Courageous Leadership – Why Imperfection is the Gift Your Team Needs
This week’s newsletter explores:
Why perfection in leadership creates distance, fear, and slow progress 🚫
How courage and vulnerability inspire stronger, more resilient teams 💡
4 practical ways to lead with authenticity and impact today 🚀
Warning - it's going to get a little personal & encourage you to get personal with yourself.
When we think of leadership, the word perfection often sneaks in. Leaders feel the pressure to have all the
answers, make flawless decisions, and model strength without cracks.
But here’s the truth: perfection doesn’t inspire teams—courage does.
Brené Brown, in her book The Gifts of Imperfection, highlights a powerful truth: courage isn’t about being fearless or flawless. It’s about showing up, even when you can’t control the outcome. It’s about daring to be vulnerable (one of the scariest words EVER) in front of others. And when leaders bring this type of courage into their work, teams don’t just perform better—they thrive.
Before we go any further, I want to just hold up for a sec. Up to this point, I guarantee that most of you have had an image in your head of your direct reports. This is not the only team you have. You are a leader and a member of teams throughout every aspect of your life. My smallest team is Team ME - this isn't selfish, it's imperative. If I'm not supporting this team? Nothing else is going to happen. Sometimes this is the hardest team to bring courage to the table for. I am 100% known for being courageous for other people in my life. I will face the kraken if someone in my circle has been wronged, but for me? Oooph, that's hard.
Like the year I lost my mother and my big brother literally two weeks apart and in the middle of the downward spiral, I felt a lump in my breast. I did NOT want to make that call to schedule a scan. I couldn't deal with one more thing at that moment. I stood in water the temperature of the sun for probably ten minutes. I'm not a stand in the shower for no reason kind of person. I argued with myself that it would go away, followed by daaaammmnnn girl, that's a big lump, it's not going away, how did you miss this for so long, followed by being irritated that all the genes I seem to have gotten from the Wolf side seem to be the really crappy ones. I took a really deep breath, mentally slapped myself in the face, and told myself to deal with this the same way I deal with every other project. When is this current project expected to wrap up? What are my post-project responsibilities? How do I find five minutes to make the scheduling call discreetly? And I got out of the shower and moved forward with the belief that I had this next project under control - yeah, this is my courage for myself. It's a lot of logic and not a lot of emotion. I had my appointment ten days after my brother passed and then summoned my courage to take the news to Team #2.
Team #2 is a two person team. It's my marriage. For the rest of my little world to rotate, this team needs to be solid. Giving him this news was not going to be a great moment. I had to have courage for the both of us. And it's the same every other step of the way. This man knows I'm not perfect by now. I get hangry. Bad. When I announce I'm hungry, he judges by my tone exactly how much time he has to get me fed before things start going poorly. I know he's not perfect - he can't find an item in the fridge to save his life. Frankly, if either of us thought the other one thought they were perfect, neither one of us would have been interested! (yeah, that's a messy sentence) We knew we needed someone that we could work through imperfect things together with. (Another important note here - we both have areas that we lead on this team. We take turns leading this team. We huddle and make joint plans to lead this team. If I thought I would have to lead this team all the time I wouldn't have signed up.)
Do you see where I'm going with this? Siblings / parents? Team. Your own kids? Team. Faith group, hobby group, sports group, gym buddies, parent groups - Teams. How you show up to all areas of your life affects all areas of your life.
Think back to your school days. Who did you appreciate the most? The teacher / coach that acted as if they'd always nailed every single assignment / shot they ever had? (or said as much) Or the one who took you aside and said something along the lines of - hey, I see you struggling with "x". It's OK. I used to have that same problem. Do you want to try something that helped me?
Alright, now that we're all in the right frame, and we know that we need to apply this to our whole life, let's get on with the book analysis.
Why Perfection in Leadership Backfires
Many leaders fall into the trap of thinking they need to be perfect to earn respect. But perfection creates three hidden problems for teams:
It builds distance, not connection. When leaders never admit mistakes, employees hesitate to bring forward their own challenges. This stifles growth and problem-solving.
It breeds fear instead of trust. Teams get the message that errors are unacceptable, so they hide issues rather than collaborate on solutions. Which just makes problems bigger and more difficult to solve once they actually come to light.
It slows progress. A focus on perfection means endless tweaking, second-guessing, and missed opportunities to learn from action. Also, pushing dates on release due to inappropriate amounts of perfection = catastrophic.
In short: striving for perfection makes teams play it safe and play small.
"There are cracks in everything. That's how the light gets in. "
The Power of Courageous Leadership
On the other hand, courageous leadership looks like this:
A project manager admits, “I don’t know how we're going to get around that yet—let’s figure it out together.”
A CIO shares a personal learning moment from a mistake, showing the team that failure is part of innovation.
A leader encourages progress over perfection, celebrating iteration instead of only finished products.
What happens? Teams feel safer, more engaged, and more willing to take risks. The workplace shifts from fear of failure to freedom to grow. Amazing things happen when you give your team the respect and courage to show you their best ideas.
What Courage in Leadership Looks Like (and How to Practice It)
Brené Brown describes courage as ordinary people making the decision to be vulnerable. For leaders, that means:
Own your story. Don’t gloss over your missteps—share what you learned. Your team will respect your honesty more than a polished façade.
Ask, don’t assume. Courage means admitting you don’t have all the answers. Invite your team (relationship team, home team, school team, work team) to co-create solutions.
Celebrate authenticity. Encourage employees to bring their real selves to work. Teams do their best work when they feel safe to speak up (about who they are, what they know, what they want to try, what they have observed, etc).
Redefine success. Focus on growth, creativity, and resilience—not just flawless execution.
The Team Impact of Courage
When leaders embrace imperfection with courage:
Employees feel comfortable speaking up before small problems become big ones.
Collaboration improves because the team knows they’re in it together.
Retention rises—people don’t leave environments where they feel valued and safe.
In a competitive world where talent has options, courageous leadership isn’t just nice—it’s a business advantage.
A Call to Leaders
Courage in leadership isn’t about a title. It’s about choosing to show up as you are, and inviting your team(s) to do the same.
The question isn’t: How can I be the perfect leader?
The real question is: Am I brave enough to lead with imperfection?
Because when you are, your team will follow—not out of obligation, but out of trust, loyalty, and shared purpose.
✨ If you’re ready to explore how courageous leadership can transform your projects and teams, let’s talk. Whether it’s project recovery, communication coaching, or fractional leadership support, I help leaders create environments where teams do their best work.
✨If you want to take a look at this book for yourself, you should also check out her website - there's a workbook! Well, there are a lot of workbooks - this one is toward the end of the list. And no, I'm not getting any kickbacks from sharing this info, I just found this reading to be really good for my continued work on myself. https://brenebrown.com/resources/
Created with © systeme.io