We looove to talk about the power of vulnerability for leaders, and there is so much data to show the best leaders are vulnerable. But there’s a group of leaders whose vulnerabilities make us uncomfortable: CEOs. The guys at the top. The image of the male leader is so unshakable that men themselves feel trapped by these stereotypes.

Pre-pandemic, research showed “men face backlash when they don’t adhere to masculine gender stereotypes — when they show vulnerability, act nicer, display empathy, express sadness, exhibit modesty, and proclaim to be feminists. This is troubling not least because it discourages men from behaving in ways known to benefit their teams and their own careers.”

Listen Stromberg, founder of Prism Work, says “The workplace has seen a radical evolution in the past five years. Collectively, we have done important work to understand how to support and advance women, people of color, the LGTBQ+ community, and other diverse talent populations into leadership.  But men, and in particular white men, still make up 72% of leaders. In our consulting work, these men have told us they are struggling to understand how to lead in today's world, a struggle that is causing high levels of anxiety and confusion. As one executive shared, "It feels like the goal post keeps moving. I used to know what it meant to be a good leader, but now I don't really understand what's expected of me. It's incredibly stressful." Stressful, yes. But positive too.  There’s been too much mess shared among colleagues to pretend anymore.

Adam Baruh is a CEO rewriting the rules of what a CEO talks about. He’s working with the mess of midlife- the legacy of a divorce on the kids, the extreme stress of providing for people, poor decisions along the way, and long repressed childhood trauma that caused him shame for decades.

We make peace with our pasts when we can integrate negative experiences into our personal narrative. If you are a trauma victim, and you can integrate this horrible experience as part of your personal narrative, healing can happen. Baruh now integrates his trauma into his leadership and role as a CEO, which is not something that we hear very often. I love his radical approach. 

Before he began to explore his traumatic past, Baruh felt impostor syndrome as a CEO, and it wasn’t until he had experienced panic anxiety at the start of the pandemic that he realized he needed help. This process helped him understand “that my sensitivity and my heightened empathy is actually my superpower. I thought it was like a fatal flaw in my character..something  I had hidden for so many years, but when the imposter syndrome went away is when I realized, this is who I am. There's a need for more empathy in the world [and] for more servant leaders that are trying to destigmatize mental health issues. Once I started to have all these realizations and recognize the type of leader and CEO that I wanted to be, I started investing in my team a lot more.” Baruh’s search for self-awareness made him a better leader.  

Here’s Adam Baruh’s advice on how leaders can become more self-aware:

1. You have to look within first. Reflect on decisions that you’re making, how you’re acting, how you’re presenting. Ask: “Am I doing things that are supportive of others and supportive of myself, or is this decision I'm about to make going to run counter to that?”

2. Journal. identify what's important to you both personally and professionally. Explore negative self-talk and explore where that comes from. 

3. Get help to address negative self talk and bring it out to the open.

4. When you’re ready, be vulnerable, share your story, and model to your team members. 

5. Tap into your team members. Do more check-ins and one-on-ones where you don't just talk about the work. Ask how they're doing. Say, “Hey, on a scale of one to 10, how are you doing today?” When you ask it that way it incites more of a deeper response.