Benefitting From Weakness
Could awareness of our weaknesses be a new strength?
I remember a time in middle school when I raised my hand, eager to answer a question, and got the answer wrong. Having a weakness so publicly highlighted was mortifying. I thought I would never live it down and would forever be known for that mistake. Luckily, life goes on, and we avoid being labeled forever by a misstep while finding our footing growing up.
Leaders, however, are exposed to growing up in public, where flaws and failures take center stage. No one starts off as the consummate leader, so you experience a sort of “secondary adolescence” with a glass wall conference room in place of a bedroom with a door. Like no one else, the leader’s performance, or lack thereof, is viewed as the first cause of what went wrong. According to McKinsey & Company, leadership strength explains nearly 80 percent of the variance in a company’s ability to sustain exceptional performance over time.
So, in reaction to this exposure, we mounted a counterattack. We started identifying our leaders based on their strengths, applying a hyper-focus to finding our strengths, leading with our strengths, soaring with our strengths. Obviously, we must be compensating for fear of something with all this Superman/Wonder Woman talk. I remember early in my leadership journey being told to spend all the time I could in my strength areas and to avoid my weaknesses. If you’re looking at my self-assessment scorecard, Strengths 100 — Weakness 0. Does that seem odd to you?
What could be wrong with showing up strong all the time? Exactly that. Showing up “strong all the time” makes the leader out to be more fake than real, more style than substance, and more title than ability. It turns out, as the most exposed person in the company, the leader cannot afford to be unaware of what others too often see plainly… their weaknesses. In her book, Insight: The Power of Self Awareness in a Self-Deluded World, Tasha Eurich said:
“Leaders who lack self-awareness bring down team performance, reducing decision quality by an average of 36%, hurting coordination by 46%, and increasing conflict by 30%.”
Strengths don’t destroy our weaknesses, only mask them. So, what can you do with your weakness in a culture of strengths? After all, no one is hiring you or paying you for your shortcomings. Here is the leader’s dilemma: If you admit your weaknesses, you risk appearing incompetent, but if you don’t you are either lying or in denial.
In Reality, the issue isn’t so much about being weak, as it is about being aware of your weaknesses. Having weaknesses and not knowing it, you’re set for a fall. However, when your weaknesses are as known to you as a well-traveled road, they can provide an alternative path of empowerment for your leadership. Where strengths fix problems, weaknesses identify opportunities to create, turning an imperfection into one of your greatest assets. Consider the amount of energy required to mask a deficiency. It is a real drain on three key leadership traits: creativity, connection, and credibility.
- If your awareness of your weaknesses was suddenly awakened, you would be firing on new parts of your brain. Think creativity. The well-trodden pathways of our strengths can often become a rut that short circuits new neural routes of innovation.
- If your awareness of your weaknesses was suddenly talked about, people would feel like they could connect with you in vital, authentic ways. Think connection. What if your leadership was not based on having the most answers, but being the most deeply connected.
- If your awareness of your weaknesses was suddenly how you led, you would have the license to help others see their flaws and develop a culture of transparency and personal growth. Think credibility. People don’t resist leadership when they can identify with it.
These three coveted traits of leadership do not come to us by our strengths; some essential parts of leadership come only by that path which our weaknesses illuminate. The complexity of the 21st century will require leaders to move beyond systems of control and certainty to adopt new levels of flexibility and transparency. Alan Mulally, the former CEO of Ford Motor Company, once said:
“The biggest opportunity for improvement — in business, at home, and in life — is awareness.”
In the highly exposed life of the leader, we are called to remain human yet effective, authentic, but empowered. As leadership changes to meet the needs of a fluid economy and planet stewardship, only those who can move between both the shadow and the light will have the strength to lead.
This article was developed in collaboration with Barry Brown, adapted from his work with be/do labs at Runway Innovation Hub in San Francisco. To learn more about our workshops, message me for more information.
Barry Brown is a former community leader, nonprofit organizer and personal coach that works in identity and leadership development for startups and enterprise businesses around the world. He’s a cofounder of human(Ethos), on faculty at Singularity University, and runs be/do labs, a part of Runway Innovation Hub in San Francisco.
Damien Foord is an Air Force veteran and creative entrepreneur that has advised hundreds of brands in Silicon Valley, including LinkedIn, Tesla, Adobe, and many more. He is a cofounder of Prismonde, applying cognitive science to business strategy and brand development and speaks on organizational identity and human-centered innovation.
