Diversity and Inclusion
Having interviewed 26 quietly powerful leaders and reflected on what they told me, what struck me was that some were reluctant leaders.
They never thought of themselves as leaders initially. Someone – a mentor, a manager, a senior leader – saw something in them, encouraged and gave them opportunities to step into leadership.
Read more “Reluctant leaders may be your best leaders”
Diversity and Inclusion
My last article Quietly Powerful Leaders – who are they and why don’t we have enough of them outlined the key attributes observed in Quietly Powerful Leaders whom I interviewed and why we don’t have enough of them, based on conversations and research.
Read more “7 reasons why we need more quietly powerful leaders – now, more than ever (short)”
Diversity and Inclusion
Since starting the Quietly Powerful movement just over 2 years ago I have had the pleasure of interviewing 24 Quietly Powerful leaders so far, to understand what makes them quietly powerful and how their natural tendencies have been their leadership strengths (join the Quietly Powerful LinkedIn Group to access the recorded interviews). A few patterns started emerging, which I have been sharing more of in my talks.
Read more “Quietly Powerful Leaders – who are they and why we don’t have enough of them”
Diversity and Inclusion
In conversations with quieter professionals, I hear examples of how they have felt disadvantaged in the workplace. It is surprisingly common place and yet often not seen as a problem. It is more often seen as the problem for the quieter professionals to fix and fit in. While I have the view that the individuals can develop to overcome some of the disadvantages, I also believe that organisations are wasting talent by not being aware of or addressing these disadvantages.
Read more “Quietly Disadvantaged Talent”
Conversation
What started as a little experiment with 15 women for breakfast is growing up – Quietly Powerful is now 2 years old and have now reached thousands of people from around the world. I feel grateful for the memorable moments, inspiration and support from a range of people!
Read more “5 additional insights from 2 years of Quietly Powerful”
Conversation
Have a laugh.
Laugh at the things you didn’t quite get right.
Laugh with others about the things you didn’t quite get right.
Read more “If you have perfectionist tendencies which hold you back, try this…”
Confidence
And where are they taking you? To dark places you don’t want to be, where you feel anxious, afraid and small? Or to places where there seems to be big thick walls and ceilings to keep you locked up? Or to places where you feel frustrated and annoyed with yourself, that you can’t reach your own standards? Or to places where positive voices are drowned, belittled or mocked?
Read more “Have your inner voices taken over the driver’s seat?”
Diversity and Inclusion
There have been plenty of discussion and writings about sexism, racism and age-ism. Have you noticed personality-ism, though?
Let me offer a few examples I have personally heard of or experienced…
Read more “Personality-ism”
Diversity and Inclusion
Recently I heard two cases where leaders with track records were unsuccessful for roles they applied for, and they were unsuccessful because the hiring manager was looking for a ‘strong leader’.
One of them wrote to me and said:
“I think they were looking for that [a dominating style of leader] because it is their current workplace culture. They fight, they push each other around…”
Read more “Strong leadership ≠ dominance”
Diversity and Inclusion
There seems to be an automatic assumption that when we talk about quiet people, they are introverts. In many cases this is true, but not always. Having worked on the Quietly Powerful movement for a while now, this is definitely not the case and worth keeping in mind.
Read more “Quietly powerful is not just about introverts”