The influence of your Ethos
My wife and I watch some TV channels that have ads that seem to cater to the interests of seniors (I guess if the shoe fits). One of these ads features Tom Selleck as a spokesperson for a reverse mortgage company. The ad spot begins with Tom saying “Look, this isn’t my first rodeo.” Then he goes on in his friendly but authoritative manner (just like in his role as Police Commissioner Frank Reagan on Blue Bloods) to tell about the reverse mortgage product. The ad ends with Tom saying, “I trust them. I think you can too.” We find ourselves wanting to trust them, because Tom Selleck makes us want to trust him. Because he’s Tom Selleck.
Creating Trust
The ad creators know that for selling a product like this, involving large sums of money, they need to create trust with the customer. And what better way to do that than to use the face and voice of someone who seems to ooze trustworthiness. I don’t know that much about Mr. Selleck, but by celebrity standards he seems like a credible guy with a good reputation. “Seems” may be the key word, since most of us don’t know him personally. So, our perception may also depend on the persona he has created in some of his TV and film roles. Whatever the reason, we listen to people that have an ethos we can trust.
Whatever your season of life, but especially if you are in your “middle years,” how do people perceive you as a person? Do you communicate trust? Are you able to leverage your personal character, image, and reputation as part of your influence and leadership? Your overall personal image, character, and reputation is known as your Ethos, and is a key element of your visibility and influence. It is your presence and way of being. It is the influence of your Ethos.
Develop your personal credibility as a person of influence.
This is your Ethos, and is part your “brand” and what you are known for.
In prior posts I have explored the elements of rhetoric as developed by the Greek philosopher Aristotle more than 2000 years ago. The three elements of rhetoric are known as Logos, Pathos, and Ethos. Aristotle proposed that these are three ways that a speaker or orator can persuade or influence an audience. Logos refers to logic, or the words we use, Pathos speaks of influencing through appealing to emotions, and Ethos is the overall credibility that the speaker evokes, giving the audience reasons to trust him or her.
Here I will explore elements of Ethos, of how you can curate your credibility and trustworthiness.
It doesn’t matter how persuasive you might try to otherwise be–if people don’t think they can trust you, then you end up seeming like nothing more than a snake-oil salesman.
Likewise, if you exude credibility, it can balance out what you may lack in the other areas.
Aristotle considered Logos, or logical appeal, as the most important element of rhetoric. But I think there is a case that a credible Ethos is at least as crucial to your influence and leadership.
What are the building blocks of your personal Ethos?
Moral character
Your personal moral character could be considered the essence of the influence of your Ethos. The root word for “character” originally referred to the image stamped on a coin. It very literally was a “brand.”
The moral characteristics people associate with you are part of your own brand.
Philosophical traditions have long curated the moral virtues include integrity, honesty, empathy, courage, loyalty, and trustworthiness. Religious traditions have shared a common view of many moral characteristics including compassion, tolerance, forgiveness. Christian tradition has specifically identified characteristics known as the “Fruit of the Spirit”: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control (Galatians 5:22-23). In Roman Catholic tradition, morality also includes avoiding sins such as those called the “Seven Deadly Sins”: pride, greed, wrath, envy, lust, gluttony and sloth.
Without focusing my attention exclusively on this category, we can agree that it is good to cultivate the virtues in our lives, and harmful to allow their opposites.
The degree to which we are consistent with these things is part of our character, the reason we can be trusted, and how we influence with our ethos. Our moral character is at the heart of our ethos, and we are wise to nurture and guard it carefully.
E.A.T.
You may be aware that when you do a Google search, certain websites appear at the top of the search, with a higher ranking than others. Websites can get higher ranking by engaging in “Search Engine Optimization” (SEO). One of the ways of doing this is paying attention to what Google calls “Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness” (E.A.T.). That is, they give higher search ranking to sites that have quality content that is well presented.
Besides helping websites rank well, it just so happens that Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness are also helpful ways of thinking about personal ethos. Let’s unpack them a bit.
Expertise
An “expert” is someone who has significant knowledge, experience or skill in a certain area. You may wonder if you are expert at anything, but likely you are. Whether related to your work or professional life, or even just a hobby or personal interest, you may likely have at least something in which you have significant knowledge, experience, or skill. Of course, if you have an academic degree or background in a certain area, likely that would qualify you as expert, especially if you continue to develop in that area over time. Certainly, there are different levels of expertise. You don’t have to know more than anyone else to be an expert, just learn to do something very well.
Perhaps you don’t think you’re an expert at something, but would like to be. Well, what would it take to develop your basic level of skill or interest into expertise?
To develop expertise, start with something you’re interested in or passionate about. Something that matters. Spend time with it, and commit to it over the long haul, not just in passing. Practice, read, learn from others. Be willing to fail, and to work through struggle. Never stop learning.
It is ok if you are not an expert at everything you try. Most of us are amateurs at lots of things, such as our hobbies. Often, we’re good enough to enjoy ourselves, but aren’t pros. That’s ok, that’s why they are hobbies. We can be generalists as well, and be good at a number of things without being considered an “expert” in the truest sense. But by the time you reach midlife, you’ve enough life and experience behind you to have developed genuine knowledge and skill in something. Let this become part of your personal ethos, part of what you are known for.
Authoritativeness
Expertise and authoritativeness are not the same. Expertise is your knowledge, skill or experience at something. Authoritativeness is the degree to which others recognize your expertise. Someone with authority is confident in their knowledge, and able to use it for the benefit of others.
A person with authority is not arrogant with it, not a know-it-all. Certainly it does not mean imposing your expertise or knowledge on others.
But a person with authority is one others seek out for their viewpoint, their support, their knowledge and assistance.
Do you have a way to share your knowledge and expertise with others? Consultants, authors, bloggers, podcasters–all are ways of demonstrating authority. If you make sales, speak, teach, or preach regularly, you have a venue for your authority. Even if you are active on social media, expressing well-formed views, you are recognized for some degree of authority.
Authoritativeness is a key part of the influence of your ethos. In midlife, you are in a season where you have experienced and learned enough to begin to be a resource for others. Be a learner, but be a teacher as well. People need what you have to offer.
Trustworthiness
Trustworthiness is in many ways a combination of the things just mentioned–your moral character, your expertise and authoritativeness.
Trust – worthy.
You can count on trustworthy persons to follow through, to do what they say they will do. A trustworthy person will tell you the truth. A trustworthy person will hold your confidences.
To be trust-worthy is what separates the snake oil salesman from the voice of expertise and authority. We trust a person not just because of the words they say, but because of who they are, their reputation. It depends on the character and overall ethos of the person.
We cannot demand the trust of others. It can only be earned.
Appearance and outward image
Commonly, people think of the influence of your ethos as primarily your character, reflecting your inner life. And it is true, these are the most important parts of it.
I would add that your ethos, your personal brand, also extends to your style, your appearance and attention to detail, and your demeanor. At least to some degree.
We are used to hearing that the heart and the inner self is what counts, and that what is on the outside matters little or not at all.
You will hear some people say that it doesn’t matter how they look, and they don’t care what others think of them. It is nearly always men who say this.
I propose that it matters quite a bit. Our appearance and how we present ourselves is not as important as our inner self, for sure. But that doesn’t mean it isn’t important at all.
The fact is, your style and appearance, your demeanor and manners, and the way you present yourself to the world, is a part of your personality and your overall ethos. It becomes part of your influence and leadership.
People will often make up their minds about you and size you up within seconds of meeting you, based on personal appearance alone. This may not seem fair or right. You may say that it shouldn’t matter. But the fact is that it does.
Our minds are programmed to categorize things, on visual information in particular. This is what enables us to get through a day without expending mental energy thinking about basic things around us. We see a chair and our minds categorize it immediately. We know what it is for, and what to do with it, without having to consciously think about it. The same goes for all kinds of things–a fork, a pen, a set of keys, etc. We look at it, categorize it, and move on.
People say, “Don’t judge a book by its cover.”
But we do that all the time. This is why publishers give a great deal of attention to cover art and design for book covers and dust covers. They know that in a bookstore with thousands of books (or even online), a customer can’t look at them all, not even all the ones in the category they are browsing. The way the cover looks may be the only way the publisher has of drawing a customer to pick up that particular book. They see the book, create a mental impression and category, and make a decision about it.
For better or for worse, we are inclined to do the same thing with people we meet. We see the way a person is dressed, groomed, and their physical condition and the way they carry themselves, and we create categories.
I’m not saying that this is right, just that it is generally how it is. We can either resist this human tendency, or we can use it to our advantage.
Studies on human attractiveness and appearance at Cornell University revealed that attractive people get more and better job offers, and are even more likely to get more favorable rulings from judges and juries.
Again, this may not seem fair or right, but it reflects reality, even according to academic studies.
The Cornell study may have focused on inherent, genetically transmitted looks. But I’m not suggesting you have to look like a movie star. Rather, I propose that any of us can give attention to presenting the best version of ourselves, and to developing a personal style that helps develop our ethos and accomplish our goals. At the very least, our personal style and presentation should not distract from other aspects of who we are. But with a little attention to detail in the right ways, it can be so much more.
One of my professor friends gave me permission to share a comment that appeared in one of his student course evaluations:
“This may sound odd, but I really appreciated that Dr. ____________ presented himself in a professional manner. During zooms, he would stand up to teach and have his camera in a way that made it feel like a class. He would also dress professionally. I know some will think this is silly, but this is a graduate level institution, and this is just refreshing. Workplaces have expectations for dress. When I was teaching high school, I had to dress professionally. Anyway, some of those things go a long way to making a class feel like a class – that I paid for – versus just some rambling discussion time that goes nowhere.”
People notice–appearance matters
Whether we like it or not, aesthetics do matter to the influence of your Ethos. Over time, my intent with this blog is to give attention to many topics of interest to grown up men. I want to be a resource and inspiration for you in the middle adult years of your season of life. This will include some attention and tips on style, appearance, and aesthetics. I’ve taken time here to put this in context of the larger purpose of our ethos, as I have no interest in doing just a men’s style blog. There are a number of those out there already, better than anything I could do.
But I do have an interest in helping you be the best version of yourself, and helping you function at your best in all aspects of your life, in every season of life.
If you were a website, I would want you to rank well on Google 🙂
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Sources:
1.Homiak, Marcia. “Moral Character.” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Books Llc, 2010.
2. “Search Quality Evaluator Guidelines,” https://static.googleusercontent.com/media/guidelines.
raterhub.com/en//searchqualityevaluatorguidelines.pdf
3. Toledano, Enbar. “May the Best (Looking) Man Win: The Unconscious Role of Attractiveness in Employment Decisions.” Cornell HR Review, 14 Feb. 2013.
