Mitzi Perdue

Women’s Leadership Styles: There’s a Lot to Learn!

Women in family businesses face a particular set of distinct challenges when it comes to leadership style. Heather Powell, a family business coach for women and couples, has an impressive track record of dealing with a whole host of these challenges.

For today’s blog, let’s focus on just one of them. In Powell’s view, too often a woman in a family business has trouble seeing herself in a leadership role.

To see how this plays out, let’s take the example of Mary Smith from the Smith Medical Device Manufacturing Company. (As you might expect, we’re not using real names here, but the circumstances are real.)

A CASE OF MENTAL, PHYSICAL, AND EMOTIONAL BURN OUT

Several years ago, Mary Smith left her very successful job in nursing to help her husband George grow the family business. The good news is, this decision paid off. The Smith Company experienced impressive success and today the company employs 75 people.

Smith had some notable qualifications for her new role. With her graduate degree in nursing, she had a grounding in the whole field of medical devices.

Things should have been going well, but they emphatically weren’t. Smith’s  problem was lack of self-confidence. She kept asking herself, “Who am I to be part of running this business?”

Her background contributed to her lack of self-confidence. Growing up, her role models consisted of women who stayed home and served their families. She couldn’t process the idea that she was a leader.

Her lack of self-confidence caused her to second-guess herself continuously. It reached the point where she couldn’t make decisions.  She foundherself experiencing what felt like unrelenting pain, anxiety, and a sense that she just couldn’t handle things.

Her overwhelming feeling of being unqualified meant she felt paralyzed at the thought of talking  to the board of directors or the attorneys or other stakeholders. She was tuning out from her husband and everything around her.

How Was Powell Able to Help?

At this point,  Heather Powell entered Mary Smith’s life.   This was fortunate because Powell’s skill as a leadership coach meant she was able to help Smith turn things around.

“To help Mary better identify who she is as a leader and what are her strengths,” says Powell, “We used scientifically grounded assessments, and at the end of the process, we knew a lot more about her and her unique leadership style. This kind of self awareness is invaluable. When you know what you want, what you don’t want, your strengths and your areas for growth, you become a lot more effective and productive as a person.”

What both women learned was a revelation. When Mary moaned to Powell, “I’m just not a leader!”, Powell shot back, “Are you kidding me? You’re an accomplished leader!”

Mary had been oblivious to her own leadership strengths because they were entirely different from her husband’s. George was brilliant in his leadership approach, but it was entirely, based on execute, execute, execute.

Mary’s collaborative leadership style was what had made her husband’s execute approach work. It was Mary’s ability to create positive interactions with their staff, board, and stakeholders that had made the company’s growth possible.

Both Mary and her husband came to realize that her husband’s skill set was not enough by itself to have created the success the company was now experiencing. “Once Mary recognized her own skills,” says Powell, “it was enormously empowering to her.”

As Mary gained the awareness of her own leadership style, she began embracing it. Her change of attitude meant that at the end of about half a year of coaching, Mary had the self-confidence and the self-awareness to own and enjoy her own personal approach to leadership.

“Before we knew it, she was creating new business initiatives,” marvels Powell. “By the end of my year of coaching her, she was on her way to successfully creating three new business initiatives.”
What about her husband in all of this? “George was overjoyed with the change,” says Powell. “It did mean a lot of work on his part because it meant changes in their relationship. It was both a painful and an exhilarating experience.”

The results were worth it. Husband and wife are now a mutually supportive team. The each go about their work with zest and a shared sense of adventure and excitement.

It you’d like to contact Heather Powell, you can e-mail her at heather@heatherpowell.org. Her website is: http://heatherpowell.org