How to embrace the Use of Self concept for impactful leadership 

The coaching journey

The coach poses a key question to Faysal. In his interpersonal interactions, the coach asks him who he wants to be in the boardroom. “The biggest challenge I face is refraining from being myself,” he says.

Together with the coach, Faysal explores this statement. He realizes that this attitude is neither sustainable nor healthy; it’s also counterproductive in that it will delimit his ability to put the full spectrum of his talents to use supporting organizational growth in these turbulent times. This feels like an epiphany.

With the coach, Faysal starts to explore a new concept: the Use of Self (UoS). This is the conscious use of one’s whole being in the intentional execution of a role. It’s being aware of and deploying our own emotional, cognitive, and perceptual processes to create impact and change. For Faysal, this is about resolving the tension between wearing a “mask” or “costume” and bringing his full, authentic self to the role and proactively managing the interplay between behaviors to elicit better outcomes for himself and others. This begins with conscious and intentional self-leadership.

Faysal’s coach asks him to reflect on feelings that either strengthen or diminish his sense of well-being and performance and to monitor the energy levels that attach to these feelings. Practicing this kind of “internal workout,” he starts to zoom in to explore his feelings and zoom out to consider the external context and other people’s reactions. The coach encourages Faysal to monitor his energy levels during this exercise to measure how balanced he feels. In this way, he can understand how his adversarial and defensive behaviors could elicit adversarial and defensive responses from others – and, importantly, demonstrate why adversity has no place in the higher levels of his organization.