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#AuthenticLeadership #InnerVoice #OfficeSpielSpotlight
Anna had the kind of poise you expect from someone who’s spent twenty years navigating executive teams. She arrived in a pressed navy blazer, her voice measured, her every word weighed. But beneath the polish, there was a softness—like she was holding something back.
“I just don’t want to be too much,” she told me after a warm-up exercise. We’d been laughing, improvising, letting go—but Anna held back. Years of meetings, metrics, and managing perception had made her careful. Too careful.
“I used to be a bit wild,” she said quietly, almost surprised by her own words. “But somewhere along the way, I learned to shrink. I got promoted every time I toned it down.”
In rehearsal, we cracked open the shell. First with laughter, then with rhythm, then with stories that had nothing to do with KPIs. We gave her roles where she got to be bold, even ridiculous. And one day, in the middle of a mock press conference, she forgot to filter herself. Her hands moved. Her voice deepened. She stepped forward and owned the room.
Afterwards, she blinked. “That… that felt like me.”
The following week, she delivered a presentation without slides. No branding jargon. Just her. She told a personal story about values, about failure, about what it means to lead with honesty. Her team stood up when she finished.
“I thought vulnerability would make me smaller,” she said. “But it made me more powerful.”
Anna doesn’t play small anymore. She laughs loudly. She challenges assumptions. She speaks with her full range—not just her safe notes.
Turns out, being “too much” was exactly what her leadership needed.
