Leadership: Everyone Wears a Mask

🎭Everyone wears a mask, and that's normal.

🧊 Like icebergs, people reveal only a small portion of themselves in the workplace. 

What we see above the waterline - their professional persona - is 10-20% of who they are.

The CIA teaches its agents that there are three versions of ourselves: 

🔵Public - how we appear to others
🔵Private - what your close friends or family knows
🔵Secret - often you don't share due to fear of rejection

Many secrets stay hidden forever

In business, we typically only interact with the public version, unaware of the vast private experiences, challenges, and circumstances lurking beneath the surface. You can forget about knowing about the secret self. Even their spouse or partner is a stranger to this land, and many secrets stay hidden forever.

Why is this important? Let’s say someone on your team misses a meeting, and you decide it’s a good time to let that subordinate know they are in big trouble. 

You could have inquired why they missed the meeting. Instead, you flexed your authority when that person had responded to a medical emergency for their child. How’s that feeling now, tough guy?

When you communicate with anyone in business, you must check your emotions. This can be challenging when you're tired, overwhelmed, or frustrated. You are also a human being with layers.

Here are some human first principles I've learned:

1️⃣ Lead with curiosity, not judgment.
2️⃣ When someone seems "difficult" or "resistant," remember: you're likely seeing a response shaped by what is below the surface you can't see.
3️⃣ Create psychological safety (avoid psychopaths!)
4️⃣ Make it okay for people to share glimpses of what's below the surface. A simple "How are you doing?" can open doors.
5️⃣ Balance candor with compassion.
6️⃣ Direct communication is vital, but it must be delivered with the understanding that everyone carries hidden burdens.
7️⃣ Normalize "I don't know the full picture."
8️⃣ You can start conversations acknowledging that you're working with limited information about someone's reality.
9️⃣ Check your assumptions
🔟 Before reacting to someone's behavior, pause and remember: there's always more beneath the surface.

The most effective leaders recognize that every colleague is like an iceberg—complex, deep, and largely unseen. Communicating with this awareness creates more resilient workplace relationships. 

Do you embrace the unseen when communicating with colleagues?