Leadership your way. How to be an authentic leader in the modern world?

“None of us wanted to be the boss. We imagined that a boss was someone like the character in the movie The Devil Wears Prada,” says Agnieszka Czmyr-Kaczanowska, CEO of Talenti, about the beginnings of her adventure with leadership. Sound familiar? During the webinar “Leadership – yes, but my way,” she and Martyna Orlik, a coach specializing in leadership development, showed that leadership can look completely different from the stereotypes we see in movies.

When reading books about leadership becomes a curse

Have you ever read an inspiring book about management and tried to put all the advice into practice the next day? Martyna Orlik admits honestly:

“Whenever I read a book on leadership, I behaved as if I wanted to simply absorb all that knowledge, go to work the next day, and it was breakneck and terrible and awful for everyone.”

This shows how important it is to find your own leadership style instead of imitating ready-made models.

What challenges do new female leaders face?

The webinar was not just a conversation between the two hosts. During the webinar, the participants also talked about their struggles in this position. “Most often, I want to do it myself” was, appropriately, the most common answer. This was followed by difficulties in setting boundaries and expressing dissent, problems with finding one’s own leadership style, and maintaining a work-life balance. Many respondents also struggle with the pressure of omniscience—the belief that a leader must know everything—and with losing themselves in their leadership role.