Karl Edwards presents Working Matters

Tag: authenticity

  • Angry Conversations with God by Susan Isaacs

    I don’t usually write posts on my personal reading, but I have to give a public nod to comedian Susan Isaacs.

    Anyone with a personal spirituality will love Angry Conversations with God.

    Anyone who’s sworn never to have a personal spirituality will love Angry Conversations with God.

    Creativity kudos for taking God to couples therapy! It’s about time too. (I wouldn’t be surprised if an entirely new genre of therapy emerges out of this.)

    I’m not usually attracted to memoirs (i.e. listening in on someone else’s story.) But Isaacs does such a great job telling her story that I was able to both “feel her pain,” so to speak, on the one hand, as well as connect deeply to my own relationship with God on the other.

    This book is both hilarious and touching. Authentic to her private experience as well as profoundly insightful about what we all experience.

    If you want a good laugh while brushing up against some of life’s most intimate, turbulent, and significant issues, then sit down with Susan Isaacs. You might end up taking God to couples therapy too!

  • Keeping it Real: It’s Easier to be Yourself

    I am the world’s foremost expert on being me.

    I am a novice at being someone else. Anyone else. Even someone else from whom I might have a lot to learn.

    Yet so many consultants, coaches and career counselors are advising us that we need to be someone other than ourselves.

    “If you want the job.” “If you’re serious about the promotion.” “If you want to negotiate well.”

    I find myself over-thinking interview and sales situations. I am managing both a conversation with the person I am with as well as a conversation with myself about how I am going about the conversation with the other person.

    How can I possible be fully present with someone when I am preoccupied with talking to myself?

    I’m not! is the answer I pretty consistently receive from those willing to tell me.

    Key for me has been realizing that I am an incredible expert on being myself. The task doesn’t require any more thinking. I can give my full attention to the issue on the table and the people I am with.

    When I let go of the need to impress, to appear unrealistically competent, or to artificially mirror the qualifications of an attractive job description, I am free to come alive in the skin within which I am most comfortable—my own.

    I make a very attractive “me.” Even if I’m not a fit or match for every client, job or interview, I will come across infinitely better as myself than any image of competence I might be tempted to put on.

    It’s simply much easier to be oneself.

    On your side,

    – Karl Edwards

    Keeping It Real is the column where I share what I myself am learning. Beware of the leader who is not always learning themselves!

  • Listen In -> Faking Authenticity #4: When Wanting to Perform

    Are you pretending to be competent?

    Where do you think you got the impression that you needed to appear to be more than you are in order to be effective?

    Could you be making assumptions about leadership, competence, respect and authority that may not be grounded in reality?

    In this week’s show, Claudia and I discuss the temptation to fake authenticity in situations that require us to peform beyond our current skill or experience level.

    You won’t believe how much happier, energetic and effective you will be when you stop trying to be someone you aren’t.

    Listen in.

  • Listen In -> Faking Authenticity #3: When Wanting to Confront

    I don’t know anyone who loves confrontation. Do you?

    Work life, though, is filled with situations where something or someone needs to be confronted.

    Confrontation is one of the most common situations where we feel we need to be someone we’re not.

    We put on a “fake nice” to head off a negative response, or we cop a “fake stern” to show we mean business.

    Could it be we don’t trust how we’ll show up in a complicated situation if we are simply ourselves?

    In this week’s show, Claudia and I look at faking authenticity in situations of confrontation.

    Listen in.

  • Listen In -> Faking Authenticity #1: Trying to Buy Credibility Cheap

    Authenticity is the new credibility.

    More than competence. Much more than credentials. Exponentially more than position on the organizational chart.

    Those who are real. Those who shoot straight. Those whose words and actions are consistent with each other. These are the people who wield influence. These are the people who can make things happen. These are the people who earn the trust of subordinates, peers, vendors and clients alike.

    Join us for our new podcast series on Faking Authenticity. Sure enough, as soon as research demonstrates the effectiveness of any new leadership technique, onto the playing field spill all those leaders who want the results without taking seriously the means.

    Even though everyone around these pretenders can recognize intuitively and instantly that they are faking it, there is a group of us who are convinced we can pull one over on everyone and “technique” our way into results.

    Chat with us as we laugh and cry together about the benefits and pitfalls of authenticity both when genuine and when faked.

    Faking Authenticity

    Week #1: Trying to Buy Credibility Cheap

    Week #2: When Wanting to Impress

    Week #3: When Wanting to Confront

    Week #4: When Wanting to Perform

    Week #5: When Wanting Others to Respond

    Listen In.