006: The 5 Leadership Traits Women Already Lead With (But Rarely Claim)

In today’s episode, Mandi Casey breaks down five leadership traits women naturally excel in — empathy, adaptability, communication, self-awareness, and vision — and reveals how these strengths become liabilities when they’re underused, misdirected, or softened to keep the peace.

This conversation isn’t about becoming a leader. It’s about recognizing where you already are one, and where you’ve been avoiding the fullness of that identity.

You’ll learn:
 • Why empathy is a strategic advantage only when it includes you
 • The difference between intentional adaptability and self-abandonment
 • How communication becomes clearer — and kinder — when it’s direct
 • What self-awareness really means (and why it’s the meta-skill of modern leadership)
 • Why vision isn’t about goals, but identity and direction
 • And why resilience didn’t make the list — on purpose

If you’re ready to stop waiting for someone to hand you a title and start leading with the traits you already have, this episode is your permission slip.

Reflection Questions
Use these questions to deepen today’s lesson and step more fully into your leadership this week:

• If you truly believed you were already a leader, what conversation would you finally stop postponing?
• What boundary would you stop negotiating or softening?
• What decision would you make without waiting for permission, approval, or validation?
• And if you want to stretch further: What identity would you step into if you stopped pretending you weren’t ready?

Apply for Elevate Mastermind
If you’re ready to stop leading reactively and start leading intentionally, Elevate is where that shift begins. Apply at: https://themindherco.com/mastermind

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Transcript

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You are listening to The Mind Her podcast where mindset, leadership and personal growth come together to help you create a life and business you truly love. I'm your host, Mandy Casey, and today we're talking about five leadership traits Women already excel in often without realizing how much power they're leaving on the table by not owning them. I'm here today to hold up a mirror and show you where you're already leading and how you're avoiding stepping into the fullness of that identity. So let's ground this conversation and something really simple. A leader is someone who directs another's way. By that definition, most women listening are already leading. You're guiding families, clients, teams, communities, committees, organizations, and households every single day. The issue has never been that women aren't leaders. The issue is that women lead unconsciously, intuitively, quietly, naturally, and often don't claim the identity simply because no one handed them the title. Over the last decade research from TalentSmart, Gallup, McKinsey, Forbes, and Harvard Business Review all point to the same truth. Okay, women outperform in the leadership traits, organizations are literally starving for traits like empathy, adaptability, communication, self-awareness, and vision. You don't need to become this. You need to recognize where you're already doing it and where you're still dimming the lights. And just to underline this, I asked a Facebook group of more than 8,000 women,, which of these traits they believed was the most important in leadership? there wasn't one clear winner. Communication and self-awareness rose to the top, but the overwhelming response was that these traits work together. They feed each other, and that's what we're really discussing today, is how the traits you already carry can become intentional tools instead of unconscious habits. We'll explore these traits one at a time, not as inspirational ideas, but as lived realities and also as places where women unintentionally. Undermine themselves. So let's start with empathy. The trait, I believe women downplay the most emotional intelligence, which includes empathy accounts for 58% of workplace performance, more than technical skill, more than experience, and more than strategy. Empathy is the reason you can read a room in five seconds. It's why you know when your child, your partner, or your client is off before they ever even put words to it. It's why people feel safe bringing you their half-formed thoughts or their messiest feelings. And yet, empathy is the trait. Women often apologize for hide or suppress because they've been taught that emotional understanding is weakness rather than wisdom. But empathy only becomes weak if it becomes self abandonment. Women misuse empathy when they anticipate everyone else's needs before their own. When they soften truths that need to be said when they absorb emotional labor that no one asks them to take on, but simply because they can. High empathy leaders can accidentally create dependency when they jump into Fix, soothe, or even Overexplain. Instead of letting someone sit in a hard moment and rise to meet it, we rush to the rescue. That feels really kind in the moment, but it can quietly teach people to lean on us rather than building their own strength. Real empathy isn't rescuing, it's seeing accurately. I once had a client come into a session spiraling toward a panic attack. She told me she wanted to cancel, and frankly, many people would've let her. But a real leader doesn't abandon someone in their moment of humanity, and they're also really careful not to sink into the chaos with them. Instead, they hold space, not solutions. That's exactly what I did. I said to her, let's find a space where you feel safe. Let's see her together and just breathe. Empathy stabilizes. It doesn't suffocate. So I want you to ask yourself, where are you using empathy to avoid telling the truth? Where are you absorbing what isn't yours to carry? And let's add one more layer to this. Where are you seeing everyone else clearly, but not giving yourself that same understanding and compassion. Empathy is a leadership advantage, but only when it includes you in the equation. And this naturally brings us to the next trait, which is adaptability. Because listen, women are master adapters. We do it constantly. We pivot schedules, rewrite expectations, manage crises, absorb, change, and anticipate impact on others before people are even aware that something has shifted. It's a survival skill, but survival and leadership are not the same thing. Adaptability becomes a liability the moment it turns into shape. Shifting when you're bending to everyone else's needs, adjusting your standards downward, and losing sight of your own direction in the process, you've probably lived this. You rework your workday around your kids' schedules. You fill the gaps in at work. When someone drops the ball, you change your expectations to keep peace at home, you become the default fixer, not because you want to be, but because you can be. Over time, that default role can pull you away from your own priorities without you even noticing. When the world shut down in 2020, our coworking space, the collective, had two choices, react or respond. Our masterminds, which at that time were only held in person, shifted to zoom overnight. Not because we panicked, but because we were clear on our purpose. Women needed community more than ever, and when the world reopened, we didn't revert, we didn't go back to the way it was. We adapted forward by keeping Masterminds accessible to women in all stages of business members, were juggling kids at home health concerns, shifting work demands, and a lot of uncertainty. Adaptability meant asking What do women actually need right now? And being willing to redesign the way that we deliver that support system. That's an intentional adaptability. Strategic leaders use adaptability to respond to reality without abandoning their vision. Nonstrategic leaders adopt so much to others that they erode their own boundaries and goals. So I want you to ask yourself this. Are you adapting from clarity or from exhaustion? Are you responding to what's needed or accommodating to avoid discomfort? Ooh, that one can sting. Are you changing course because your vision evolved or because you don't wanna disappoint someone else? Or, adaptability is an asset only when it's anchored in identity. And this leads us to trait number three, communication. Because every one of these traits intersects with how we speak and what we avoid saying. Gallup shows that women excel in communication. But here's the truth, most women are great at communicating around the truth, not directly through it. We pad soften, justify and disclaim. We give context instead of clarity. We can talk for 10 minutes without. Actually naming the one thing we really want or need. That's not because we're incapable of directness. I believe it's because we've been socially conditioned to equate honesty with being too much, too direct or too emotional. But listen, I've had to practice uncomfortable communication more times than I care to admit. During my years of coaching, I've let two clients go and clear kind communication was necessary for that to happen. One, the client had become reliant on me to make every single decision, and that wasn't coaching. It became dependency, and so I told her that directly. I said, this coaching relationship is no longer serving you. You're outsourcing your power. Another was a coworking member, whose behavior didn't align with our values of the collective, trust me, financially, it would've been easier to keep her on. But leadership wise, it was unacceptable. Direct communication is not cruel. It's clarity. And I tell clients all the time that clear is kind, clarity saves you time. It keeps your team from spinning and confusion. It keeps your family from trying to read between the lines of what you really meant. Clear expectations. Clear asks and clear boundaries accelerate the work and reduce resentment. So I want you to ask yourself, where are you softening your language to avoid being seen as difficult? Where are you protecting harmony instead of protecting your vision? Where are you editing yourself so heavily that no one actually knows what you think? If you want to lead, you must be willing to speak in full sentences, not tiptoe around the truth or hint at what you're trying to say. This brings us to trait number four, and that's self-awareness. Harvard Business Review calls us the metas skill of the 21st century, and they're right because it amplifies everything else. Self-awareness is the ability to notice what's happening internally, get curious instead of reactive, and then change course intentionally. It's the difference between, I always do this, what's wrong with me? And I notice I'm doing this again. What is it trying to show me? When I lived with my parents after traveling, I found myself holding my breath. Every single time I pulled into the driveway, I was hoping their car wasn't there. It really wasn't about them. It was more about me avoiding admitting that I wanted independence. Again, one moment of awareness changed my entire living situation. Another time a corporate client kept expanding my responsibilities outside the scope of our agreement. And if you're nodding your head right now, know that you're not alone in that. I kept saying yes because it was easy money, let's be honest, but every single yes, chipped away at my identity. I honestly felt like a cheap version of myself, like I was selling out. Every time an email from that client came in, my stomach dropped, and that sensation was awareness. Trying to get my attention, awareness gave me permission to make a different choice and reclaim my vision for my business. Ask yourself, where are you ignoring the signals your body has been sending from months? Where are you mad at someone else when the truth is you're disappointed in yourself for staying silent. Self-awareness is not about who you've been. It's about who you refuse to keep being, and that sets the stage for the last trait vision. It's a leadership trait that I believe women hold most naturally, but are so hesitant to claim. Listen, vision is about more than goals. I believe it's about identity. Goals. Answer the question, what do I want to do? But vision answers the question, who am I becoming in the process? And then aligning your life accordingly. When I merged my brands into the Mind, her company, it wasn't a rebrand for the sake of a new name or a pretty logo. It was a realignment. Finally naming the identity. I had actually been living for years. You see, I'd been running three different brands hoping that clarity would magically appear, but clarity doesn't show up. Through the waiting it emerges through decision. Once I claimed my new identity, the mind, her company, everything started falling into place. Vision is not just seeing your future. I believe that vision is intentionally choosing who you're going to be in that future. McKinsey's research shows that women excel in purpose-driven leadership. In other words, when women are clear on why something matters, they lead with conviction and courage. The challenge is not that women don't have vision, it's that many are still living according to an old identity that no longer fits them. Vision is what transforms a worker bee into a CEO. It's what takes you from, I'm just trying to keep up to, I'm building something on purpose. So ask yourself, if your future self took over your life today, what would she stop tolerating? What would she stop negotiating? What would she finally admit that she wants? Women often have incredible vision. They just don't give themselves permission to follow it. So I want you to consider this your permission slip. Before we close, I wanna touch on one more trait that did not make the list, and that's resilience. Deloitte lists resilience as a top leadership trait, but I fundamentally disagree, at least with the way resilience is applied to women. I believe resilience has become a compliment that women receive when systems fail them. They're navigating a disproportionate amount of mental load caregiving, emotional labor, and workplace expectations often without adequate support. Women aren't resilient because conditions support them. Women are resilient because conditions collapse around them and they survive anyway. I don't wanna praise a woman for enduring what should never have been required of her in the first place. Personally, I wanna praise women for building lives and businesses that don't demand resilience as the default operating mode. Resilience is reactive. It's what you tap into when things start to fall apart, whereas leadership is intentional, is what you use to build something that doesn't require constant emergency mode. Instead of celebrating how much women can carry, I want us to celebrate when women put things down, when they ask for help and design structures that support their wellbeing. So no, resilience is not on my list as a top leadership trait. Not because we don't have it, but because we shouldn't have to keep proving it. You know what I mean? So what does this conversation actually mean for you? I. You're not waiting to become a leader. You are learning to stop avoiding the places where you're already leading. The real work isn't an asking, do I have these traits? Because you do. The real work is in noticing where you've been underusing them or misdirecting them. When empathy turns to over-functioning, when adaptability becomes self-abandonment, when communication softens into avoidance. When self-awareness points to a truth that you don't wanna face when vision asks you to grow, but you hesitate. These aren't questions you have to solve today, but they're patterns that I want you to become conscious of. So here's your actual challenge for the week. Just three questions. If you truly believed you were already a leader. First, what conversation would you finally stop postponing? Second, what boundary would you stop negotiating? And third, what decision would you make without asking for permission or validation? And if you wanna stretch it even a little bit further, what identity would you step into if you stopped pretending you weren't ready yet? That's where the shift happens, not in acquiring traits, but in owning the ones that you have. Stop asking whether you're ready and start acting like the female leader that you already are until next week. Sending you so much love and gratitude. Thanks for listening. Today's episode is brought to you by the Mind Company's Elevate Mastermind. It's a year long coaching experience for women ready to stop micromanaging their businesses and start leading them. Insight, elevate vision and identity. Are the work, not productivity or hacks or hustling harder, who you are, how you think, how you lead, and what you believe is possible becomes the foundation of everything you build. The five leadership traits discussed in today's episode, empathy, adaptability. Communication, self-awareness and vision. They don't just show up and elevate. They become your strategy. The next cohort begins January 26th, and applications are officially open. If you're ready to stop building your business based on where you've been and start building it based on the leader in CEO, you're becoming, elevate is where that happens. Visit the mind her co.com/mastermind to apply or visit the link in our show notes.