The Mask We Wear

Leadership Point of View: Conversations with Alkema & Friends

Season 4, Episode 2: The Masks We Wear

In this powerful and deeply personal episode of Leadership P.O.V: Conversations with Alkema & Friends, Leadership Coach Alkema Lewis invites listeners into a quiet moment before a major presentation. Standing in front of a mirror, jacket straightened, notes in hand, she wasn’t checking her appearance. She was checking whether she looked like a leader.

Confident. Composed. Unshakable.

Inside, she felt uncertain. Tired. Pressured to perform.

That moment became the doorway into a courageous conversation about performative leadership. Not deception, but protection. Not dishonesty, but survival. It is what happens when the role begins to overshadow the person. When we lead for approval instead of authenticity. When strength becomes performance rather than presence.

In The Masks We Wear, Alkema explores three common leadership masks:

The Fixer
When worth becomes tied to solving every problem. What begins as helpfulness quietly turns into burnout and dependence. Leadership shifts from empowering to rescuing.

The Expert
When knowledge becomes armor. Competence creates credibility, but hiding behind expertise can isolate us from connection and collaboration.

The Perfectionist
When excellence quietly transforms into exhaustion. Flawlessness feels safe, yet it often steals peace and authenticity.

Through heartfelt stories from her own leadership journey, Alkema reveals how each mask once felt like strength but eventually became a barrier. She reminds us that leadership is not about impressing people with performance. It is about building trust through presence.

This episode invites you to pause and reflect:

• Which mask do I wear most often?
• Where did it come from?
• How has it served me?
• What might shift if I led without it, even for one day?

Because when we remove the mask, we do not lose our strength. We rediscover it. And in doing so, we create space for others to lead freely, honestly, and fully seen.

Discover Your Leadership Identity

How do you lead when the pressure is on?
Take the “What Kind of Leader Are You Under Pressure?” assessment and uncover how you naturally respond in challenging moments. 

Then, go deeper with the "Leadership Identity Reflection Journal" — a guided tool designed to help you pause, realign, and grow in self-awareness and integrity.

Connect with Alkema

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thealconsulting/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/alewisconsulting

TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@coachalkemalewis

#LeadershipPOV #TheMasksWeWear #AuthenticLeadership  #UnmaskingLeadership 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

A few years ago, right before an important presentation, I found myself standing alone in a conference room. And I remember I was standing next to the door. There was a mirror next to the door, and I was straightening out my jacket and adjusting my nose. And I was looking in the mirror. I wasn't checking my hair and I wasn't checking my makeup. I was looking in that mirror to check to see if I was a leader. Now I know that sounds weird and may sound crazy to some, but it is the truth. I wanted to seem confident, collected, and unshakable because I believed that that's what leadership demanded. I believe that there in my mind was a certain look. You had to sound a certain way. You had to demonstrate certain actions. But in the in in reality, inside, I was anything but what I felt or sensed a leadership, a leader should be. I felt uncertain. I was worried if I was prepared enough. I was worried if I was even enough. And in that mirror, beneath the poised smile, I remember seeing this level of exhaustion, but I wasn't yet ready to name it. Not because it came from long hours. I worked long hours, but I was constantly performing. I felt like I was always on this rat in this rat race. I felt like I was always um tap dancing. I was always wearing this clown suit. I was constantly performing, performing this confidence that I saw other people exude. But in me, it was just anxiousness. Performing this level of strength that I saw other leaders demonstrating, but I when I really needed help. Performing what I thought was calmness when everything in me was out of control. It was in that moment I realized that I had perfected the mask of leadership, but had forgotten to see the face beneath it. Right? It was that memory, looking in that mirror, that I said, you know what, today something has to change. So when I think about that mirror, and I think about the memory from that entire situation, this story, this is the basis for our conversation in this episode because so many of us are leading well, but beneath the surface, we're carrying hidden pressure. This episode is titled The Mask We Wear. Welcome to Leadership Point of View Conversations with Alkema and Friends Podcast. I'm your host, Alkema Lewis, and in this season, we will be unmasking leadership identity. We will start doing the work of taking off the mask and exploring performative leadership in this episode. That quiet pressure to appear composed, confident, and capable at all times, even when you're not. I'm going to share various masks we wear as leaders and share some of the stories of when I wore masks in my own leadership. This episode is personal. And I hope that you do take it personal. Because when you think about growing and developing your leadership, there are times when we have to take a step back and assess how we're showing up as we lead, what mask we're wearing when we lead. Because if you have ever tried to lead, to show up and to make a difference in your leadership, you probably want a mask too. So as you join and listen in, I want you to consider what mask you're wearing when you lead. So it's performing performative leadership. I want to start there. And so as I think about performative leadership, um, what I've learned is that many people believe that performative leadership is deceptive in nature. Right? Remember, I said, you know, I felt like I was in a rat race. I was forever performing in a clown show, so forth and so on. And yeah, I was performing, but it really wasn't or isn't about deception at all. That's not what performative leadership is. It's not about deception because I really wasn't trying to deceive anybody. It was just all about protection, protecting me. It is what happens when the role starts to bury or cast a veil over who you really are. It's when we lead for approval rather than lead from authenticity. To me, when I think about performative leadership, as I stated, it's not about, again, deception. It's about me as a leader not really being sure of who I am and what my identity is and my purpose is as a leader. So that's why I believe we get in performance mode when we lead. We are mimicking other leaders and how they show up and how they perform because we're seeing that obviously if they have success, you know, and they are showing up the way that they're showing up, why not show up like them? But, you know, when I think back to those situations and the leaders that I've modeled my leadership after, some good, some not so good. Um, I never thought to ask myself, what mask were they wearing? And I definitely never asked them, um thought to ask them what mask they were wearing. I just saw that, saw their success, and I said, hmm, like I said, it's working for them. Let me model my leadership like that. And so for years, I thought this was normal. For me, it was normal. After all, that's what real leaders do. They do the work, they get accolades, they get acknowledged. Well, so I thought. As leaders, we want to show up strong. I mean, there's no doubt about that. We want to project certainty with every edge polished. But what I learned is that masks may earn you respect, but they cost you true connections with people and opportunities. So there are three masks that leaders wear. You have the fixer, you have the expert, and the perfectionist. And I'm going to elaborate on all three and share personal stories of where I've worn each mask. So let's begin with a fixer. This is where the worth of the leader comes from, solving problems. But the concern with wearing this mask uh is that we never let others lead. We create dependence and burnout. So I remember there was a point in my leadership where I believed my job, my calling was to fix everything that was broken. If a teacher was overwhelmed, I stepped in. If a process wasn't working, I rewrote it. If my morale was low, I tried to lift everyone's spirits all by myself. I told myself, they need me. I can fix this. You know, I showed up with the da da da da da superhero cape on. Crisis ready to be managed. And to be honest, it felt really good. It felt so good to have affirmation, the affirmation that came with being dependable, the problem solver in the room. But over time, I noticed that the more I wore this mask and showed up as the fixer, the more people expected me to. The more that people really didn't want to do what or to learn what I thought that they needed to learn or do what they needed to do. And that was to solve their own problems. And the heavier the work became for me. I remember one particular week, everything seemed to be falling apart. I mean, I was putting out fires after fire that was between staff and their conflict, parent emails, parent phone calls, parents showing up at the school. Uh, we had evaluations going on. So I was in classrooms trying to meet those deadlines, and student discipline was off the chart all that week, all happening at the same time. And I took a breath and I thought to myself, I can handle this. I got this. I've always had it. That's what I do. I solve problems. I'm I show up, I'm the problem solver, I can fix anything. So I handled all of those problems. I remember staying late, sending every email, inputting all of the discipline referrals, and every problem was resolved. And by the end of the day that Friday, while every problem was handled, I was depleted. I was done. And that entire weekend, I sat on my couch, you know, got up out of bed, did what I needed to do, sat on my couch, and I was scrolling through my phone when I came across a simple quote that stopped me cold in my traps. And it said, When you rescue every time, people forget they were when you rescue every time, people forget they were born with wings. Wow. I remember when my sister and I were, I was um a junior in college, she was a senior in college, and we went we went to different schools, of course, and we were at our parents for summer vacation. I remember my dad calling us outside. He and my mom were outside, and and and you know, if anyone knew my dad, he he he he was hilarious, and he said, you know, he talked in parables, and but he said, I raise you girls like birds. He said, When you get older, fly away. And I remember that thought came to my mind when I read this quote when you rescue every time, people forget they were born with wings. And I realized at that moment what my dad was saying to my sister and I. He was saying, you know, I've done all that I needed to do. I've raised you all, I'm sending you all to school, you're getting the best education. When you leave and graduate from college, I want you to go and expand. I have helped you to think critically, have taught you how to solve your own problems. So when you leave and you graduate from when you graduate from college and you leave, I want you to leave knowing that you'll be fine because I taught you everything that you needed to know, right? And I realized in that moment, I was not giving the people, the adults inside of my in inside of my school the opportunity to spread their wings and fly. I wasn't even giving them an opportunity to teach them in many cases how I go about or think about or process through solving the problems, right? I was just solving problems for them. And I thought about many cases where my father and my mother, there we would bring things to them and they would say, okay, so what do you think you should do about it? Right. I never did that with the adults inside of that building. And so I said, okay, instead of rushing to stay the day and taking away the opportunity for them to grow and to problem solve on their own, I needed to begin to build a level of independence because I had built dependence that didn't serve me or them. And in that moment, I realized something deeper. There was a need for me to fix things. And my need to fix things wasn't just about care, it was about worth. I tied my value as a leader to my ability to solve problems. So again, I had to make the shift. And I made the shift. The next time someone came to me with a problem, I didn't jump into solution mode. I jumped into coaching mode. And I would start by asking, so you have this problem. What have you tried to do to solve the problem? What actions have you implemented to solve the problems? So we would go do that for a course of time. And then I would say, okay, you've done those things. So can you share with me what actions or what steps you think you need to take to try to solve this problem? And from there, I would take them on a journey of discovery, them thinking about what they need to do. So when they leave this time with me, they're able to now take ownership of the steps or the action that they needed to take. Because what would happen is I would solve the problem, or at least I thought I would solve the problem. And some of the things, if they didn't work, they would come back and blame me. And I would feel a certain type of way in that moment. But in actuality, I did give them that step. I did give them that action. So who needed to own it? Yes, I needed to own it. So after I started making that shift and taking them through that mode of discovery of how to solve their own problems, it felt strange in the beginning. But slowly over time, something beautiful began to happen. People started bringing solutions and not just problems. The load seemed as it didn't seem as heavy, though it was heavy. And in many cases, some of the people didn't even come to me to share with me the problem. They came and shared with me what the problem was, what the solution they came up with, and how it worked. They were taking ownership for their own problems that they were seeing. So I began to think about what it looked like in the beginning when I was solving their problems and what it ended up being. And it didn't happen overnight, but the leadership, at least my leadership, started to look a lot more like partnership than performance. Because I felt that I was doing the job of a leader, building the capacity and equipping leaders inside of my building to take on some of the heavy lifting, to do a lot of the cognitive work of thinking and solving their own problems and carrying the vision. The focus wasn't just on problems. The focus could we could get the focus back on the vision of the school at the time. And that was ensuring that students had what they need to be successful, not only just in the school, not just academically, but in their communities, in the world, in society. So the shift happened again very slowly, but over time I saw collaboration and instead of performance, partnership instead of performance, instead of me doing all of the work. So now when I feel that superhero or the inner superhero rise saying, Here's your cape, Alkema, get to managing crisis. I pause and I take a break and remind myself, leadership isn't about saving the day, it's about equipping others to lead the way. I don't have to be the only person that leads inside of a space. There are other people. And as a matter of fact, if you are in a leadership role and you sense that you are the only person leading or need to needing to be the leader in this space, I would suggest or recommend that you take a pause and assess if you are showing up or how you're showing up or what mask you're wearing, right? Because fixing everything might feel good in the moment, and it does. Like I said, it really, really did feel great to be the person that was called on to, you know, fix matters. But what's more important here is teaching others to lead. That's what it means when you build something to last, right? So that's the fixer. So let's now move into the expert. Who is the expert? How does the expert show up? And so this is the leader I call the miss or Mr. Know It All. And the characteristics of such leader and what they demonstrate in their leadership when they wear this mask is I know it all, right? Um come to me. I'm the keeper of knowledge. Why? Because knowledge for them becomes armor, it is safe. But as one who's worn this mask, I know it's lonely behind that shield. And of course, we will never share with anyone how we are afraid and fearful in many cases, and not having answers and not knowing everything and not knowing it all. So I remember there was a season in my leadership when I had I had convinced myself that my value was directly tied to how much I knew. Um, I was serving as the associate director um and leading a high-performing team in a community filled with strong personalities in a community synonymous to a department. Um, deadlines were constant. The expectations were even higher. Every meeting felt like a silent competition test. Who's prepared, who's informed, who really gets it? So I came armed because I did not want to show up as if I didn't have myself together. Um, I was armed with data points, research, and just color-coded charts. You know, what you think a good leader should have in place when they show up in meeting settings? I made sure I had an answer for everything. And if I did know, I made it my mission to find out before anyone noticed. Um, I started to realize though that knowledge or the knowledge that I had, um, though it was my greatest asset, it had become, I had become quietly my armor. It kept me safe from embarrassment, from shame, from being wrong, from being questioned, but it also kept me isolated. Because behind that polished expertise, I was exhausted. Um I was terrified of being seen as unprepared or unsure. One afternoon, though, during a strategy meeting, one of my team members asked a question and I didn't have the answer to the question. So you all probably can't imagine how I felt on the inside. And as a matter of fact, I felt exposed, right? Something so simple, something I probably could have responded and said, I'm not sure. I deflected in my response. I redirected the conversation and I gave a surface level response, hoping it passed as confidence. And it really did. I promise you it did in a moment. But later, another colleague came by and softly said, You know, Alkema, we would have been fine waiting if you just said you didn't know. And at that moment, yes, I felt really exposed, but I also realized that people in spaces, though we may be wearing these masks, some people truly know that we're wearing masks. They may not say anything, but they know. And what she moved on and said, she said, we trust you, not because you know things, but because you lead and you lead well. So that sentence lingered with me for a time, and it hit me that I've been in performance mode or performance orientation all that time. So I started doing something new. And of course, you know, it was wasn't the easiest thing to do because there were, I had to be vulnerable with myself. So in meetings when I didn't have the answers, I would say, you know, that's a great question. Let's find out together. Instead of saying something like, hmm, I'm processing. When I really just wasn't processing, I was going nuts on the inside because I didn't know. So at first, it it it felt vulnerable and risky to say that. But over time, those words became liberating. Um, it it felt freeing to be able to say, you know what, I don't have the answer to that question. Let's find out together. Or, you know what, I just don't know. It it built it, it built a deeper connection and more collaboration and more trust amongst the people that I was working with, and to know that I didn't need to have um the perfect answer every time, right? They could trust that I would bring them into the fold to discover what this answer is, or we could learn together in finding an answer for whatever the question that someone may have had. And also, I could allow whoever asked the question or throw the question out to the space. Does anyone Can anyone shed light on and give insight about the question or the matter at hand inside of a meeting? So you see, the extra mass whispers, if you don't know, you'll lose credibility. And for some, and for many, for everyone, credibility is important. But the truth is, when we remove that mask, we gain something far greater: credibility grounded in authenticity. I'm not just only want to be right or a credible person. I want to be credible in true fashion, alchema, true identity, who she was called to be and the purpose in which she was called to be here or do this work, right? The leadership work. So what I've learned when I think about the expert and the mask that experts wear in their leadership, uh, that leaders wear when they put on this mask of an expert, right? Or the expert. That leadership isn't about being the smartest in the room, it's about making room for the smartest ideas to emerge. And I don't have to be in the expert, I the expert in the room for um the smartest ideas in the to emerge. I remember I remember reading this quote. When you're the smartest person in your group, you need to find another group. And this is one of those situations where you need to be in a space with people that that just can help you grow, right? A leader can still grow from people who don't hold titles or who don't have their position. I think that that's when people will begin to trust you when you can show up as who you truly are and you can be vulnerable about what you know and what you don't know, right? Because while knowledge may impress people, humility connects them. So being humbled and seeing you don't know, or hey, I could use help. Can anyone help me find the answer or identify um uh the the answer to this person's problem or something like that, right? So that's the expert. Let's dig into the perfectionists. So this takes us to the final mask, right? The perfectionists. This is a mindset, or this is a mindset under a mask, right? I know so many leaders that I work with that struggle with perfectionism. I was one of them. And I think that that's still a struggle for me as well, right? Having to have things perfect, flawless, right, right? And these leaders believe they have to be flawless, flawless. Things have to be flawless. And here, this is where we mask our fears with performance, but at the expense of our peace, right? So I recall a time or a season in my leadership when excellence quietly turned into exhaustion, right? So see that through the line. These masks lead to exhaustion when we wear them. And I didn't notice at first. Um, I told myself I was just being diligent, responsible, giving my best because that's what I thought great leaders do. But somewhere in between the after-hour emails, the rewritten reports, and the restless nights, I stopped being excellent and uh started trying to be flawless. I remember a moment late, it's like a Thursday evening, when a team that I led finally wrapped up in the semester, like a data meeting, and everyone had gone home, but I was still in my office staring at a report that was 99% complete. And it was really good. I mean, everything in that report was perfect, but the remaining 1% haunted me, and that's why I can't couldn't leave the office because I needed to figure out how I could get that report to 100%. So I stayed fixing margins, adjusting words, retracking numbers that already matched. I might add, each keystroke said this had to be perfect. And when I finally shut my computer down hours later, the building was quiet. Um, no applause, there was no validation, just silence, and I was just extremely fatigued. So as I was driving home, I felt this tug in my spirit. And I'm telling you, it shook me. I heard, Al Kimu, who told you your worth was in your flawlessness? Even recalling it now as I think about it, and as I say that, it takes me back to that moment. Um, that question unraveled me as I drove home. I was I realized that I was chasing excellence, that I wasn't chasing excellence anymore. I really was not. I was running from fear, the fear of making mistakes, the fear of judgment, the fear of failure, the fear of someone thinking that I wasn't capable. I had been masking that fear with performance for a very long time. And it came at the expense of my peace. It came at the expense of not really making genuine connections with people. And that night I made a quiet decision to start choosing peace over perfection. So the following week, when the project was due, I stopped one draft earlier than usual. It wasn't perfect, and I felt it. I just knew it because everything in me was cringing. But for the first time in a long time, I turned in that report without anxiety in my chest. And you know what happened? I mean, I'm still shocked to this day. No one questioned it. Not one critical comment. No one criticized it. In fact, um, those that I worked with and the people that I submitted the report to said the clarity and the authenticity of my message came through more than ever. Think about that. All the time, not the same I was wasting time, but all the time that I was putting in making sure that everything that I did prior to me having this epiphany, um, making sure that these things were perfect, when I stopped and said, you know what, I'm not gonna really look at this with a critical lens. I'm going to make sure that all the information is right, but I'm just gonna submit it. And let me add that listen, don't just submit anything, submit your best work, but don't be so critical that you can't um that that your peace is disrupted. So I realized, you know, or that's when I understand perfection hides us and peace reveals us. So I was hiding behind perfection. And that's where I thought my value laid, or that's where my value was when I showed up as a perfectionist. Like things had to be flawless. As leaders, we tell ourselves our best offering is flawless work. But what our teams really need, what we really need, honestly, is presence that holds grounds and gives us peace. Now, when I feel that old perfectionist voice whispering to me, make it flawless, Alchema, I respond softly, no, make it faithful, right? Because leadership isn't about having every detail right, it's about having your heart right. Leadership is a heart posture, and that's where real excellence, the kind that honors God and brings peace, truly lives. So when I think about my experience wearing each mask, they started out as strengths, yet each became a barrier. So I want to encourage you to take a moment to ask yourself, which mask do I wear most often when I lead? The fixer, the expert, or the perfectionist? And where did it come from? How has it served me? And what would it look like to leave without it just for a day? Think about that. I want you to really reflect on that. And remember, authentic leadership doesn't mean revealing everything, it means leading with honesty and heart. So as I close, when you take off the mask, you don't lose your strength. Remember that. You're discovering who you are and the real strength that you carry, as well as you make it safe for others to do the same. So if this episode spoke to you, share with another leader who might need a reminder. As I stated in the previous episode, I've created a leadership identity reflection journal to help you assess your current leadership and provide you clarity as you journey forward in your leadership. You can download your free copy by visiting my website ALewisConsult and clicking on the resource tab. Lastly, follow, subscribe, and stay connected as we continue this journey of unmasking our leadership identity and move toward authentic leadership. I hope you enjoyed this episode. Peace.