By Julie Smith
Authentic leadership builds multi-layered confidence: your self-trust, the trust others place in you, and the confidence of team members who feel free to be themselves.
‘Being yourself’ is a neat two-word definition of authentic leadership. But what does it mean in practice, and why does it matter for confidence – yours and your team’s? In this article, I explore what it means to be yourself in context and why authenticity is one of the most powerful confidence-spreading tools a leader has.
What authentic leadership means
Let me offer a fuller definition for authentic leadership, getting beneath the surface of the simple invitation to be yourself. I think being authentic as a leader means embodying your leadership role in a way that reflects who you are as a person. It’s about bringing yourself to your role rather than playing the part of a leader.
This is a subtle but important distinction. With authenticity, there’s alignment between values and behaviours, and between words and actions. This alignment doesn’t make leadership easy, but it does bring an ease. Striving to be someone else is exhausting.
Here’s how one leader made that point to me: “Being CEO means being on show every minute of the day. And the only way you can do that is by being yourself. You can’t fake it because that requires too much energy.”
Some important nuances
Authenticity is sometimes assumed to be synonymous with consistency. Framed in this way, authentic leadership means that a leader would show up in exactly the same way in Organisation A as they would in Organisation B. This is overly simplistic and misses the significance of context.
In their brilliantly titled book Why Should Anyone Be Led By You?, Rob Goffee and Gareth Jones use the term ‘authentic chameleon’ to point to the nuances of being yourself in context – it’s possible, and in fact essential, to be authentic and adaptable.
Authenticity is not an excuse for poor leadership. I’m a control freak. Always have been, always will be is not authenticity; it’s being closed-minded. Neither is authenticity an invitation to inflict an entirely unedited version of yourself on your team. Authentic leadership comes with a responsibility to be intentional about your impact on those around you.
Authenticity and self-confidence: a virtuous cycle
Confidence requires self-acceptance – a willingness to say, this is me, imperfect and flawed, brilliant and unique. I can be me without fear. I can resist the urge to mould myself into a shape that will please other people. I am enough.
There’s a virtuous cycle here, with authenticity and self-confidence fuelling each other. A degree of self-acceptance makes it possible to show up more authentically; and showing up authentically deepens your self-acceptance. Each time you lead as yourself rather than playing a part, you build a little more of the internal congruence that underpins confidence.
Inspiring others to trust you
It’s easier for people to have confidence in you if they think they are interacting with the real you. Authenticity inspires connection and trust. In their book Unleashed, Frances Frei and Anne Morris describe how “authenticity wobbles” undermine trust. They tell us: “If the version of reality you present feels overly curated or strategic, an invisible wall can form between you and the people around you.”
This resonates with my own experience. When I’m with someone who seems to be presenting an edited version of themselves, I can become hesitant or guarded in what I say. There’s ‘noise’ in my head as I try to make sense of what I’m seeing and hearing and as I create my own hypotheses to explain gaps or inconsistencies. In contrast, there’s something deeply settling about being alongside a person who is being their authentic self. My mind is not occupied by the noise of inauthenticity and I can simply be present and engage with them.
Authenticity is contagious
Authentic leadership inspires confidence in another important way: it gives team members the confidence to be themselves. Authenticity is contagious. If you’re confident to be you (imperfections and all), then that gives your team members confidence to be themselves. It’s reassuring for us to know that we’re not the only beautiful mess of a human being; that colleagues (and even the boss!) are imperfect too.
Conversely, trying to be perfect sends a signal that perfect is what you require from others. In response, team members are likely to offer a pretend (polished) version of themselves and to perhaps harbour doubt: if they have to offer a ‘pretend’ version of themselves, does that mean that their true self isn’t good enough?
There’s a multiplying effect here too: team members who feel free to be themselves inspire others to trust them.
The need for courage
I don’t want to suggest that authenticity is easy. It’s not. Being an authentic leader requires you to know yourself, and it requires the courage to be yourself.
This courage might be required to a greater degree if there are things that make you different. Frances Frei talks eloquently about this in her TED talk ‘How to build (and rebuild) trust’: “It’s super easy to ‘be you’ when you’re around people who are like you. But if you represent any sort of difference, the prescription to ‘be you’ can be super challenging. [There’s a] sincere temptation to hold back who we are… And if we hold back who we are, we’re less likely to be trusted.”
Something to try
I’d like to offer you a reflection that I use with coaching clients. If a good friend from outside work were to come and observe you with your team, what aspects of ‘work you’ would they recognise, and what would they be surprised by? Make a note of what comes to mind.
Read through your notes and reflect: is there something here about the way that you adapt to your context as an authentic chameleon? Are there any ways in which you’d like to bring more of your authentic self to your leadership? What courage would this require? What support might you need?
Bringing it together
The confidence-building power of being yourself is real. First you have to know yourself. And then, with intentionality and perhaps a little courage, you have to choose to be yourself with your team. When you do, you don’t just lead with greater ease; you give the people around you permission to access the same sense of ease and assurance. You create a contagion of authenticity, and with it, a contagion of confidence.
