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Discovering Your Authentic Leadership
Denial can be the Intrinsic motivations are congruent with
greatest hurdle that your values and are more fulfilling than extrin-
leaders face in becoming sic motivations. John Thain, CEO of the New
self-aware. York Stock Exchange, said, “I am motivated by
doing a really good job at whatever I am doing,
but I prefer to multiply my impact on society
through a group of people.” Or as Ann Moore,
chairman and CEO of Time, put it, “I came
here 25 years ago solely because I loved maga-
zines and the publishing world.” Moore had a
dozen job offers after business school but took
the lowest-paying one with Time because of
her passion for publishing.
Building Your Support Team
Leaders cannot succeed on their own; even the
most outwardly confident executives need
support and advice. Without strong relation-
ships to provide perspective, it is very easy to
lose your way.
Authentic leaders build extraordinary sup-
port teams to help them stay on course. Those
teams counsel them in times of uncertainty,
help them in times of difficulty, and celebrate
with them in times of success. After their hard-
est days, leaders find comfort in being with
people on whom they can rely so they can be
open and vulnerable. During the low points,
they cherish the friends who appreciate them
for who they are, not what they are. Authentic
leaders find that their support teams provide
affirmation, advice, perspective, and calls for
course corrections when needed.
How do you go about building your support
team? Most authentic leaders have a multifac-
eted support structure that includes their
spouses or significant others, families, mentors,
close friends, and colleagues. They build their
networks over time, as the experiences, shared
histories, and openness with people close to
them create the trust and confidence they
need in times of trial and uncertainty. Leaders
must give as much to their supporters as they
get from them so that mutually beneficial rela-
tionships can develop.
It starts with having at least one person in
your life with whom you can be completely
yourself, warts and all, and still be accepted un- often profound. The key to their success is
conditionally. Often that person is the only one
who can tell you the honest truth. Most lead-
ers have their closest relationships with their
spouses, although some develop these bonds
with another family member, a close friend, or
a trusted mentor. When leaders can rely on un-
harvard business review • hbr.org • february 2007
Purchased by Ken Hampian (kchampian@charter.net) on March 15, 2013
conditional support, they are more likely to ac-
cept themselves for who they really are.
Many relationships grow over time through
an expression of shared values and a common
purpose. Randy Komisar of venture capital
firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers said his
marriage to Hewlett-Packard’s Debra Dunn is
lasting because it is rooted in similar values.
“Debra and I are very independent but ex-
tremely harmonious in terms of our personal
aspirations, values, and principles. We have a
strong resonance around questions like, ‘What
is your legacy in this world?’ It is important to
be in sync about what we do with our lives.”
Many leaders have had a mentor who
changed their lives. The best mentoring inter-
actions spark mutual learning, exploration of
similar values, and shared enjoyment. If people
are only looking for a leg up from their men-
tors, instead of being interested in their men-
tors’ lives as well, the relationships will not last
for long. It is the two-way nature of the con-
nection that sustains it.
Personal and professional support groups
can take many forms. Piper Jaffray’s Tad Piper
is a member of an Alcoholics Anonymous
group. He noted, “These are not CEOs. They
are just a group of nice, hard-working people
who are trying to stay sober, lead good lives,
and work with each other about being open,
honest, and vulnerable. We reinforce each
other’s behavior by talking about our chemical
dependency in a disciplined way as we go
through the 12 steps. I feel blessed to be sur-
rounded by people who are thinking about
those kinds of issues and actually doing some-
thing, not just talking about them.”
Bill George’s experiences echo Piper’s: In
1974, he joined a men’s group that formed
after a weekend retreat. More than 30 years
later, the group is still meeting every Wednes-
day morning. After an opening period of
catching up on each other’s lives and dealing
with any particular difficulty someone may
be facing, one of the group’s eight members
leads a discussion on a topic he has selected.
These discussions are open, probing, and
that people say what they really believe with-
out fear of judgment, criticism, or reprisal. All
the members consider the group to be one of
the most important aspects of their lives, en-
abling them to clarify their beliefs, values,
and understanding of vital issues, as well as
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