Your Leadership is Not Served by You Thinking You are Less Than
Ken Carlson
Experienced Executive Coach and Leadership Trainer with a knack for working with Geeks; Specializing in Engineering, Science, Math, and Medical.
The Neurodiversity Coach Newsletter
Welcome to The Neurodiversity Coach Newsletter. As an Executive Coach, Leadership Trainer and self-professed geek, I've had the opportunity to work with neurodivergent leaders and coach them through many leadership and workplace challenges. Each week I share resources and insights for neurodivergent leaders and the rest of us.
In this week's newsletter I recall a client who thought her ADHD and other challenges made her less than.
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Your Leadership is Not Served by You Thinking You are Less Than
You are perfect just the way you are. No fixing necessary.?
Last week, I wrote briefly about being a victim--and how leaders don’t do that well.?
She (my client) is hard working and smart, but the confluence of her ADHD and other personal challenges has her feeling helpless—has her feeling like a victim of circumstance. As a leader, she doesn’t want to play the victim and starts telling herself that she SHOULD be able to do this better. Compound that experience several times a day, she starts to believe that she has nothing to offer—that she is not good enough—and eventually it is just a fact in her mind.
This does not produce motivated, productive, and inspiring leaders.?
Enter a coach.?
Coaches (esp. LIFE coaches) have a reputation for just talking about butterflies and rainbows—of telling their clients how amazing they are without showing them anything negative. Thank God that’s not what we do.?
In reality, the two core functions of a coach are to help our clients grow in their self-awareness and grow in their self-responsibility.?
In my client’s case, what she needs is a dose of reality (she isn’t actually a failure and she actually is talented) and she also needs to find out where she has choice in the situation and take back her agency.?
As we spoke the other day, it was a surprise for my client to see herself in all of her glory—to not just talk about what is missing—but to talk about what is present. She, just like most of us see all the negatives in color and we tend to dismiss our strengths.?
We didn’t cure cancer or even solve her issues, but we created a plan of action that gives her back some control over her future, and therefore her feelings of overwhelm.
How about you? Do you ever feel like you are not enough??
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Past Articles: Neurodiverse Leadership Resource Library
Want more resources on neurodiversity leadership? We are finding and creating resources for you. Watch this section expand every week.
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