Why Being A Vulnerable Leader is Worth it
Being vulnerable is not a weakness, especially as a leader.
Did we throw you off there? We know it’s not a common conception to think that being vulnerability especially when you are someone’s boss is a good thing, but it’s actually a GREAT trait.
Here’s the thing – we are conditioned by society to believe that vulnerability is a weakness. If you expose your true feelings of uncertainty about anything, especially your business, you are taking a major risk. The good news is that this risk can be everything that you need and more.
Let’s break down why vulnerability is a good trait as a leader.
There is Strength in Failure
Don’t cover it up. We are human, we all fail at some point. It could be a big failure or a small failure, but it doesn’t matter the magnitude. Being open about it, finding the lesson and learning from it is where all the magic happens.
By being open with your employees about what really happened, why it failed, and what the lesson is, you are creating an incredible space. The space you created allows all of your employees to know it’s okay to be vulnerable, it’s okay to fail, and it’s okay to talk about it at work. All of a sudden everyone at work is willing to be more themselves and share more even if it’s scary. This is very important to great culture and creating stronger bonds between colleagues and superiors.
No One Likes the Fake Person
There is one in every workplace. They work really hard at impressing everyone, always being right and outshining everyone with their work performance. We all know that they fail, they are human, and we just talked about this. But they will be the last person to show you who they really are, which ultimately brings down your culture.
As a leader, when you stay your authentic self at all times – that means showing your employees the good, the bad, the ugly and yes, the failures, you open up the door for them to do the same.
It may take a while for some to open up and others it will happen quickly, but no matter how long it takes they are looking up to you. If you make the effort to show all parts of you, it truly does make it easier for your employees to do the same.
Increased Productivity
If you’ve been reading our other posts, you would have learned by now that any time you make the culture in your workplace better, you automatically increase productivity.
The two are correlated because better culture, means people are happier and that automatically will increase productivity across the board. This includes performance, which means there are less fails for everyone to admit to.
By being vulnerable you also open the door to asking your employees for their thoughts, opinions and advice on decisions for the business. This makes them feel more included and they can truly feel their worth within the business, which allows them to be more themselves.
Encouragement to Fail
We have talked a lot about failure already, but we need to drive home one more point.
You learn from failure and the one thing stopping employees from going above and beyond their roles is fear of failure.
If they fail, they fear they may be int rouble or worse lose their jobs depending on the magnitude of failure.
To add to this, if we don’t fail, we don’t grow.
When we put this all together you will see that if your employees are afraid to fail, your company may never grow, and your employees most certainly never grow.
Showing up authentically and not being afraid to admit when you are wrong, or fail is what your employees need to do the same thing. It’s even better if you encourage them to take chances and let them know it’s okay to fail because that’s how we grow.
Is Being Vulnerable as A Leader Worth It?
Absolutely and there is no doubt out it. Show up as your authentic self and be proud to show up when you don’t know 100% what you are doing. Your employees will follow suit, your business culture will improve, productivity will go up and most of all you’ll break through milestones for your business you never thought possible.