00:08 Hi, I'm Denise Simpson, a master life and leadership coach who helps women step into their authentic and feminine power so they can lead like visionaries, influence with grace, and create a legacy of contribution and service. You'll hear about real leadership clients with real problems navigating their success in life, business and career. If you're ready to become a masterful leader, then this podcast was made for you. So let's get started.00:46 Hey, welcome back leader. I wanna talk a little bit about this one critical thought that so many of us have as women leaders. It is the thought, I have to know everything about leadership, or I must know everything about leadership, or I'll be found out. Or if I don't know everything about leadership, they're gonna see me as a fraud. So these are some thoughts that some of my clients are having, and I have personally have had these thoughts when it comes to serving my leadership clients. I used to in the beginning, pretend like I knew everything just because I had a PhD in leadership studies. Just because I had all these credentials and certifications, I positioned myself as an authority, which is what you're doing. You're a leader, you're a manager, you're a director, a supervisor, a ceo, or a senior executive or a chief in your organization.01:46 You have power because of your position. It's power and authority because of your status. And so what we believe is that because we have power and authority as these leaders, that we must know everything. We must be subject matter experts. And I know some of your organizations have SMEs, subject matter experts, and you're hired for the specific skills that you have in regards to this specific expertise. I understand that, but I'm talking to the general public here, the general leaders out here. Because of our titles, we have this misconception or this burden of proof that we are leaders and that we have to prove to everybody in the organization that we know everything. And I'm here to tell you that it is okay that you don't know everything. First of all, it is impossible, my friend, for you to know eving about your position and leading your people.02:52 It's impossible. You have to learn so much to be well-rounded in this position that you can say to yourself, it's okay that I don't know everything. It is okay that I may look like I don't know certain things. Listen, I know as women leaders, we do have that burden of proof. We're the ones who have that extra responsibility to be perfect, to fit the part, to play the part, and to not screw up the part. We, women leaders have been put in very interesting critical binds. We call 'em the double binds sometimes are triple binds. For example, the double binds that I talk a lot about is that you must be competent and you must be liked because if you're smart and you're a bitch, then you're screwed, right? You have to have both competency and likability. And so it's interesting that we are put in these specific binds because of the bias that people have against women leaders.03:55 And here we are internalizing the biases that we are experiencing. And then what happens is we then go and act upon these biases onto another woman. That's what internal, uh, oppression or internal bias looks like. We have internalized it for ourselves. And then we then go and behave from these b, these biases. And so it's what we've learned, it's what we've experienced, it's what we know, and then we go and do this to others. And so pay close attention to your behaviors right now, but I want you to know, it all leads back to the burden of proof that women leaders have to show every day that we know who we are and we are, we're confident in our leadership, and that we don't ask for help. And we're not supposed to ask for help. We're supposed to know everything. Now, if you're a woman of color who's listening to this, there may be some added layers of burden of proof.04:51 For example, I am a Latina leader and in my subculture, and I don't wanna say all of our culture, that would be wrong again, of me to generalize all of my, my Latina leaders and put them in a box that would be so unfair. And, and I want for you to know this disclaimer. It is in my subgroup, my subculture, where I was raised, where I was born, where I have experienced leadership. This is very specific to my brain and to my neurology that I'm only speaking on my behalf. In my culture subculture as a Latina leader, what I have experienced is that I cannot ask for help. I'm not supposed to ask for help. I'm supposed to know it all. And that that looks like knowing everything about parenting. It looks like everything about caregiving to my aging parents. It looks like, um, you know, being a community activist, it means it means me being a great church member.05:47 It means that I have to know everything about, you know, leading my people. You have to know everything about everything because if you don't, you're talked about, you're gossiped about, you are, you know, people are talking about you judging you, and they're spreading all of these rumors and lies and gossip that you don't know what the hell you're doing. This is my subculture. This may be different for you, Latina, if you're listening to this. What if you're a, an African-American woman, maybe in your black community, in your black culture, that is something that has been told to. You have to be perfect. You can't show a flaw, you can't be imperfect in your relationships. You have to come knowing everything. And God forbid that you show that you're imperfect. So I want for us to take a moment and and assess whether that's something that we have felt before or that we're feeling today, right?06:40 This is critical that we find self-awareness around these very interesting thoughts that we have about us being perfect and us knowing everything about leadership. I also want for you, my friend, to think about what this is doing to us when we think this way. Because when we don't know something, we immediately go into this imposter syndrome because we fear that we're going to be found out. We fear that our, our skills and our credentials and our accolades were all a fluke. It was just luck. We start then internalizing this as we don't belong here. We're frauds. Oh my gosh, I don't even know how to lead. I pretended I knew how to lead. I faked somebody out and they hired me. My goodness. Now I'm going to be found out. And this is where the imposter syndrome is. This undercurrent, it is driving the energy of, of, of your self identity, of your leadership identity.07:42 It's this really this driving thought of I must know everything about leadership or I must be perfect here, or I must know everything here. And that imposter syndrome, if you are, if you have symptoms of the imposter syndrome, it's going to lead back to this, this idea that we have to know everything about leadership. So the purpose of this specific episode is to tell you that my friend, you don't need to know everything about leadership. You don't need to know everything about parenting. You don't need to know everything about being a great supportive wife or spouse or lover. You don't need to know everything about everything. You don't start normalizing that you are a human who has human flaws, who is imperfect. You are not a robot, you are not chat, g p t, you are not ai. You my dear leader, are a human trying to figure it all out at once.08:48 And that's why you feel so overwhelmed. You don't have to figure it all out at once. So I want for you to do three simple things for me today. Are you ready for number one? I want for you to ask yourself this question, why do I think I need to know everything? It's a simple question. Why do I think I need to know everything? Is it because I'm afraid of something? Am I afraid or do I fear being judged? Am I afraid to show my employees that I'm vulnerable and human just like them? Am I afraid to be transparent that I don't know everything? Am I fearful that my leader is going to think that he made the wrong decision in hiring me as a leader? Is it embarrassing to be judged, to be talked about? Am I fearing that they're going to gossip about me?09:50 And my inadequacies, ultimately my dear leader, my dear friend, is that we feel like we're not enough sometimes and, and to be afraid to show people that we don't know everything is equivalent to us fearing that we are actually not enough. That's the, that's I think like the underlying root of that, of that feeling is that we ultimately want to be enough and we want to be lovable. We want people to love us and we want people to, to know that we are enough. Those are two primary, um, battles that we have according to Tony Robbins is that number one, we fear not being enough. And number two, we fear that because we're not enough, we're not lovable. And so ask yourself that one question. Why do I think I need to know everything about this job, about this leadership role? Why do I think this?10:49 And then start free flowing your writing. Remember, this is self-awareness work. We must stop and do the mindset mastery work. This is how we become strong, powerful, impactful, influential leaders is when we do the mindset work. And we do that through self-awareness questions like this. The second thing I want for you to ask yourself, how can me telling my staff that I don't know everything helpful? How can it actually be helpful that my staff knows that I don't know how to do something specific? Here's what's interesting. We as leaders think we need to take on everything. But there are gaps in our skills. There's gaps in our competency. There's gaps in our abilities. Again, we're only human. We're responsible for solving these problems. We're responsible for creating results. And we have to do that through a team effort. And so some of our skills that we lack may be dominant in one of your employees.11:51 And to be able to tell that one employee, Hey look, listen, I'm not a very good technician in this area, but I know you are, my goodness, your experience level and what you do every day, I want you to take on that role, that specific role. Can you do that for us? Cuz you're the best at it. And they'll look at you and say, whoa, um, well thank you . Yeah, actually it would be an honor. Thanks. I will do that for us. And so then that way it's not you saying, look, I don't know how to do this and you're gonna do it now. No, it's saying that you appreciate them, you see them for their value, you see them for the skills that they bring to your department and you wanna leverage that. And you wanna, you wanna, you know, elevate their, their skills by having them take on this lead or, you know, lead this particular project.12:39 That's how you do that without having to say, I don't know everything about all of this. This is a way for you to eloquently tell your staff, tell your employee, Hey look, listen, I think you're amazing and you do this so darn well and I would love for you to spearhead this. How fantastic would that be, don't you think? And they're gonna be so honored to be able to support you in that. So this second question, how can me telling my staff be a bad thing? How could it be helpful actually, how could me telling my staff that they are really great at one area that maybe the rest of us aren't? How could that hurt me? It's, uh, it's gonna elevate the team. It's gonna elevate that person. It, that person is going to think, wow, she sees me, she knows me and she really understands my skills and I'm, I'm happy to oblige this is amazing.13:29 Know that it's a benefit. This is not, this is not something to fear doing, it's just in how you present this to your employees. That way you can just sit back and say, okay, I'm not great at that area. I've got a big void in that area. Something for me to be aware of, but I know that John is really great in that area. Or I know that Mary is exceptional in this other area and I wanna give them the opportunity to shine in those areas. You see how, just a, a shift in how you think about this question. How can me telling my staff that I don't know how to do a certain thing be beneficial to me and the team? That's question number two. The third thing I want for you to do, dear your leader, is I want for you to tell yourself, I don't need to know everything about this role.14:21 I'm learning. I come into the organization with a beginner's mindset every single day. This beginner's mindset keeps me curious, it keeps me on my toes, it keeps me fresh, it keeps me wanting to learn. It keeps me, you know, highly aware of the gaps that I have in my skills. Even though I've been in this position for three years, even though I've been in this position for 10 years, I'm gonna come into the organization every day from here on with this beginner's mindset because this will help me. When I don't know something and I don't know how to do a particular task or don't have a spec, a particular skillset, I won't feel so bad. I'm going to go in there with a beginner's mindset and I'm gonna tell my staff to do the same that way. I encourage them. I create an environment of psychological safety so that everyone can say when they're lacking something or when they're needing help.15:18 That's the point of creating these psychological safe spaces in our workplace. It's so that everyone can say or be, feel safe enough to be able to say, I don't know how to do this. You know, I think I need some professional development in this area. You know, can you help me find a really great professional certification for this? And that way your employees come to you when they need help and you're there to help them solve a problem. Remember, you're a leader. You're, you were hired to solve for problems and to create results. And so with that mindset, you'll be able to support your staff, create a, a culture of psychological safety. And you my friend, you have this energy of a beginner, right? Excited, curious, moving forward, looking for alternative ways to a problem solving this problem. Beginner's mindset is where you wanna be every single day.16:19 And the fourth thing I want for you to do, my friend, and this is it. I just added this fourth one just now. It wasn't originally on my list, but this fourth one my friend, is this value, the value of resourcefulness is going to drive the decisions you make every day as a leader. You have values, we've talked a lot about values in the institute and on this podcast, the values are what drive your decisions at the unconscious level of your mind. So you have a set of values that drive your actions, your behaviors, your habits, your decisions as a leader. And I want for you to think about this one value called resourcefulness and think about maybe perhaps putting that value as one of your top three as a leader. For me it's number one because when I can't find a solution to a problem that my client is having, I tell them I don't know anything about that.17:24 But let me go do some research because I am a damn good researcher. So let me go find some information and get right back to you being open insane. That being transparent to your staff, to your employees, I don't know a lot about that area, but let's go find someone who is, that's being resourceful, that's saying, I don't know, but I'm gonna go find some solutions. I'm gonna find some, some ideas for us to entertain. And then you call a friend, maybe a mentor, maybe your coach, you know? Or maybe you go and look, you know, look up something online and you do do some research and you find some ideas and you bring it back to the team, you bring it back to the group and you say, Hey, you know, I spoke to my mentor and she actually uses this system in her organization and why don't we give it a try?18:15 It looks really productive and I think we all could, could really learn something from this new process. And so that's you being resourceful. So that last idea of, of adding resourcefulness to your top three values, that right there is going to change how you talk to your staff, but more importantly how you talk to yourself, right? Cuz that's what it's about. It's you telling yourself, I don't need to know everything about everything , and I certainly don't need to know everything about this job, but I sure am resourceful. I can definitely take that value on. And let me see what that looks like when I don't know the answer to a question. I don't have to know everything, but gosh, I can be resourceful and plus I'm very resourceful and my personal life in my motherhood, in my spouse life, in my caregiving life, you know, I'm pretty resourceful so I can apply that here in the workplace.19:14 So that fourth one, my friend, I think is if, if you take anything from this show, from this particular episode, it is that it's putting resourcefulness in your top three values. All right? Dear leader, I just wanna wrap this up by telling you, you don't need to know everything about leadership. You don't need to worry about that part of your role anymore. You don't need to have the burden of proof to show everybody that you know everything, that you are the expert because you're a leader, because you have this status, because you have this title. Know my friend. Drop into resourcefulness so that when you don't know something, you're able to go and find ideas and find solutions and open yourself up to curiosity, being a beginner every single day so that it's easier for you to do this job, to do this role of leadership, resourcefulness, my friend, is ultimately what you want in your top three values. A right. Dear leader, I know you found today's episode helpful. If you did, I want for you to join me over on LinkedIn. That's where I hang out. Go check me out there and DM me. Let me know what you got from this episode. I'm wishing you all my best dear leader, take good care. Bye for now.20:36 Hey, leader, do you want weekly leadership tips, coaching and training straight to your email inbox? Yeah, I thought so. Head over to dr denise simpson.com/leadership. Again, that's dr denise simpson.com/leadership. Just submit your name and your email address and we'll get started right away. I look forward to serving you inside your email inbox. See you soon.
