Why Bringing Your Authentic Self To Work Is Bad Advice

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0:30This is the Squiggly Careers podcast and one quick thing this is our 500th episode today. Thank you. Effective authenticity is where you project a version of yourself that resonates with others whilst maintaining a semblance of genuineness. Trust is more important than authenticity. Whether they're being their authentic self as a person flying the plane, you know they're bringing themselves to work, that is less important than trust. Do you trust them to fly the plane. Are you part of an emotionally intelligent team? Interesting thinking about the we rather than just the I. Am I emotionally intelligent?

1:07Are we emotionally intelligent? You need to understand, like, how does this team work? It's almost kind of keep questioning yourself. What ideas do the team need from me at the moment? Because the last thing they need is more ideas. You know sometimes more ideas are actually annoying and it's overwhelming. What we need is decisions, not ideas. Hi, I'm Sarah. And I'm Helen. And this is the Squiggly Careers podcast. Each week we borrow some brilliance and turn that curiosity into actions in a way that we hope will help all of us succeed in our squiggly careers. And in today's episode, we are going to be tackling the topic, it's hard to say, of authenticity, which it turns out also might be harder than you might think to do and I was intrigued by somebody whose work we followed for ages I think we're just really big fans of how he thinks and that is Dr.

1:58Thomas Chamorro-Pimusic who has a new book all about basically like not being yourself this mantra of just bring your whole self to work and what does he call it like the authenticity cult or something like that he's basically like very very anti this idea of everyone should just be themselves at work so we thought today that we would talk about that a little bit maybe share some of his insights and our own opinions on his advice and then as ever because we're trying to turn our curiosity into actions for you at work we've got three things that you can do with his insights and advice so that you can put them into action to support your swiggly career that is our plan and one quick thing this is our 500th episode today which yeah i mean sure there's not loads to say is there do you know what i normally do the milestones and then you normally just sort of flatten them that was my version of doing a milestone it's because no one cares i don't think you think i well do actually don't i do care about i do think doing something consistently for that long every week is something to be really proud of I agree and so that that I think for my congratulations Sarah personal recognition of myself I think I care and I did you know if I think about where we started 500 episodes ago it does you know we've in a little studio come a long way do you remember that little black studio went down the stairs and we would sit there like really rigid with our microphones being really formal i feel like i know i feel like our standards might have dropped i think we're quite high standards well i mean there was that there was a moment where i wonder if you can ever tell you know like when we would have been recording the podcast and both of us would have had really young children and having like no sleep i wonder how whether we were this is amazing because it's not that you know we're getting a kind of break from something else that's that's harder or whether at times we just sound broken you know if you listen you're like oh they're really annoyed with each other there or yeah someone's interrupted that one or yeah i mean something a bit stressful is happening so i can't listen back they're traumatizing imagine if you've listened do you reckon anyone has listened to all 500 episodes apparently i have been on like sessions like with the pod plus crew before and some people have listened to every every single one that's a lot of helena sarah in your ears but thank you if that is that is you i am very grateful that you choose to spend your time with us um and if you're new and you're like wow 500 that's really daunting don't worry just just go back to the ones that you need search for what you need go on our website amazing.com put in your topic and it will tell you like the most relevant podcast or sarah and i often use an app called overcast which often has quite a good search function and we'll often just put for our own for our own podcast we'll just put in because it's got good search because it's got good search and we'll find it i was just thinking you'll be able to tell me maybe maybe i bring too much authenticity to the podcast like my actual personality about celebrating milestones maybe now you're going to tell me i've been that's not the right thing to do what do you think well why don't i tell you a little bit more about this authenticity with a very i think like i say i think thomas has a very critical lens on it so we don't have to agree with it right we're just gonna we're just gonna learn from it so i've got a few notes my notes from from from reading and reflecting um and i think what we're really looking here is how to use and not use authenticity as a strategy for career success so that was like my frame when i was absorbing this i was like okay what can i take from this that can help me to use authenticity and what i'm learning to support my career success so a couple of let's do a couple of points to begin with um what he says that we are really aiming for is something called like effective authenticity and i'll i'll talk about the difference between effective and ineffective so let's start with effective he says effective authenticity is where you project a version of yourself that resonates with others whilst maintaining a semblance of genuineness and semblance yes yeah this is this is a really key point um because he says it's about achieving a harmony between self-expression, so Helen as I want to show up in the world, and social connection, the Helen that the world wants to see.

6:18And his point is, if we go around every day just going, well, I'm just going to show up as who I want to be in the world. That's me being authentic. I'm just going to do all the things that I want to do in the way I want to do them. Then actually, what that can cause is friction and disconnection from the people that you are working with, because largely the people that are most successful, so you go back to the filter of how does authenticity support career success, largely the people that are most successful in their careers have two dimensions that are consistent. One is agreeableness, so they get on with people.

6:56People want to spend time with them and kindness, so they are kind of empathetic and understanding. And so this idea that you just show up as you kind of want to be regardless of what people want, to see like you're just like take me as i suppose that's quite selfish right potentially yes you could say um it's not very thoughtful it's not very empathetic to almost be just like i'm just going to be me don't care don't care how other people feel think like what's useful for them just kind of completely unfiltered like if you wanted to kind of think of it like that you could be like okay well that might be it's quite egotistical i guess doing yeah you know when you start looking at it like that you're like oh sometimes we say oh just you know be yourself at work but actually if you look at it with a critical lens I think you do get to oh but what if what if that isn't relevant to these people or what if that isn't helpful to what we're trying to do then actually like you say it's kind of getting in the way of the work we're trying to do and he has this um point I thought it's quite interesting about he says that actually trust is more important than authenticity and he talked about um he talked about like a pilot for example he was like you whether they're being their authentic self as as a person flying the plane you know they're bringing themselves to work that is less important than trust do you trust them to fly the plane so actually he was saying that you know the trust that we place in people to do the job is actually more important to the relationship than you know am i just being fully helen yes though i don't think i also care if a pilot is kind or agreeable but i do care if they can fly the plane you know like back to your like your and i'm like oh as an example i find that one trickier because of the job that they do one of the other kind of not it's not a counterpoint but it's it's an interesting one to think about is i suppose if you go too far the other way and you feel like you're wearing a mask you know pretending to be someone you're not at work because if you're feeling like i have to be really agreeable it's all about other people if you kind of go that way that is then really tiring that is when people are very unhappy and i i have definitely kind of flirted with that at certain points in my career being like trying to to show up in a way because i thought it was like the right way to show up and that's hard to do well and i think also not that helpful and i wonder if you are naturally i mean this this bit isn't me but if you are naturally a people pleaser and you're very selfless almost your description as well you could you could end up being kind of very other orientated yeah and then not confident enough and yourself it's a tightrope it's a tightrope that's what i thought you know this like projecting a version of yourself that resonates with others so you're being kind of quite adaptable whilst maintaining a semblance of genuineness it is like that is quite a hard and i was i wrote down as i was reading i was like what what are the themes that are coming through so clearly authenticity but the underpinning themes are trust not an easy topic transparency not an easy topic and it talks about emotional intelligence quite a lot like people who do this well because you are good at understanding others and how you show up in relation to them i actually haven't read something for a while where emotional intelligence has been so kind of you know it was quite fashionable for a while wasn't it but he really comes back to it in this topic i read something on that last week on are you part of an emotionally intelligent team so you know to your point i'd not read anything on it for a while and then it just popped up i'll have to find the lady's name who's the researchers it's kind of it's a well-researched piece of work um i think it's an academic lady who's done it and it was on harvard business review because i've shared it with a few people so we'll put the link to that in the in the show notes but i was like oh interesting thinking about the we rather than just the i am i emotionally intelligent are we emotionally intelligent i was like oh that's interesting so what actions could we take on this because this feels really hard right yeah i know so i did i did get just sort of three three areas that i think actually you could take sort of the insights which are quite quite complicated I think it's quite a few different things that are feeding into this into something that's useful so the first action that I think is is important if you're going to start thinking about what does it mean for me to be authentic in a way that supports my squiggly career success I think you have to know what makes you you but I think you have to look at that from two perspectives you at your best and you at your worst and I think the way to do this.

11:19I and Sarah, we often talk about, you know, values are what makes you you. So I think you can start with your values and understanding of what your values are. And for anybody that sprinted with us, we recommended a tool called values.institute as a very good starting place to understand your values if you've not used that tool. So you start with what your values are. And then what you want to think about is for each of those values, what do they look like when I'm at my best and what do they look like when I'm at my worst and if you are super self-aware you might be able to do that and you could go and get some feedback if you're feeling brave or what I did is I went to AI and I said these are my values this is what I do what is likely to be the impact of them showing up at their best and at their worst would you like you could just ask me I I reckon I could have done that for you.

12:08I know, but you were busy and I wasn't feeling like a brutal feedback. Because Sarah brings too much of herself to work. Let's see what you think about these. So let's see if you agree. So freedom is one of my values. I'll just pick out a couple of them. I wrote down my definition. I actually just voice noted it to chat GPT to make it quicker. I don't use voice noting as much with GPT. I found it so helpful. I'm going to experiment with that because I love their voice note, but I forget, I think, to use GPT in that way. It's so helpful. I was like, oh, my value is freedom. It means being unconstrained about my choices and it's got it all here.

12:41Just easier than typing. Nice. Yeah. How might it work for you? Gives you the courage to build and scale your own business rather than being trapped by corporate norms, apparently. Sure. How it might work against you? It can risk of spreading yourself and the company too thin by chasing too many opportunities at once. You want to do too much? Energy. I'm just going to say all of them. Energy. Energy works for you because it inspires your team, clients and audience. Works against you. Pace and positivity might overwhelm or unintentionally silence quieted team members. Growth works for you. Keeps your company evolving.

13:17Working against you may create impatience when progress feels slow. Achievement works for you. Drives results. You don't just think you make things happen. Works against you. You'll love this one. Risk of prioritizing visible wins over deeper, longer term investments that might not quickly pay off. oh I don't know I don't think I actually think a few of those you know that you know about yourself already and so there were a few there where I was like well I think I I actually think you're very good at including people in conversation so I don't see you silence other people with your energy I understand how that could be a risk with you yeah because you do bring so much energy and it is like it's literally your watch word I feel like if I cut you in half that's the word that would be in the middle um but maybe because you're self-aware or maybe because you've thought you've thought about it also because we all have agility right just because just because you bring energy doesn't mean that you can't and include you have to have the awareness to have agility and i you know we've talked about this at length so what you know i know i know what my values are and i've thought about them before but i think other people might not be in the same place so the first action i think is in order for you to have the agility which is what thomas is recommending like don't just go be yourself all the time helen so don't ignore that sometimes when i show up with my values it can have a negative impact i think that first bit is be aware of what makes you you when that works for you and when that could work against you and it's the working against you bit that he's saying don't be 100 authentic or all those things that are going to work against you are going to show up for you at work and get in your way a team activity i can see that working as a team feels quite um I mean you definitely have to have some trust right because you're talking about yourself at your worst but I can also imagine uh that making people smile and you know like often you at your worst you people have a little bit of an inclination of that anyway and then actually being able to say it and kind of people being like oh yeah Helen freedom loves loads of stuff you're like well of course she does that's sort of what makes her brilliant but actually people may be hearing it from everyone could be quite nice is that's quite a nice like team trust activity yeah i think and i the reason i quite like they're using the chat gpt stuff is you've you've got 75 percent of the way there without anyone having to say the hard thing you're like yeah i've done some of the hard work for you i'm just asking you what you agree what you disagree with you don't you have to say it out loud and i do wonder whether it's nice to be able to still have the choice in terms of what you share for you at your worst versus you imagine other people telling you even like you and i doing that there were some that were a bit vulnerable so I just didn't say them okay but that's that's okay right that is also part of doing what you feel comfortable about yeah with um and I remember in um why should anyone be led by you one of the things that Rob Joffe and Gareth Jones talked about which actually is a similar theme you know when you start to connect dots they talk about the idea of being selectively vulnerable so actually again as a leader they say you shouldn't just you know when there's like a real trend to be like leaders need to be really vulnerable and stuff they were like sure you need to be human but don't share everything all of the time because actually that's not what teams need that's not what they don't need to know from you that this is really stressful or that all this stuff is kind of going on like you do need to think about what's useful for you to share but also what's useful for the people so actually though initially that idea of authenticity could sound quite brutal kind of being like well it's about being agreeable and kind and don't worry actually when you start to get to it you're like it sounds quite smart and sensible yeah well Well, that bit about the team, I think, is the next part of where I get to on the action.

16:55So I almost see it as like a bit of a funnel. So the top part one of the funnel is like, what are you bringing? Where does that work for you and work against you? And let's hold the what might work against you stuff. Before you just adapt for adapting sake, I think the second bit is he talks about like the rules of the game. You need to understand like, how does this team work? What are the dynamics of the team? who does well in the team what does success look like in the team that you need a bit of data so that you can take those things that might work for against you and you're looking at them in the context of the team and the company that you're working in so that's where that's where you're going to do the like potential adapting otherwise you're you're you're changing in a very kind of undefined or unmanaged way yeah so this is about being situational yeah so i suppose knowing how your values work for and against you generally useful but sort of even more useful if you then make that application to or what kind of team am i working in what kind of culture am i in what kind of organization and that am i in and actually in some places like you and i both have achievement as a value if i think about how that achievement shows up in different companies it's actually always been quite different because of what that organization is like are they a very achievement based organization and what would achievement mean to that company are they very results focused are they very people focused are they very short term you know all of those kind of things it's sort of it's connecting the dots isn't it between like you and who you work with and who you work for yeah and I think and knowing that that is quite dynamic so I was thinking like it's team and time So how does this team work?

18:38But also even the same team can need different things at different times. Nice, yeah. And therefore, you know, my energy might be really appropriate in some times of the year, you know, start of the year or a big moment. You're like, bring that is usefully authentic, you know, effectively authentic, as he would say. Use that at that moment in time. But other times that level of authenticity is going to be really annoying and it's not actually going to help the team. It's just I'm going to be really energetic when actually people want to be reflective or calm, for example. Yeah. OK. OK, so the third thing.

19:12So we've now more and more on board. The more we talk about it, the more on board. OK. So we're more so we've we've kind of we're aware of what kind of what makes us us and how that works for and against us. We've got this sort of situational context of what does the team need from me so we can be adapting. And that is the third item, which I've got two names. so um one i've got like focus on your flex so you work out in this team at this time what do you need to flex so that you can still be yourself the other thing i've caught written about is be intentional about the coffee can i explain that point talk to me love a coffee yeah love their coffee so he has this really nice comparison where he talks about authenticity and coffee and he says that like lots of people don't like 100 % full strength coffee like you know people like a latte with some milk and some foam and some sugar and so very very rare we saw that we were away as a team last week and the range of coffee orders like some people definitely don't really like coffee and then there's you having like a pure black coffee yeah that's true that's true strong i'm like triple espresso please i think you did have something like that one day I was like, here you go, Helen.

20:22Well, apparently most people don't like that because if we're thinking about authenticity, most people don't want the pure unfiltered version of each other. They want the, I've had a bit of extra milk, please. Bit of milk. Bit of sugar, kind of soften you up. And my point here is focus on your flexors. You still want a bit of coffee, right? You still, but you need to work out like how much coffee. Are we triple espresso today? because your company really, really does need the full-on version of you. Or actually, are we, I mean, I'm going to go out of my depth for the coffees here, but are we a, I don't know.

20:56Cortado? Cortado. You and I both drink a lot of coffee. We're not out of our depth. Are you a pour over? Are you a V60? I mean, I can keep going. You can go far further than me. I am like an espresso pod in a room and you're like, I'm going to walk for a mile to find the coffee shop. Yeah, though I still have milk in my, I do have milk in my coffee. um but yeah i do i will walk to find the coffee shop so but yeah i guess the point is you need to work out like what coffee you're bringing or if you if that doesn't work for you you need to focus on your flex but i think the point is be intentional like you might think about over the next month over the next quarter who does my team need me to be and how can i still bring me at my best it's it's his whole point is this isn't just this selfish I'm just going to be myself at work every single day regardless I need to be the person my team needs to be whilst also still feeling true to me and that is tricky but I think this sort of awareness team context intentional flex is how you might get to that outcome I also wonder if you need to keep coming back to it because I mean you said the word dynamic we said situational we talked about context this sound it's not um a sort of solve it once this is not a one and done is it this is a you kind of need to know yourself at the core so i think you do need to do values and also we've got a free values toolkit on our website use that use the values institute there's loads of good stuff out there now that you just get for free that's pretty good quality and then i think it's kind of the wrapper it's like what goes around that and as you said it's unlikely to stay the same it's all but it's almost kind of keep questioning yourself like I would think okay so one of my values is ideas what ideas do the team need from me at the moment do they need loads of ideas so they actually need me to back away because the last thing they need is more ideas you know sometimes more ideas actually annoying and it's overwhelming what we need is decisions not ideas and I suppose there were if this if I was going to think about this more consistently I wonder if I'd want to come up with almost like a set of questions to ask myself because obviously I like I love a coach self question regular listeners will know that and so I think I find questions a useful way to be it gives you a frame for me to get started so it might be things like um you know uh what do my values mean at my best at the moment you know what what would my values mean kind of at the worst at my worst this week or you know just to start to get some really like useful insights that i can then turn into kind of actions oh i need to dial this up a bit i need to dial this down i need to think about doing some things differently because often we just don't have that awareness do we we're just we're just we're just operating operating yeah but but i think in this like social context of being authentic and bringing yourself to work is brilliant and i think what he's doing is putting a mirror up to that and going but maybe we should think a bit more about yeah it's been much more intentional isn't it uh very useful so um if people want to find more please make sure you go to the show notes where there's loads of links lots of you will already be signed up to squiggly careers in action that's our newsletter that comes out every tuesday and pretty much everything in that newsletter is always free so our ambition is to make careers better for everyone so we try to make sure that we're doing as much um useful ideas actions tools that anyone can access wherever you are in the world and however you like to learn.

24:25So if you don't sign up to that and you've enjoyed the podcast, that just might be helpful for you and your development. And nearly 40 ,000 people do, Sarah. So lots of people are getting all that insight. So hopefully we can have a few more into the mix. But that's everything for this week. Thank you so much for listening. I'm back for you again soon. Bye for now. Bye, everyone.

24:50Thank you.