Authentic Leadership – sharing my reflections with the Health and Care LGBTQ+ Leaders’ Network

To coincide with Pride Month 2022, I had the pleasure of being interviewed by the Health and Care LGBTQ+ Leaders’ Network, which is hosted by NHS Confederation .?This is one in a series of interviews about authentic leadership conducted on behalf of the network by Amy Hobson, founder of The Wellbeing Collective .?My interview, along with others in the series, can be accessed from here: Authentic Leadership - Ian Adams (on soundcloud.com) .

A transcript of my interview with Amy is below:

Amy Hobson: I have been working on a project about what it means to be authentic in the workplace.?What does it mean to bring your authentic self to work??We asked a diverse group of people who hold senior leadership positions within health and care. They also identify as LGBTQ+.?I want to explore what authentic leadership means to them.?

Hi Ian. Really nice to meet you and thank you so much for taking time to chat with me today. I know listeners are going to be really fascinated to hear your thoughts about authenticity.?So I wonder if you could tell everybody a little bit about yourself and just give us a bit of context in terms of who you are.

Ian Adams: Thanks Amy for giving me the opportunity to share some of my leadership insights with you. I've worked in the NHS since 2010 and today I'm employed as a director of NHS Resolution , which is the NHS’s in-house insurer and it's an ALB (arm’s length body) of the Department of Health and Social Care .?I've been here for over six years and before then I worked in commissioning, principally in northwest London …. Looking more broadly, my career formatively started in the BBC. I was there for over a dozen years in several middle management roles, so that’s when I first got into being a leader within an organisational setting ….?Alongside my career, I've also had the privilege of serving my local community as an elected local authority councillor for 20 years and I also serve on a number of charity boards as a trustee, principally concerned with homelessness and young people.

AH: Absolutely. Thank you for sharing that. I think it's a really powerful message about who you are.?I think actually just those two minutes tells us an awful lot about the man that you are. So yeah, I'm really grateful.?When you first heard about this project, what was it about this piece of work that interested you that made you feel like, yeah, I'd like to be involved in that?

IA: The whole topic of authentic leadership is something that's still in gestation - still evolving, still developing. We hear a lot in our day-to-day lives about authenticity, walking the talk …. But I think the whole concept of authentic leadership is something which probably each individual will interpret and practise in their own particular way.?I mean just a few initial reflections on the topic for me, based on my experience - I think it's around the visibility piece and there's huge challenges, of course, at the moment in the context of the ongoing concerns around the pandemic, the rapid change to the home-working, moving now to hybrid working.?So there's practical aspects about authenticity in a two-dimensional world should we say in the context of that visibility piece.

And I think interestingly that the pandemic itself has enabled, certainly speaking personally, me to take a step back and be slightly more reflective around my leadership behaviours and the impact of those behaviours on those around me.

AH: So actually it's interesting that context can change our views of things, can't it??And it's almost like the change through the pandemic has started to shift things in your mind, and with that in our mind, why do you think being authentic as a leader is really important?

IA: First and foremost, you know, leaders don't have all the answers. In fact, quite often I think leaders need to have more of the questions than the answers.

And that's based from a kind of contingency point of view in terms of being able to shift and morph and evolve to cope with different situations literally day-to-day, hour by hour. But also I think it indicates that leaders and the concept of leadership is something which both reflects the individual, but also reflects the individual operating within a particular context. And that context can also change. ?

You know, you might find yourself leading purely through a kind of internal lens, but conversely you might find that shifting rapidly to representing your organisation again as a leader through a wider, more systems-level lens as well. So I think that being reflective of that kind of dynamic is an important part of authenticity.

But at the end of the day, in my own mind and my own experience, directly leading and leadership is around relationship-building and executing your authority as a leader and the accountability that comes with that as a leader, with and through others.?So fundamentally, you know, your success as a leader can only be defined by the success of those around you. ?

Just a few further reflections on the pandemic.?I think from a leadership perspective within the NHS where I work today, I'm actually very proud of the compassionate response that I and the rest of my leadership team at NHS Resolution have shown to the wider workforce.?And by that I mean we made a rapid move, like many organizations, to homeworking.?But ever since then we have dialled-up the degree and depth of engagement with our workforce.?We've responded even when we haven't had the full or even partial answers to their concerns, but I think just being visible, showing concern, taking time, making time, more time, to engage with colleagues, I think, has been a real trait that we have been conscious to exemplify over the last 20 months or so.

AH: Thank you for that. It's almost like beyond competence and skill in your job, the other two raw ingredients are authenticity and compassion. Yeah. And I think that's really interesting. The point you bring is that your authenticity is part of role-modelling for others and in your relationships. And I wonder if there's a difference there or an impact there if you're part of the LGBTQ+ community?

IA: I think there's a whole kind of nuanced considerations there. I’ve been openly gay throughout my adult life in all of my professional spheres, and I'm very, very both grateful for the support that I have had from all of my employers during my 30-plus year career. But I'm also very aware that other people are not in that same position necessarily, even in the UK today.?Data from Stonewall, for example, tell us that around a quarter of UK graduates go back into the closet having been out at uni when they enter the workplace, so something isn't quite right there. So there’s something about those individuals not feeling safe to be who they are, being authentic, but also what does that say about those employers in terms of nurturing that aspect of authenticity in the workplace.?But from my perspective, I've had a great deal of support from those around me. I think it reflects a few things, so you know, yes, my sexual orientation is a very, very central part of who I am, of course, like it is for all of us.

But sexual orientation, identity, can be less or more visible depending on the circumstances of the situation and the individual. In contrast, there's obviously gender or aspects of race [that are often more visible].?So as a protected characteristic, I'm always very aware that as an openly gay man, there may be others in the room, actual or virtual, with me who may not be as visible as I am.?So I'm hoping that through my being authentic about who I am and open about who I am will help to nurture an element of confidence and hopefully greater understanding as well among the whole of the workforce that I'm working with.

AH: So I hear from that, that sense of emotional intelligence, that you're using your own authenticity to set a safe culture for others around you, hopefully, to feel more confident in being themselves.

IA: Absolutely. And we've got some great examples here at NHS Resolution where we set up a BAME staff network about a year ago.?And interestingly, the two individuals who took the initiative and ran with it and set it up were two staff members stemming from my own team, which is great.?I know having spoken with the two individuals about one of the prompts was them feeling confident of having the support from me as their director and because of them knowing who I am within the workplace.

AH: And that’s a really powerful example, isn't it, because your authenticity in work contributed massively to that as an opportunity for other people to feel psychologically safe.?So it's interesting for me that that's where your head is now, that’s where your confidence levels lie.?How have you navigated through this process as a younger man earlier in your career, you know, was that a conscious thing? Did it just happen??How did you take that step from perhaps being the out student into the workplace?

IA: So being very honest with you, I’m a pretty driven individual, but not at all costs, however …. But I think most importantly a lot of it comes down to self-respect and self-awareness. And I've been on a journey throughout all my life.?At the risk of sounding like a cliché, you know, coming from a very modest working class family in Liverpool where I grew up and then aged 18 I made the move to London to literally find myself as a lot of young people do within the higher education context. Going through that kind of life stage. So, you know having the facility and the agency, if you will, to do that was a privilege at the time, and again, not everyone has the option, nor opportunity, to go to higher education and have that nurturing safe environment that I had.

But it's always stuck me throughout my career that I've grown both managerially and sectorally, having many opportunities to undertake some really fascinating roles that impact across society. And again, another part of this conversation is how my personal values around social inclusion, social mobility, partly reflect my being that open gay man, but also more roundedly reflect other elements to who I am, that growth that I just described from my family background in the northwest through to holding down a pretty senior role nationally for the NHS and the work I do in a sense outside of that in my local community. ?

AH: So there is something that you're saying that's inside you that isn't just about your sexual orientation, it’s everything about you. I think you used the word driven and so I guess for some people it is very much about forging their own path.?And for other young people, I guess it's going to be slightly different. So my last question for you really is what advice would you give to young people coming out into the workforce now who may not be quite as confidently driven??How would support and advise them?

IA: First and foremost, seek out help and support from those around you. I mean, there's nothing I appreciate better than being asked for my views and to provide some of my insights and my personal reflections to those around me, whether that's a sort of coaching, mentoring perspective or in a less managed or less structured way.?So you know there will be those within the organisation, I hope, who you could reach out to and if that isn't the case then clearly networks today, whether it's by social media or organised groups, can play a really important part.?I think the role of straight allies is something that I would also emphasise. And, you know, if you strike up a relationship through a conversation with a straight ally, remember that they, too, are possibly going to be on a journey with you, maturing their own view around sexual identity, sexual orientation. So you know there will be support, there ought to be support within the workplace, but if not, then look more broadly. There’s a huge amount of resource available.?And it’s a game, tapping people up and don't be shy about that. It takes a bit of confidence, actually I get that.?It can be a direct approach; it can be a less direct approach.?It could be a broader conversation that you wish to have with a colleague around career development, career aspiration, or particular interventions that will help you move or succeed within your current role. But within that context, there's a relationship forming, a relationship building with those around you, and that might give you the opportunity or wherewithal or capacity to broaden out that discussion into other aspects of who you are within the context of your contributions to the workplace.

AH: Ian, thank you so much.?There was a couple of things that you said there that really struck me. One was about straight allies will be going on their own journey and to kind of build that relationship with people who may also be exploring their thoughts and views about themselves and others.

And secondly, I really love the idea of that indirect conversation. You know, you don't always have to jump straight in with the thing that's most on your mind. It can be organic and authentic and take a bit more time. So thank you so much for sharing your views with us today. I've been absolutely fascinated listening to you, and I know our listeners will be, too.

(c) Ian Adams 2022