My Leadership Kryptonite🦸

Early in my career, I compensated for the not-good-enough feeling by buying into outdated leadership philosophies: watch your back, don't trust anyone, and never let them see your weakness. Like Will Ferrell’s character Ricky Bobby in Talladega Nights, I believed, “If you’re not first, you’re last.”

This fundamentally false notion promotes social comparison and senseless competition. I tried to project confidence and smarts at all times while internally struggling with self-doubt, a sense of helplessness, and impostor syndrome. I felt like a misfit, and like the proverbial square peg trying to fit itself into a round hole. 

Worse, all the external accolades, degrees, promotions, and career successes never changed my internal chatter—I still didn't feel good enough. I was blind to how this lack of self-worth impacted my behavior and coping mechanisms. Even though I put myself out there, had a thriving social life, made good friends, and was generally well-liked, I didn’t like myself—not really. I wasn't aware of the walls I built and the armor I wore to compensate for, hide, and protect my insecurities.

That armor turned out to be my Leadership Kryptonite.

If you relate to this and think you and your team are engaged in this form of hiding and self-protection, it’s essential to recognize this may be a manifestation of a lack of trust and psychological safety in the work environment. 

While it's natural to have some instinct to hide, acknowledging this behavior is the first step to emerging from the shadows. 

We all replay outdated stories and limiting beliefs about ourselves in our heads. We’re prone to listen to these voices, even if they’re brutally judgmental. Whether you call it your inner critic or self-limiting beliefs, these voices and fear-based thoughts can cause real damage. However, we often forget that they’re based on good intentions and attempts to keep us safe. 

That’s why I’ve coined the term well-intentioned, misinformed protectors (WIMPs).

We often expect leaders to be heroes with superpowers: x-ray vision to foresee problems, telepathy to understand every team member's needs, the flexibility to adapt to diverse challenges, and the stamina to endure relentless demands. This idealized view of leadership creates an unrealistic expectation of infallibility and invulnerability.

Our WIMPs play a critical and often misunderstood role, yet they can become kryptonite to our true leadership potential. 

Our WIMPs can show up as different personas, such as the perfectionist, the hardass, the achiever, the people-pleaser, the impostor, or the contrarian. You may have met one or several of these internal voices that emerged from our formative experiences, acting as guardians aiming to protect us from perceived dangers like vulnerability, criticism, and failure. These protectors, though well-intentioned, are informed by the limited understanding and fears of our younger selves. 

WIMPs urge leaders to maintain a façade of perfection, seek relentless validation, and hide any sign of weakness or uncertainty.

While WIMPs intend to safeguard us, their strategies are based on misconceptions about what effective leadership entails. They push for an unattainable standard of superhuman capabilities, forcing leaders to stretch themselves in unsustainable ways. This pursuit can become a leader's kryptonite, not because human fallibility is inherently detrimental, but because denying their own limitations cuts leaders off from their greatest strength—their authentic humanity.

WIMPs, in their effort to protect, inadvertently encourage a leadership style disconnected from the very qualities that make us relatable and effective. It’s ironic that these WIMPs foster a culture of invulnerability that undermines genuine connection and empathy, shielding leaders from embracing their true power.

Putting on that armor and hiding my true self was equivalent to wearing a leadership costume. And over time I learned more about my WIMPs, details I’ll share in my forthcoming book, Human First, Leader Second. 

I’ve identified six main types of WIMPs who lack self-compassion: the perfectionist, the hardass, the achiever, the people-pleaser, the impostor, and the contrarian. As complex humans, we don’t fall neatly into one, or even several, of these WIMPs. However, they can help us understand some of our most prominent tendencies in context.

Would you like to meet your WIMPs?

I’m excited to share that I’ll be diving deep into each of these WIMPs in the monthly editions to follow. If you know someone who might find this helpful, please forward this along. New readers can subscribe here.