Are You Charismatic Or Charming?

Time To Decide

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Which kind of person is most likely to attract followers and win support? Someone magnetic, mysterious, and special? Or someone nice, sympathetic, and relatable? This year’s presidential election was almost a giant experimental test of that question. Donald Trump and Kamala Harris didn’t just have different politics; they projected radically different brands of political personality. This was a battle between charisma and charm.

The two words are often used interchangeably but they have distinct meanings. In a new book, Charm: How Magnetic Personalities Shape Global Politics, the sociologist Julia Sonnevend argues that charm has superseded charisma to become the dominant political style of the twenty-first century. Charm thrives on proximity; on a sense that the politician would be at ease with the voter in person. Bill Clinton, who felt your pain and played the sax, had bags of charm. Charisma depends on distance - on the leader being ‘up there’, gazing down at us. De Gaulle was the archetypal charismatic leader. He believed that a leader must never be ordinary, but wreathed in mystique and larger than life.

The comedian Jimmy Carr has also given this question some thought (standup is as much about developing an onstage persona as it is about jokes), and he offers a succinct definition of the difference. Charm is I come to you; charisma is You come to me. Jennifer Aniston is charming; Angelina Jolie is charismatic. Charismatic people don’t care what you have to say; charming people really do. The essential thing, Carr says, is to know which type you are and inhabit it. (He defines his own persona as charismatic, on the basis that nobody could find him charming.)

Donald Trump’s political brand is defiantly charismatic. He is boastful, abrasive, self-involved, sometimes incomprehensible. He demands obeisance. If you don’t like him, he doesn’t care. He is, at least in the eyes of his supporters, and certainly his own, a superior being blessed with extraordinary gifts, near-magical powers, which he is generous enough to deploy on behalf of the country. He is a genius businessman, a master negotiator, who fires anyone who displeases him. He can see things the others can’t see, do things nobody else can do.

From the moment she stepped into the spotlight, Kamala Harris leaned into her charm. She was the friendly candidate, the VP of good vibes, the one who loved to share recipes, playlists, dance moves and life hacks. Laughter was essential to her brand - not sarcastic or bitter laughter, but exclamations of delight. She was more at ease on the sofa than on the podium. She aimed to be the candidate voters could see themselves sitting down with for a chat and actually enjoying themselves. Even her supporters didn’t claim that she had truly remarkable skills or talents, more that she was smart, sensible and decent.

Of course, the election did not give us a definitive answer to the question of which mode of persuasion works best. It turned on more fundamental questions. Neither would it be correct to say that Trump was without charm, or Harris without charisma. Trump can be funny, and Harris can convey steely determination. But both candidates played to their strengths, resulting in a showcase for these contrasting styles.

It’s important for a politician to know which style suits them. Shortly after his entry into the campaign J.D. Vance, who has a certain charisma, made the mistake of trying to be charming. He visited a doughnut shop and attempted banter. He plainly didn’t have the natural ease with ordinary folk displayed by his counterpart Tim Walz. But Vance’s popularity recovered, at least somewhat, after a strong performance in the VP debate. In this more formal setting, where he could perform a skill very few of us have honed, he excelled. Walz, on the other hand, seemed out of his element.

In the early days of Gordon Brown’s ill-fated tenure as Prime Minister, Labour’s ad agency created a poster for him which became so well-known that it has its own Wikipedia entry:

“Not flash, just Gordon” was a clever way to contrast Brown with his slicker, more socially facile opponent David Cameron (and with his predecessor as PM, Tony Blair). It played to Brown’s competitive advantage: he was, at his best, charismatic, but he was not charming. Nevertheless, Brown became very unpopular and lost to Cameron. This was partly because social media had inflated the value of charm. TV demands charm, the smartphone even more so. Social media is a close-up medium. It rewards informality, the performance of intimacy, a mastery of micro-gestures of pitch and tone. Not every politician has the social skills to succeed at it. When Brown made YouTube videos at Downing Street, they were excruciating.

A few politicians can master both charisma and charm. Obama delivered stunning orations to vast crowds, and delighted in playing with kids in the Oval Office while on camera. But this is rare. Most politicians need to understand which mode best fits their talents and goals, and how to be good at it.

Trump deploys charisma in a world of charm because it works for him. He simply isn’t a very relatable person, so he’s making the most of it. He is always in suit and tie, the billionaire CEO, lording it over his minions. He has a genius for the iconic image - consider the now-famous, instantly self-engineered photo of his reaction to the assassination attempt. The second most viral photo of Trump from the campaign showed him wearing a McDonalds uniform. This was ostensibly an image of charm, but the power of the image derived from its incongruity. Podcasts are the perfect medium for charm, but Trump uses every conversation - apparently successfully - as another stage from which to blather on about himself.

Leaders and public figures of all kinds benefit from figuring out whether they are essentially charismatic or charming. It’s easy to get stuck between the two. One of the problems faced by the British Royal Family, for instance, is whether and how to retain their charisma. The institution depends on it. Charm implies a more equal relationship with the audience than charisma does. It dissolves hierarchy and formality. Members of the modern Royal Family must be liked, but to retain their aura they cannot be too charming. Even as she adapted her role to the age of television, the Queen kept a strategic distance from her audience. She had to be seen to care about her subjects, but she couldn’t be seen as trying to please them. King Charles and Prince William are struggling to get the balance right.

Pop stars from previous generations were more likely to use charisma rather than charm. Bob Dylan loudly denied caring about what his audience wanted. The whole point of David Bowie was to be untouchably different from ordinary people: an alien you couldn’t take your eyes off. Taylor Swift is more charm than charisma: she wants her fans to know she empathises with them. She embodies her audience, rather than hypnotising it. We go to her concerts, but she comes to us.

Pete Townshend once spoke amusingly about the difference in how Lennon and McCartney behaved in social settings. He said that Lennon would immediately acknowledge his superior celebrity status, and allow the conversation to revolve around him as he rambled on. And it was great: “everybody gets into his thing and has a good time.” By contrast, McCartney would seek a genuine conversation, which was both impressive and unsettling. After all, “one of us is fucking Paul McCartney, a Beatle…And he’s starting to tell me that he digs me and that we’re on an even par so that we can begin the conversation.” Townshend was describing the difference between encountering charisma and charm.

Charisma and charm go wrong in different ways. Charismatic figures often come to be seen as too distant; as arrogant and out of touch (late-period Margaret Thatcher being one example). If they fail to deliver on the promise of their superior talents, they can look like cardboard icons. People who push their charm too far come to be seen as manipulative, shallow, and obsequious; small people who aren’t up to the job.

Once you start thinking about the distinction between charisma and charm you see it everywhere. Cats are charismatic, dogs are charming. A thunderstorm is charismatic, a sunny day is charming. In column-writing, Janan Ganesh is charismatic, Adrian Chiles is charming. The God of the Old Testament is charismatic; the God of the New Testament is charming. Christianity became the world’s most successful religion because it fused charm with charisma; Jesus Christ came to us.

What about you? In the workplace, are you charismatic or charming? If you’re not sure, you could ask your colleagues - although if you’re truly interested in what they have to say, you probably have your answer already.

This one is free to read, so if you enjoyed it, please share. After the jump, for paid subscribers: a fascinating study on how AI will change science and scientists and the nature of work; notes on Trump’s appointments; who should be Britain’s US ambassador; the greatest music teacher of the twentieth century; a beautiful Beatles moment featuring Steve Jobs, and more…