Meet Amy

Are you a competent leader who is passionate about making a difference and implementing your ideas? Do you struggle with the confidence to get those ideas seen and heard without compromising who you are?

I have lived through the frustration of knowing I was highly skilled and competent, yet I had a fear of speaking up and voicing my ideas. 

I came to realize that being competent and being confident were two different things.

Early in my career, I quickly mastered the skills and knowledge that gave me a solid reputation as the ‘go to person that would get it done’. 

That success propelled me into management and leadership roles where I gained greater responsibility for a team, a budget, and making more strategic decisions.

However, being one of the only women technology leaders in my organization, I found it increasingly hard to rise above the voices and opinions of my male counterparts. 

I knew I had the solid skills and ability to get the job done, but in order to compete, I worked three times as hard, typically late into the night and into the weekends. I never said no to a request. I didn’t rock the boat. I was the ‘nice one’. 

While I was getting great reviews on my performance,  my counterparts were getting the bigger budgets. They were getting the headcount. They were getting their projects approved.

But when it came time to fight for what I needed, I struggled to speak up. I feared being told ‘no’ or engaging in any conflict would show failure on my part.

I lacked confidence.

I thought if I could be more like the other stronger leaders, I would be more confident

Frustrated with my weakness, I asked for feedback and was told, “Amy, you are too nice.  You will never get what you need without getting way more aggressive.”

So I started reading books, attending seminars, and listening to TED talks to form an idea leadership persona. I reshaped my style and approach. I was convinced that if I acted more like the stronger aggressive leaders, I would be more successful in speaking up, being heard and getting what I needed. 

The funny thing is, while this did start to work, I still didn’t feel confident. I was constantly second guessing myself. Fear was lurking in the background that I would I eventually fail at acting in this role and be seen as an imposter. I was compromising who I really was. 

I finally learned a secret. I needed to master myself.

So how did I find the confidence to progress my career to be part of the executive team and the board. I finally learned this simple truth:

“Mastering others is strength; Mastering yourself is true power.” Lao Tsu

It is like that warning they give you on airplanes. “In the event of emergency, put your oxygen mask on first.” I needed to shift my focus away from figuring out how everyone else did it, and focus on my own strengths. I needed to master my unique and authentic self. 

I learned that the very things that I was criticized for (by others, but mostly myself), were my greatest strengths. I fired up my natural desire to ‘be nice’.  I leveraged that strength to increase my empathy for others and learned to listen more deeply. This in turn cemented the trust that others had in me and helped me to build powerful allies and collaborators who rallied behind my ideas.

By giving myself permission to be authentically me, I ignited a power surge of confidence and comfort.