Monisha is a young aspiring leader. Joined the organization after passing her MBA from a prestigious B school. She has lots of aspirations of how she wants to lead an organization, take up responsibilities, drive businesses. She had quite well settled herself in the company and proved her mettle to the organization of her capability to drive things. She was amongst the few people chosen to undergo leadership training to become ready for the next leadership level.
The day had arrived for a yearly review and she was anxious within as she was waiting for better feedback from her manager than usual. But Alas, she got the same feedback that you lack strategic thinking, need to take proactive initiatives, drive the business to the next level. This kind of left her thinking that does she even has any strengths. Every time she needs to keep proving her performance which kind of left her frustrated, irritable, questioning herself that if she is even worthy of the leadership training. Every time she would take a decision, she would question the decision and be unsure of how things are going to span, kind of led to a reduction in self -confidence and doing things the way how her boss or management would want her to be even if few things within her inner consciousness told her, it’s not right to do this.
As a part of the leadership training, she met her Coach- Jasmine. She shared this incident of her performance review, things she did unwillingly, the decisions taken half-heartedly.
Jasmine listened to her with her utmost childlike curiosity and asked her- When you were not convinced with the decision within, what made you make the decision? And what is making you now feel that the decisions taken were not appropriate? It made Monisha very uncomfortable, she had no words to say and there was an elephant silence. After such a long pause, she told Jasmine- I don’t want to repeat my mistakes of doing something which my inner self doesn’t allow me to do and work on it to become the leader I want to be.
Jasmine then asked- What kind of a leader are you now? And Who do you want to become? These questions rattled her and she said I don’t know. These conversations with Jasmine started to make her think about her strengths about which she had forgotten in the process of just being like someone who others expect it to be. In the next few conversations, Monisha confided that she is seeing two versions of herself. And that is not something she wants to be. Slowly she identified her goals and worked on them with the help of her coach. Jasmine supported wholeheartedly in the journey of the leader Monisha wanted to become as a result, she is now confident, knows her strength, and stands up to the leader she is being.
Being a leader is not a flowery garden, one has to face testing times, business pressures and there are circumstances when one has to do things that can be very challenging & uncomfortable as a leader. There is nothing right or wrong the way we are as individuals. And in the process of proving our leadership, one falls into the trap of behaving like someone who we not. One can never be a perfect leader, there is nothing ideal in this world. However, we can try to be closer to the person who we truly are.
Now you would ask, what did Jasmine do to help Monisha? Jasmine listened to her, created a space for Monisha to be truly herself, challenged her in these conversations and Monisha found her way to create a path for herself – the leader she wanted to be. Having a coach can help you discover the person and leader in you.
While we all play different roles in life both personally and professionally. But a thing to remember always is Who we are being and Who we are becoming both are important!