The Action Catalyst
REMASTERED: 6 Elements of Great Communication, with Dianna Booher | (Leadership, Personal Development, Balance, Confidence)
31 Mar 2026
Transcript generated automatically by AI and may contain errors.
Chapter 1: What is the essence of leadership communication?
The essence of leadership is communication, and that is one-on-one integrity. When you say something, you absolutely do it, and you are genuine about doing it. If you fail to follow through on what you say, everything else goes away.
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Diana Boer is truly one of the most prolific writers on communication and specifically leadership communication and sort of executive presence. And she has a book called Communicate Like a Leader. And we're going to talk a little bit about that. And specifically, I think some of the leadership, you know, some of the communication challenges that leaders face on a daily basis.
So, Diana, welcome back.
Thank you. It's great to be with you.
First of all, when you talk about leadership, I think a lot of times people kind of group management and leadership together. But you talk about a distinction, and I'm curious, how do you delineate between those two? What's the big difference between a real leader and then a manager?
I think really the biggest distinction there, there are several that I mentioned in the book, but I think the biggest difference is that the manager is a maintainer. They're interested about maintaining the status quo. They want things to go well, operations to go off without a hitch. But the leader improves the status quo.
if you think about it like this, if you think about the financial advisor, if you want them to get the same return on your portfolio that you do, you don't really go to them. If you're getting 4% on your money, that's what you can get. But you go to a financial investor and say, hey, I want you to improve the return over what I can get.
If they came back to you a year later and say, hey, here's what you were getting. I'm doing the same thing. You take your money somewhere else. So you want them to grow something. And that's basically the same thing a leader does.
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Chapter 2: How do leaders differ from managers?
And here's the outcomes that we expect to have. And this will be the benefit to the whole organization. Now, depending on who asks you that question, you might also add, this is how it will affect your timeline and your budget. Not everybody you'll give that answer to.
What you don't want to do is give some technical information that only makes sense with jargon that only makes sense to other people you work with, you know, the guy or the gal in the next desk. with your own tools and charts and numbers and data. You want to think big picture. That's what strategic thinking is and strategic leadership communication is about. Think about who you're talking to.
This is the problem we're working on. This is why it's important to the whole organization. And these are the outcomes that we're hoping to achieve for the organization. And that positions you as a real leader and a strategic thinker.
And when you start answering that question that way for your colleagues and other divisions, for your clients, then they'll start seeing you that way as if you know what's going on for that client, for your suppliers, for... for the general person who you talk with, your colleagues.
You really want to do that when you respond to clients because you want to position your organization as understanding their business. You want to say, you know, we're working on this new product or, you know, this new service, and here's what key problems it solves. And this is the outcome that will serve you when we get it done.
And then you're perceived as a leader in your field, in your industry, right? So that's a key, key kind of answer you want to give to clients when they ask you.
You talk about spray painting on social media. What is spray painting on social media? What does that mean?
Well, if you were going to paint your house, you don't just go get a spray gun and let me paint a little bit on the back of the house and a little bit on the front of the house and a little bit here in the kitchen area. And maybe I'll come inside and paint a room before I get too tired. That's what people sometimes though do on social media. They don't really have a strategy.
What am I trying to do? So they do a few posts on Facebook and they send out a few tweets. You need to have a strategy. What am I trying to do with my social media? Am I trying to drive people to my own website? Do I want them to read my blog and then sign up for my e-zine? What is your strategy? And then based on that strategy, do I want people to always sign up for my podcast?
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