Sync

Apology

apology: an expression of regret, a dislike of one's own actions

Apologising for who we are is something that comes up frequently when disabled people gather and talk about leading and leadership.

Many of us describe slipping into apology as a matter of course. It’s almost as if because other people feel awkward around our visible and not so visible difference, that we collude with them - saying sorry for taking more time, sorry for needing something else and sorry for doing things in a different way and being different.

There is a train of thought, that if we are apologising for who we are, then, how on earth can we be convincing leaders?

So let's look at how some disabled leaders are breaking free of this apology cycle?

Authentic chameleons

Great leadership is about being an 'authentic chameleon.' (Rob Goffee and Gareth Jones)

In the leadership book 'Why Should Anyone be Led by You?' Rob Goffee and Gareth Jones, describe great leaders as 'authentic chameleons' where the trick is to 'be yourself, your whole self – but with skill'.

In coaching, a person is encouraged to look more closely at what has shaped, moved and driven their lives. This gives a much richer picture to play with, allowing someone to see all the different things they can draw upon to make an impact.

If we harness this and think more strategically about it, developing skills in how we bring these different parts of ourselves into a room, then we may well be able to be more effective, happy and successful in interviews, meetings and even in 1:1 conversations with people we want to influence.

Bringing ourselves out of the bag

In a recent interview with disabled musician Anya Ustaszewski, she talks about the richer picture of her life and the leadership that comes from this.

"I am autistic but I am also half Seychelloise with a really interesting past: surviving and living in different cultures and without a diagnosis for my condition until recently. Now that I know why I am the way I am, I bring all of me, my music, my diversity, including my autism, into how and why I lead and the combination seems to work. I don’t know how not to do this anymore."

Anya is inspiring for so many of us who find it difficult to tell our stories and share our experiences, particularly the ones that are not about barriers and exclusion but ways of seeing and being.

Harnessing these things in our lives and using them as part of our leadership style means that we may be more able to transcend what people see and think they know about us.

Go to Anya's Case Study

Mediating our impairments

The most important point of influence is in the few seconds that you first meet someone. (James Partridge, CEO, Changing Faces)

So once we’ve started to think more about the diversity of our lives, interests, passions, skills and experience, then how do we start to use these things to develop our leadership?

James Partridge, the CEO of Changing Faces, talks about how he had to move on from the period in his life when he was apologetic for the way his facial disfigurement made other people feel when he met them.

In a recent conversation with Sync, James described this as:

"starting as a low flying guinea fowl and changing into a red kite, noticeable in a different way, high flying ready to swoop down and catch my prey"

He talked at length about making ‘a different sort of impression within the few seconds of meeting someone’ to bring something surprising and different into the interaction. He refers to this as mediating his impairment.

This approach sits right at the heart of his organisation’s Face Equality Campaign and touches on many disabled people’s experience of having to subvert or change to counter the panic and fear people have about how we look and how we might behave.

The need for us to develop skills and strategies around this in a playful, 'give it a try way', is an important thing for us to consider.

Click here to go to the Changing Faces website

Shape shifting

At Lead On, the disabled leadership Open Space Event held in Cheltenham this September, we discovered how many of us have had to change the ‘shape of who we are’ because of being very much ‘up against it’ and that this has been an important part of making a difference, being heard and leadership.

In one of the groups, someone described herself as being 'born a seahorse and turning into a rhino' because she was so angry about what happened to her.

Coaching uses metaphors to allow people to think in a different way around their behaviour and decisions and these metaphors often take the shape of animals or the elements. This allows people to talk about the nature of who they are and what they have become out of necessity or choice.

As the discussions developed during the day, more hardened and hardy creatures appeared in the room, alongside slippery, canny and subversive marsupials! Quite a zoo!

Subversion

If we're not apologising at every turn, we're being bolchy or aggressive. (Bobby Baker in conversation with Sync in 2009)

Performance Artist and acclaimed painter Bobby Baker, has always been subversive, employing powerful metaphors to illustrate her experience. She understands fully the range of behaviours we adopt and why. She is known for her powerful use of metaphor.

"One of Britain’s most fearless and conspiratorial performance artists, the confessional nature of her material has always been Bobby Baker’s greatest strength, laying bare the highs and lows of her own life, often to comic effect." (David Watson for Disability Arts Online)

In an article from the Observer this June around the launch of her Welcome Collection, "Bobby Baker's Diary Drawings: Mental illness and me 1997-2008", we see how much more of her experience she is prepared to share through her work.

She is also clear that as disabled leaders and artists, we need to be 'cunning, canny, tactical and reflective in achieving what we want.'

As part of this, she clearly advocates for the need at times, to 'walk around the wall and not through it.'

To go to Bobby Baker's Observer Feature click here

Putting this into practice

At the end of the day, it’s up to us what we do. We could choose to share more of ourselves, to subvert or mediate who we are and the impairments we have, or we could emphasise a part of ourselves that we’ve never considered bringing into a room before now - it’s up for grabs.

It is important to ask friends and colleagues to support us as we try out new things. We can then get a sense of what works and what doesn’t as we explore our changing colours and the chameleons we can choose to be.