Want to be a strong leader? Start with self-awareness

Welcome back to the Amplify Emotional Intelligence newsletter. Twice a month, I’ll share advice and inspiration to help you develop emotionally intelligent leaders and transform your company culture. Together, we can #amplifyei and create more belonging.

How well do you understand yourself? Do you know what drives you and what pushes your hot buttons? Can you explain with certainty how other people perceive you??

I believe that the journey of self-growth starts with two essential steps: centering in the present moment, and using that mindfulness to develop self-awareness. The first two keys of my 7 Keys to Emotional Intelligence?, Center and Comprehend, guide us in developing the intrapersonal skills that support our interpersonal growth.??

Comprehend—the action of developing self-awareness—sets us on the path towards effective, empathetic communication, better connections and relationships, and dynamic collaboration. Leading a team or project without self-awareness is a surefire way for your efforts to fall flat. The recent Apple iPad Pro ad debacle is a great example of this. Strong external self-awareness could have shed light on how poorly that campaign would land with its audience.?

Self-awareness is all about intentionally turning your mindful attention inward, so you can understand who you are and how others perceive you. Building self-awareness also builds empathy by giving us the capacity to see and feel another person’s experience in relation to our words and actions. But you may recall from a previous newsletter that? 95% of people consider themselves to be self-aware, but only 10 to 15% are. So it’s safe to assume that there is room to grow for most of us.

Any individual can benefit from working to increase their self-awareness, but for leaders this skill is even more vital. Without self-awareness, leaders can really miss the mark.?

I once coached a client in a leadership position who had a boisterous personality and loved to crack jokes. They thought their energetic presence improved the mood, and saw themselves as gregarious and witty. Others had different opinions. Their team thought their jokes were annoying, and felt bothered and distracted by them. Once this client increased their awareness of the situation they were able to increase trust and develop better connections with their team.

Self-awareness is a crucial part of healthy, supportive workplace interactions. In its absence, we may struggle to connect and communicate, especially across cultural differences, which can damage the culture of belonging on your team.

It’s also nearly impossible to grow without self-awareness. We need an understanding of where we are and where we want to end up. Otherwise, we can’t move through our lives with intention and purpose. Self-awareness helps us see our strengths and weaknesses, which show us where we may need support, and where we can push ourselves to excel.??

Comprehending is akin to reading the room—understanding where others are coming from and how they might perceive something. This, from my assessment, was a missing element when Apple created their controversial ad this spring. Without comprehending how others might perceive the ad’s message, they created something that offended rather than inspired their audience. Stronger self-awareness could have aligned their perspective with the way others saw it, reducing conflict, misunderstanding, and the disconnect between their intent and their impact

You can read books for knowledge, and you can read the room for others’ emotions. But you must also read yourself. Regularly check in with your thoughts, emotions, and behaviors in order to truly understand what drives you. That is the start of an intentionally led life rooted in self-awareness.??

As a board-certified leadership coach, keynote speaker, and facilitator, Patrice B. Borders, the “EI Amplifier,"? combines her employment law and human capital practices to help organizations and individuals develop resonant leaders, collaborative teams, and inclusive workplace cultures. Get in touch with inquiries about keynotes and executive coaching, and stay connected by following #amplifyei.