Stop Performing, Start Leading

Forbes

14-07-2025

Dana Williams, CEO of Dana Williams Consulting | Gallup-Certified Coach | Leadership Expert | Podcaster.
Last week, I sat across from one of the most capable leaders I've ever worked with. He had just stepped into a role he'd worked years to earn, had full support from his organization and possessed all the skills needed to succeed. Yet he looked at me and said, "I know this sounds crazy, but I feel like something internal is holding me back. I can't seem to step fully into this role."
If this sounds familiar, you're not alone. Across boardrooms and C-suites, I'm seeing the same pattern: The most accomplished leaders are hitting an invisible ceiling that has nothing to do with their competence, strategy or market conditions. Their biggest barrier isn't external—it's internal.
The Hidden Cost Of Leading From Behind A Mask
When high-performing leaders stay trapped in this performance mode, the cost shows up in three critical areas:
• Health: When leaders operate from what they think leadership should look like rather than who they authentically are, the toll is significant. They experience decision fatigue from constantly "being on," physical exhaustion from maintaining a leadership persona and deep disconnection from their purpose.
• Relationships: Leaders performing leadership rather than embodying it struggle to create authentic connections. People intuitively sense the disconnect, which limits trust, engagement and genuine influence. Surface-level relationships never develop into the deep trust necessary for breakthrough results.
• Culture: The impact extends far beyond personal experience. Gallup's 2025 research reveals that "manager engagement dropped three points" in 2024, and since "70% of the variance in team engagement stems directly from the manager," disengaged leaders create disengaged teams. The cost? "$438 billion in lost productivity" globally.
The Internal Revolution: Your Authentic Imprint
The solution isn't another leadership framework—it's an internal revolution. This starts with discovering and operating from your authentic imprint: Talents + Core Values + Mission x Emotional Recognition = Authentic Leadership.
• Talents are your natural strengths—not just what you've learned to do well, but what you were created to do. These are the unique gifts that energize rather than drain you.
• Core values are your nonnegotiables, the principles that guide every decision. When you lead from your values, decision-making becomes clearer and your team knows exactly what to expect.
• Mission is your personal "why"—the impact you want to create through your leadership. This isn't your job description; it's the change you want to see in the world through your work.
• Emotional recognition encompasses both self-awareness of your emotional patterns and the ability to recognize how your emotions impact others. This allows you to lead from authenticity rather than reaction.
The leader I mentioned earlier? His breakthrough came when he realized he was trying to lead like his predecessors instead of bringing his unique combination of analytical thinking, deep empathy and systems perspective to the role. Once he gave himself permission to lead from his authentic strengths, everything shifted. He developed a three-year vision that leveraged his unique perspective, and his team responded with unprecedented engagement.
From Confusion To Clarity: Your Next Steps
Ready to stop performing and start being? Here's how to begin:
1. Discover your unique talents. Get serious about identifying the natural strengths you were created to use. Consider when you're most in flow, what colleagues consistently ask for your help with and what energized you before you worried about whether it was "professional."
2. Clarify your core values and mission. Spend intentional time identifying the principles that guide your decisions and the impact you want to create. This isn't about what sounds good in a performance review—it's about what you actually care about. Consider working with an accountability partner or coach to guide you through this process.
3. Begin leading from your authentic self. Start small by bringing one element of your authentic self into your leadership this week. Maybe it's leveraging a natural talent you've been downplaying, making a decision based on your core values rather than what you think is expected or sharing your genuine vision for what's possible.
The Permission You've Been Waiting For
You don't need another performance improvement plan or more competencies to master. You need permission to lead from your authentic self—the person who earned this role, who has unique gifts to offer and who can create impact in ways that only you can.
When you change from within, everything around you changes, too. Your team responds to authenticity with engagement. Your organization benefits from leadership that's aligned rather than performed. And you finally experience the fulfillment that comes from leading as yourself.
The world needs difference-makers who lead from their authentic core. Your team is waiting for the real you to show up.
Your internal revolution starts now.
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