One Big Thing for Leading At Your Best
It has been a long time since I read something and responded with a big “Woo Hoo!”. My office mates must have heard the “Woo Hoo” after I finished reading “Be yourself, and trust that that’s enough”. The article is a summary of an interview with Kate Lewis, chief content officer for Hearst Magazines for the Politico Women Rule podcast. In the interview, Kate discusses feeling pressure to hide her real personality out of concern she wouldn’t be taken seriously.
“In the magazine industry, there are a lot of—there’s an image, right, that you need to be a high-fashion person, that you need to have been a journalist in the trenches,” said Lewis, the chief content officer for Hearst Magazines. As a young, ambitious woman, she emulated them—thinking doing so was key to her thriving in the notoriously fast-paced New York publishing world.
However, she had an important moment of insight. She realized she would be a more effective leader if she was herself.
“I found my success when I became who I am. And that’s hard,” Lewis said during an interview for POLITICO’s Women Rule podcast. “I became comfortable with just being Kate. And that enabled me to have more candid, more deep, more real conversations with the people who were either going to hire me or were going to manage me or who I was going to work with. And I think that has made me more successful.”
Please allow me to highlight the first sentance of this quote - “I found my success when I became who I am. And that’s hard.” Kate is describing Courageous Authenticity™. I define Courageous Authenticity™ as embracing your unique Purpose, Power and Presence.
It is:
leading at your best as your best self
allowing yourself to be fully seen and heard
being the same authentic person in all of your life domains
using best practices of effective leadership
“And that’s hard”. Why is it hard? Why do I use the term Courageous Authenticity? As Kate described, there is pressure to behave in a way that is in alignment with the culture of the organization and/or industry. Effective leaders are fully aware of organizational and industry cultures. It is counter productive to ignore these cultures. The pressure to conform to cultures is strong; I argue it is particularly strong for women. What Kate has done successfully is find a way to be her best self within her industry culture.
“I became comfortable with just being Kate. And that enabled me to have more candid, more deep, more real conversations with the people who were either going to hire me or were going to manage me or who I was going to work with. And I think that has made me more successful.”
Questions for Reflection:
What have you noticed about your organization/industry culture?
How big is the gap between your authentic self and this culture?
How comfortable are you with just being you?
What changes could you make to start leading at your best with Courageous Authenticity™?
What concerns do you have about making these changes?