When you hit a roadblock in your career, it’s easy to blame external factors like the economy, the organization, or your boss. But leaders are just as often stymied by their own beliefs about how they need to show up and operate at work, shares executive coach Muriel Wilkins. Through decades of work counseling high-powered executives, she’s uncovered the seven main ways that people limit their own success and has advice on how to overcome those mental blocks. Wilkins is author of the HBR article “The Hidden Beliefs That Hold Leaders Back” and the book Leadership Unblocked: Break Through the Beliefs That Limit Your Potential.
ALISON BEARD: I’m Alison Beard.
ADI IGNATIUS: And I’m Adi Ignatius. And this is the HBR IdeaCast.
ALISON BEARD: So Adi, we’ve all worked with bosses or colleagues who are smart and successful and fine leaders, but everyone else can see that there’s something holding them back from really getting the best out of their people or getting to the next level in their career. And they might get feedback on that, but they’re not really sure how to fix it or sometimes they don’t even want to. Have you run into people like that who struggled to change or had problems with it yourself?
ADI IGNATIUS: I’m sure I’ve had problems with it myself, but it’s easier to talk about other people. So I’ve worked for a lot of very smart, very talented people who did have something that would hold them back. So maybe they were micromanagers, maybe they were perfectionists and just couldn’t get stuff done quickly enough. People who were protecting legacy and forgetting about innovation, people who didn’t really care about process. So yeah, I’ve worked with some very smart people who there was something blocking their ability to move forward.
ALISON BEARD: Well, blocking is the right word. That is what our guest today calls them, hidden blockers. Muriel Wilkins is a longtime executive coach, host of the Coaching Real Leaders podcast, and a frequent HBR contributor. And in her decades of counseling senior leaders, she has found some common patterns in what keeps people from reaching their full potential or having as much of a positive impact as they would like to.
ADI IGNATIUS: Is it basically all the stuff I was ticking off? Are we talking personality traits? Are we talking anxieties? What are we talking here?
ALISON BEARD: Yeah. Well, behaviors are certainly a manifestation of the problem, but what’s underlying it is beliefs. Like I can’t make a mistake which causes you to overanalyze, or I need this done now, which creates a false sense of urgency. And those things actually might have served leaders well in the past, but as they move on to different roles or manage larger teams, they really just aren’t helpful anymore. But because they’re beliefs, not personality traits, you can change them and you have to change them before you can change the behavior.
So Muriel is going to talk us through how to do that. It’s a three-step process that should be very helpful for all of our listeners. Her latest HBR article is The Hidden Beliefs That Hold Leaders Back. And she also wrote the new book, Leadership Unblocked. Here’s our conversation.
Muriel, thank you so much for being with me today.
MURIEL WILKINS: Thank you. I’m so delighted to be here.
ALISON BEARD: So let’s first talk about what exactly a hidden blocker is. They’re hidden because people don’t know that they’re there and they’ve managed to be very successful in spite of them.
MURIEL WILKINS: Yeah. So hidden blockers are beliefs that you hold. And what is a belief? A belief is a narrative that you tell yourself, it’s a story, it’s an assumption. The reason why they are hidden is because while they may have helped you in the past, they have become so habitual that you’re not even aware that they’re still operating in situations where they actually might not be as effective as they have been for you in the past.
ALISON BEARD: Yeah. So if it is something that’s not obvious, how does it become apparent?
MURIEL WILKINS: It usually becomes apparent because there’s some dissonance between what you desire in terms of an outcome and what you’re actually experiencing. And so you can have a cue around that in two ways. It can be an external cue. So if you’ve ever received some feedback, for example, and you’re like, that feedback doesn’t resonate with me, or that’s not the way I want to be seen, or your team might not be performing in the way you’d like them to perform.
So there might be some external cues that things aren’t going the way that you would like them. But you can also have some internal cues if you’re feeling frustration, if you’re feeling burned out, if you’re feeling some unease or some malaise around how you’re operating at work or how you’re leading. Then that is also something you should be listening to that behind that might be a belief, or a limiting belief, or a hidden blocker as I call them, that is getting in your way.
ALISON BEARD: You’re an executive coach. And so, how did you come to understand that lots of professionals who are seemingly high powered, high achieving are suffering from these blockers and it is preventing them from getting that promotion or encouraging their team to perform as well as that they can?
MURIEL WILKINS: Really it was a parallel path, I think, on two levels. So the first level is I saw with my clients that we were very action oriented in terms of moving towards the goals that they had. And so, we were very quick if they receive feedback to say, okay, well here’s what you’re going to do. But what I found is that it wasn’t sustainable. They were able to take the actions, change the behavior, but it was short-lived. And so, I became curious around why is it that they still keep hitting a wall even though they might be successful on the outside, they may still get the promotion, but they were still facing a level of frustration, a level of unease with the way that they were leading.
That led me to think, well, what’s behind that? And I then found that, well, what’s driving the behavior is the belief. It’s our internal operating system. So I saw this happen with my clients. And quite frankly, I also saw it happen with myself where I kept hitting certain walls professionally or otherwise and recognize that, well, maybe I’m contributing to them in some way. And it’s not just about changing what I’m doing, but it’s also about changing the way I think about what I’m doing.
ALISON BEARD: So it’s like, if you get feedback that you’re a micromanager, it’s not, okay, how do I stop micromanaging, it’s why do I micromanage, first.
MURIEL WILKINS: Exactly, right? What’s driving the micromanagement, which is a lot of times based on, well, what are you thinking about the folks that you’re managing? Or what are you thinking about the work that you’re doing? Or what are you thinking about yourself that’s then leading to that behavior? And what’s interesting, Alison, is this is nothing new. It’s something that’s applied in a lot of other domains. You think about health, you think about weight loss, people always say you’ve got to change your mindset around food before you can change your relationship with food. Well then, so why can’t it apply to the way that we work and certainly the way that we lead.
ALISON BEARD: How did you go about identifying the most common types of blockers that people experience?
MURIEL WILKINS: Yeah. So I became curious, again, around not only are there beliefs that might get in your way, but then I wondered are there some that cross different types of leaders? So I looked across over 300 of the leaders that I had coached over the past 20 years and looked to see what evidence there was around what might be driving their behavior. And I wasn’t sure if I was going to find anything, but lo and behold, there were seven that bubbled up to the top. Now, that’s not to say they are the only beliefs that might get in your way, but these were the most common ones across these leaders that I had worked with who, by the way, differed in terms of gender, in terms of demographics, in terms of sectors.
Most of the folks that I looked at were in at very least managerial positions. So they did lead others, but what happens is they become more consequential the more that you’re trying to lead at scale. So the more that you are going up through the leadership pipeline, if you will, or advancing in your profession, the more that there’s a risk of them getting in the way.
ALISON BEARD: I want to clue our listeners into what the seven blockers are. We can’t dig into all of them, but we’ll dig into a few of them. So the seven are, I need to be involved, I need it done now. I know I’m right. I can’t make a mistake. If I can do it, so can you. I can’t say no. And I don’t belong here. So the I need it done now, certainly resonates with many people, particularly in today’s climate where everything is moving at such a fast pace, we need a result. So talk about how that manifests itself and the damage that it can cause.
MURIEL WILKINS: It may not manifest itself in terms of you feeling an internal cue of, oh my gosh, I have this belief and it’s having dire consequences on me. But it certainly has consequences on everyone else. And the way it shows up is it feels like there’s lack of prioritization. We are equating everything as important and urgent at the same time. It feels like people are burned out because they are pulling all types of things to be able to get everything on the list done. And oh, by the way, it never feels like anything is done. It also looks like there’s frequent change happening. So you’re on the change acceleration wheel at an organizational level, which also has dire consequences because the organization may not be equipped or ready to sustain that level of change so frequently.
So there are a number of ways that it shows up externally, and quite frankly, the only person who feels like they’re benefiting from it is the leader itself who holds that belief because they think that they are being productive. But in actuality what’s happening is toxic productivity, which is when you’re trying to do things at all costs or at any cost, which then has a severe impact on the people within your organization and your ability to build capacity within that company.
ALISON BEARD: And we’re going to talk through sort of the process for unblocking yourself. But first, let’s dig into a few more examples. The I can do it, so you should be able to too. That really resonates with me as a Gen X-er who is dealing with people from many different generations who operate in a different way than I do. It also is a functional thing. I come from a journalism background, not a corporate one. Talk about why if that’s my blocker, it could be holding me back.
MURIEL WILKINS: So what’s interesting, all of these beliefs come from a good place. The intent is good. And we often think about that if I can do it, so can you, is motivational. If I can do it, little old me, why can’t you do it? But the assumption there is that what the person is bringing to the table is exactly what you bring to the table, which runs completely counter to developing people 101 and motiva-
ALISON BEARD: And that they’ll do it exactly the way you’ve always done it.
MURIEL WILKINS: Exactly, right. So if we think about how to develop people, how to lead change in an organization, how to grow capacity again within an organization, the number one rule is you’ve got to meet people where they are. That even as underlies any negotiation or any influence. And so the skill of being able to meet people where they are and the mindset to be able to do that is what leads to a lot of effectiveness in so many different domains. So if our starting point is, no, meet me where I am, which is essentially what the if I can do it, so can you says then we’re getting in our way of really being effective in a number of different areas.
ALISON BEARD: Yeah. Okay. And then the third one I just want to touch on is fear of making mistakes. I think particularly when you get to a certain level, you expect that you’re going to know what you’re doing and that everyone sees you, and looks at you, and expects you to be perfect. But then I think also in times like this of great economic and geopolitical uncertainty with technological change, people feel a little bit paralyzed and they definitely are maybe more risk averse because a misstep could really have dire consequences for their career. So talk a little bit about how you see this I can’t make a mistake playing out for your clients right now.
MURIEL WILKINS: Yeah, absolutely. So I think the I can’t make a mistake belief really gets in the way of being able to move forward. And what’s clear with my clients who hold leadership positions is they have two mandates, particularly when they are leading organizations. One mandate is they have to manage risk. Yes, absolutely. This is not about being a reckless mistake maker. You ought to manage risk.
But their other mandate is to move the organization forward in the strategic direction that it needs to go in. We need to get results, we need to be able to deliver to whatever metrics you’re looking to deliver to. The I can’t make a mistake, tends to hold that latter part of the formula back because we become concerned about making decisions, we become concerned about putting a stake in the ground. It can lead to change in course too often instead of trying to follow through. It can lead to then even not delegating and building people from within. So it just holds us back from exacting some of the leadership responsibilities that we actually have.
ALISON BEARD: Career wise, you do make the point that people with blockers can still get promoted, they can still rise very high in the organization. So for someone who maybe thinks that some of their blockers are productive being a perfectionist or demanding urgency, what’s the impetus for doing the work required to push through them?
MURIEL WILKINS: There always has to be an impetus. The change doesn’t happen just from lying around and saying, oh, maybe today I’ll exact some change. So usually it’s either something from the outside that gets imposed. So a lot of times with the I can’t make a mistake as an example for that being a hi