.

Bodies change, and that’s okay.

Don’t hold yourself back because you’re waiting for your body to look different. Focus on dressing the body you have today.

One of the biggest things that can affect a professional look is wearing ill-fitting clothing. Something that’s too big or too tight can make an otherwise great outfit look less polished.

When you’re ready to shop, forget about the size printed on the tag and focus on fit. What matters is that the clothing fits properly and makes you look and feel good.

And remember, most people need some type of tailoring. Common alterations include hemming pants and adjusting sleeves.

A skilled tailor can adjust an item so that it fits just right. It may feel like an extra step, but it’s worth it to have clothing that truly works for your body.

6. Use Easy-To-Remember Outfit Formulas

Now that you have an organized closet filled with the right pieces, it’s time to build outfits.

Outfit formulas are quick, easy-to-remember systems for putting looks together without overthinking the process.

Here are a few of our favorites:

1. The Color Formula: Just wear core colors from head to toe. Black, grey, white, and navy blue always go together and look polished year-round.
2. The 1-2-3 Formula: Wear a top in one core color, a bottom in another, and then add a layering piece either in a core color or an accent print or color.
3. The One and Done Formula: Choose one color and wear it from head to toe. Personalize this monochromatic ensemble with different shades or textures in the same color.

Use these formulas with the items in your closet, and you’ll never be at a loss for what to wear.

Establish Your Presence in the Executive World

Developing executive presence through your wardrobe doesn’t have to be difficult or confusing. If you’re ready to start dressing for success, apply for Next Level Wardrobe’s Executive Image Consulting Services. Our stylists will take care of each of the steps we’ve listed here and so much more.