MANAGING FOR A BETTER WORLD

Having people on the team – and in the exec suite – show some vulnerability can lead to greater cut through for talking about what really matters, writes Kate Kearins.

Vulnerability and gender. By Kate Kearins.

AMERICAN PROFESSOR, author and public speaker Brené Brown appears to have hit the mark with her work on courage, imperfection vulnerability, shame and empathy. She has pulled massive Tedtalk audiences online and has a strong following for her books.

More of us are realising the importance and indomitable nature of our humanity and our humanness – and the value and challenges it brings in the workplace.

Indeed, there is strong talk about bringing our whole selves to work – and resistance by some: what rights of incursion into our private lives and our personalities do our managers or our workplace have? These are important conversations.

Author of Bring Your Whole Self to

Work, Mike Robbins says bringing our whole selves to work means showing up authentically, leading with humility, and remembering that we're all vulnerable, imperfect beings doing the best we can.

It's also about having the courage to take risks, speak up, ask for help, connect with others in a genuine way and allow ourselves to truly be seen.

He admits it's not always easy for us to show up this way, especially at work – and that managers have a big part to play to create the right environment for it.

It has been interesting to hear more messages about the importance of vulnerability from male CEOS in particular. Having people on the team – and in the exec suite – show some vulnerability can lead to greater cut through for talking about what really matters.

There is a sense I have that some of this leaning into vulnerability, on the part of business leaders, is about leading in what might have traditionally been a more ‘female' way.

As a female leader (or even to get to be one), though, I also sense that we are subtly and not so subtly told we have to harden up and not show too much vulnerability.

One of my colleagues, who works in the gender and careers space, confirms my analysis is broadly correct. Professor Candice Harris says “the discourses and metaphors many women at the top over the years have faced is either that they're too tough or too soft, plus there's the critiques of being a Queen Bee, being ‘driven by their career', ‘not a team player', ‘got promoted as they needed to even up the numbers', or even ‘spends too much on clothes'.”

There's a lot to unpack here. Let's face it, we're all imperfect and we are all subject to critique. Need it be quite so harsh? No. Is there a tendency for some of this stuff to get to us on a personal level? Yes. Is the act of managing in itself an act of vulnerability that somehow is seen to come with a tougher shell – and an ability to take more flak? Maybe. There have even been suggestions that the tougher shell is part of why more men have come to be in management roles.

But emotional connection has also been shown to be behind getting through crises and disasters better, seeking and getting help from others, offering enhanced attention to customers and achieving better sales performance and greater wellbeing overall.

Admitting to ourselves when emotional judgment clouds our decision-making is an important flipside. Deep breaths, time out, background work before a difficult conversation, and checking in with others who you know to be less biased in a particular regard are all seen as antidotes to emotional overload.

Expressing your vulnerability may not, as some have suggested, always make you stronger. It may be a card more male managers can well afford to play. But for women managers, I tend to think the tendency to show our softer side is something many of us live with, with a degree of unsurprising normality.

For all of us, it is in stepping into our power that we embrace our vulnerability instead of avoiding it. It is part of our relatability, our garnering of support and our allowing others to be vulnerable, to make mistakes and to be honest about them.

Vulnerability is also undeniably about engendering connections that count when the flak comes. M