ink, leather & thigh high boots
In our culture, leadership looks a certain way.
Think of someone you see identified as a leader in the press or media… chances are the image of that person looks a certain way. Often, that image does not represent or align with who we are, or with the greater portion of our population. So where does that leave those of us that don’t fit that image? And how does that image inspire those of us who don’t see ourselves in that image to step into positions of leadership?
This is a question I have grappled with. Obviously, if you look at my photos on my website, you immediately note that I’m not a pattern-match for the images you see of leaders in high tech companies, or elsewhere in most of our society. I’ve loved fashion since I was 12 or 13 when a friend of my mother’s, in all her French sensibility, bought me a subscription to Cosmo for my birthday. Much to my mom’s dismay, I might add.
“Aunt" Jeanette also sewed me an entire wardrobe when I entered junior high. Couple that with a grandmother who bought me my first pair of designer jeans before my mother actually permitted me to wear jeans to school. And a weekend babysitting job for an up-and-coming NYC fashion designer who paid me in clothing samples when I was 15, and I was hooked on fashion as a form of creativity and self-expression from the start.
Not speaking specifically of fashion here, but about creativity and self-expression in general. Don’t we want to inspire those in our leaders? Aren’t we, as humans beings, and as well as members and participants in our organizations and communities, better served by leaders who embrace and inspire creative thinking and problem-solving capabilities? And who encourage self-expression in those they lead for the benefit of the organization and our world?
Throughout most of my career in high tech, I was unwilling, and remain so, to alter who I was and am at my core to embody the image of leadership that I saw. I personally and professionally, take a stand for a different version of leadership - one that embraces authenticity, individuality, creativity, and personal expression - and fashion, of course, if that’s your thing. However you define it.
And one that is based in the irrefutable connection that we as people, as human beings, have to those around us and to our world. One that is grounded in the intersectionality of everyone and everything. One that embraces the fact that in order for us as human beings, and our organizations, culture, society and world to survive and THRIVE, we need different images of what a leader looks like. Are you willing to join me in taking a stand for a different image (and way) of leading in our world?
