- Leadership is an unnatural act.
You don't naturally give feedback to your friends.
You don't praise somebody
even though you may not actually have confidence in them.
You don't necessarily think about
communicating over and over again.
In fact, if you communicated
and repeated yourself over and over again,
people would think that was weird.
That and so many other things are the unnatural acts
of leadership that you have to learn
to be effective in your role.
My name is Alisa Cohn.
I'm an executive coach and the author of
"From Start-up to Grown-up."
It's very common for leaders to face
severe self-doubt, insecurity, or the feeling
that, "I don't know what to do in this situation."
That's true for brand new leaders.
And also, I'll tell you a secret-
it's true for most senior and seasoned leaders as well.
Everybody feels 'imposter syndrome.'
Imposter syndrome is this feeling
that you're going to be found out:
"You are a fraud."
"The jig is up."
They're finally gonna realize you are not qualified
for what you're about to do.
If you don't address your imposter syndrome, you might think
that the only one you're hurting is yourself,
but that's not true.
What you're probably doing is shrinking away
and not leaning into difficult situations as a leader,
or putting off decisions,
or being hypercritical, and that's leaking out to your team.
A CEO I worked with,
he had super critical voices in his head.
His people experienced him as extremely critical,
hypercritical, and he did not realize that.
Now, what happened to his team was they were demotivated,
they were nervous, they were afraid.
That's why it's so important for you to address
what are the real, internal demons that you're experiencing.
Leading yourself is the hardest part,
and yet, the first person you lead every day is yourself.
Since leadership is an unnatural act,
you have to get uncomfortable and overcome your demons.
And that's how you're gonna be a great leader for yourself.
Then you can move on to managing your team,
and managing the company.
The first thing you have to do
is create psychological safety for yourself.
Psychological safety is the feeling
that you're not gonna be blamed or shamed
for something that happens in the workplace.
That is so important to unlock
the full potential of the employees around you.
If they're uncomfortable trying something new
'cause they're gonna get punished if it doesn't work,
they're not gonna take risks.
But psychological safety really starts with you.
It's about having you come to terms
with some insecurities and issues you have inside of you,
which are normal.
And there's a few different ways to do that:
First of all, you probably have role models around you,
and you can begin to pick and choose
the things that they're doing
that will help you create your model of leadership.
Also, in the business world,
there are a lot of ups and downs.
Get in the habit of noticing when things are going right,
including when you overcame challenges.
One thing I really like to tell people to do
is to create a highlight reel for themselves.
It will give you confidence;
it will remind you of all the things
that you've been able to do successfully.
The last thing I want to say is this:
'Radical self-examination.'
If leadership is an unnatural act,
it really requires you to be courageous
at looking at your insecurities and your doubts,
and also your weaknesses and blind spots.
As a coach, I work with hundreds of leaders
to help them build tools and tactics
to master the unnatural act of leadership.
If you want to be effective at managing your team
and managing your company,
it starts with you.