Steve Brooks is our lead executive coach at FireStarter. Here are some thoughts from him about Halloween and leadership.

Is Everyday Halloween?

By Steve Brooks

One of my favorite things to do every Halloween is to go to my daughter’s school and watch the Halloween parade. What I really like about the parade is that it is an opportunity to see the kids have fun dressing up in their favorite costumes and masks as they pretend to be something or somebody they’re not. Some kids dress up like scary monsters or aliens, and others dress up like princesses or inanimate objects like palm trees or flower gardens. I know many kids by sight, but on Halloween, it is hard to figure out who’s who unless you lift the mask or yell out “Are you Sara?”

As an executive coach, I often have discussions with my clients about who they “really” are. I typically ask variations of these two questions:

– While at work, are you something or somebody you’re not?

– Are you a different person in front of the boss than you are in front of your peers or employees?

Approximately 85 percent of the answers are, “Work is work – home is home, I separate them.” One client once described it this way, “When I get into my car and drive to work. I begin a transformation. By the time I walk into my office I am wearing my work mask. And during the work day, I wear multiple masks – it all depends on who I am talking to and what I want from that person.”

As I process this statement I envision him this way: As he drives to work he is the mild-mannered Clark Kent. He arrives to the office, walks into the staff kitchen, pours a cup of coffee and shuts the door behind him – he transforms into Superman – tackling all the problems of the world and seeking recognition for all that he does. Twenty minutes later when his colleague asks him about the status of a late project, Superman disappears and the Incredible Hulk throws a temper-tantrum in the middle of the hallway where everyone can hear him. As his boss rounds the corner, the Hulk quickly becomes Eddie Haskell and talks to his boss like she’s Mrs. Cleaver — (“Hello boss, it’s so nice to see you, Joe and I are talking about some really important company business. How is your wonderful family this fine day?”) As lunch time approaches he turns into Richy Rich and generously buys lunch for all of his employees, and then by the 2:00 staff meeting – Dracula arrives – sucking the life out of everyone at the table. He ends his day as Kermit the Frog, “It’s not easy being green,” and he arrives home. It may be rare that a person exhibits all of these behaviors in the same day, but we all exhibit some of these from time to time.

Thinking about all of these different “characters” and “masks” wears me out. I can only imagine what it must be like to work for this person and what his colleagues and boss may think of him. How can he be effective in what he does, because he is always someone he isn’t?

The way I look at it, changing masks throughout the day is a signal that there may be an underlying integrity issue. Many believe they operate with a high level of integrity, but in 75 percent of “360 Degree” assessments I administer (360 Degree assessments are used to compare how a person sees themselves in areas of leadership competencies to how their boss, peers and subordinates see them) integrity is consistently scored very low. I believe that because so many masks are used at work – bosses, colleagues and subordinates don’t know who is going to show up to work on any given day. Therefore low scores on integrity are a natural consequence of people not being themselves in the workplace.

So, who are you? Are you consistently the same person 24/7/365 or are you constantly changing masks throughout your life?

This entry was posted on Thursday, October 28th, 2010 at 2:16 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.