5 Tenets of Leadership I Learned the Hard Way
Over my 35+ year career, I worked for many senior leaders and led many teams. I developed my own leadership style by observing what I considered to be good and poor leadership by others, and by evolving my own approach based on feedback I received and lessons I learned along the way. Looking back, the most meaningful parts of my career were not the titles or accomplishments, but the opportunities I had to learn from others, make mistakes, grow, and help build environments where people could do their best work.
My career could have looked very different if I had not learned from some early mistakes. My first mistake was modeling my style based on what I saw other, seemingly successful, leaders do — which sometimes bordered on bullying. My second mistake was that I thought a heavy workload and high stress was an excuse for being a jerk.
After receiving frank feedback from a brave junior associate, I realized that my approach simply reflected the environment I was in and did not represent who I wanted to be as a leader. With this wake-up call, I started to reflect on what positive leadership could look like and, over the years, I learned and evolved. Over time, it became clear that leadership is less about proving yourself and more about creating the conditions for others to succeed. I also learned that trust and loyalty, which leads to strong team performance, are earned through consistency, self-awareness, and a willingness to keep learning. Having now transitioned to a new chapter and leveraging these experiences in my executive coaching practice, I have had the ability to reflect on what worked for me. I have boiled those lessons down to five interrelated tenets, which I will share over the coming weeks — not as universal truths, but as practical lessons that shaped how I think about leadership.
1. Be Humble and Keep Your Ego in Check
Imposter syndrome is real and, if we are honest, we have all likely felt it at one point or another in our careers. While letting it consume you is a bad thing, effectively harnessing it can be extremely effective. At the same time, most successful professionals have egos. Having an ego, in the form of quiet self-confidence and an understanding of what you bring to the table, is a good thing — but letting your ego dominate is not.
A mixture of ego and imposter syndrome, while seemingly contradictory, can lead to true and effective humility. Understanding (i) what you know and what you do not; (ii) that you are smart, but there is always someone smarter; and (iii) that other views and opinions make you better is, by definition, humbling. I learned this the hard way when I was asked to take on a large role for which I had, quite literally, no prior experience. Placed in that situation, I could have responded in one of three ways. I could have let my ego lead and assumed that acknowledging I did not know it all was a sign of weakness. Alternatively, I could have given into imposter syndrome, becoming overwhelmed and ineffective. Both of these approaches would have led to certain failure. Instead, I embraced what I did not know, acknowledged it to my probably skeptical team, and asked them to teach me. I spent months learning from them, relying on their expertise and giving them the credit when things went well. The lesson was powerful: humility did not diminish my credibility, it made me more effective. It allowed the team to step forward, enabled me to learn faster, and helped build trust in a role where I had much to prove and much to learn.
This experience taught me that being humble is not a soft leadership trait — it is a practical advantage. People gravitate to, and want to work for, someone who is humble. At the same time, being humble makes you smarter, better, and more effective at your job because it allows you to listen, accept feedback and learn.
Stay tuned for lessons two through five!
