Authenticity at work means being your authentic self or showing your true colors. In other words, by showing others who you are, you can ensure authenticity at your workplace. This means that you don’t have to act in a specific way to demonstrate yourself as someone you’re not in reality. Sounds easy, right? Well, believe me, it’s not. If you’re a hardworking person and try to be genuine at your workplace, then it can have some long-term benefits for you. Such factors can play a significant role in terms of career advancements. Do you want to find out how? We bet you do!
“Your time is narrow, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be confined by dogma, which is living with the opinions of other people’s thoughts. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions tone down your own soul voice. And most essential, have the spirit to track your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you honestly want to become. Everything else is optional.” -Steve Jobs.
Importance of Workplace Authenticity
Workplace Authenticity carries its own significance and value in a world where home and work life are so related to each other. So, taking into consideration our current lifestyles, it isn’t that easy to separate our work lives from our personal ones. We all know that authenticity motivates people to be loyal and more engaging. If you’re being your true and whole self at work, then you may be able to boost the level of your dignity and inspire your other colleagues to follow your lead as well.
How to ensure Workplace Authenticity?
While it isn’t the kind of task that someone can accomplish individually, you can still give it your best. It would be best if you recall that every effort counts and even a single person could influence others and make a difference.
You might be thinking, how can someone ensure authenticity at the workplace? Well, don’t worry because we’ll answer it all for you today. Let’s take a brief look at some crucial points that can play a significant role in ensuring originality in the workplace.
· Keep a Positive Image
You should try your best to regulate a positive and constructive image in front of your employees. Be specific about what you share with others and keep private matters to yourself; this will help you to introduce practicality in your life. It would help if you chose the delightful words before speaking, as the selection of dishes plays a significant role in portraying your true personality. The wrong choice of words can display a negative image towards others. It will also help if you try to work on your communication skills and be polite and gentle to others.
· Ensure Good Leadership
Undoubtedly, great leaders never hold themselves back and make the right decisions at the right time. So, you should never hesitate to take up new challenges because even if you end up making some wrong decisions, you’ll get to learn something new. But at the same time, it would help if you focus on your decision-making abilities, as some poor decisions can have long-term drawbacks. So, if you want to stay authentic, you can also ask for feedback from your employees every year and try to address their issues; this will make you look even more graceful and genuine.
Recently a friend challenged me to write a book on leadership or something… And I replied that I would write when I consider myself a good one. Leadership is a constant learning curve. With one of my colleagues Anar who is CEO of ATL Tech with whom I communicate almost daily, we practiced an interesting thing. To understand each other better every year we gave each other feedback about each other's performance & we provided comments on our expectations of each other. Years later when we finish a client meeting with him, I ask “You know what to do right?” and he is like “Yes I got the ball”.
· Establish Psychological Safety
Having a sense of psychological safety can play a significant role in certifying workplace originality. It is to be noted that people feel more comfortable speaking and interacting or making mistakes once they know that their psychological safety is ensured. Such initiatives can also make some people take potential risks without much hesitation, as long as they’re for the company’s welfare. A man once said, “True leaders don’t create followers; they create even more leaders.”
In Azerbaijan there is a very stupid understanding “Do not bother the boss with empty-empty stuff” (apologies I could not translate it any better). I hate that locally created-philosophy. I actually like it when my colleagues approach me just to think out loud or bounce ideas off me. Recently one of the executives at ATL approached me with an issue. He said “I think that there is a negative pattern in my management skill, maybe I am doing something wrong” & while talking he started stating the most obvious answer to his issue. By the end of his speech I stated “Well you already know the answer, you just had to say it out loud”.I was glad that the person felt safe enough to come and find his way through an issue even if the solution came from himself. As I said many times before my job is to make my colleagues’ jobs easier. Subsequently, I do not feel bothered by any issue that comes my way, to me its an opportunity to reduce friction.
· Recognize Everyone’s Value
Undoubtedly, authenticity at any workplace is all about being valued and appreciated for what you indeed are. Generally, employees want a sense of appreciation and want their opinions, ideas, and contributions to be loved the way they deserve. So, you should try to embrace the efforts of your employees and ensure a sense of recognition among everyone. On the other hand, you should also make sure that your employees recognize and appreciate your efforts and respect you the way you deserve. Just listening wisely & providing feedback is a habit you need to form. Simple…
Benefits of Workplace Authenticity
A good company and team value its workplace originality. Some of the benefits which are associated with it are:
· Happy and Satisfied Employees
People who feel that they can be their authentic selves at their workplaces are generally happier. When such employees are kept contented and satisfied at work, not only effective engagement and team productivity are ensured, but overall motivation also goes up significantly.
I like that our team members can safely be themselves at work without feeling pressure, although I would want to encourage them to be even more free. I like that our team members can pull up a guitar and sing for the whole crew, I like that our team members have very close friends at work & even more I love that many of our team members have started a family together. What a joy to be part of something like that!
Do I consider that our employees are happiest? No, I don’t. However, I try to make a difference whenever an opportunity presents itself, if not I create the opportunity myself (wink-wink)
· Good Workplace Environment
When people feel observed and respected for being their true selves, they form stronger bonds with one another. This ensures better collaboration skills and high-performing groups and helps maintain a good and friendly work environment for everyone.
· More Productivity and Innovation
Wherever workplace authenticity is assured, employees aren’t afraid to share ideas or make mistakes. They’re more likely to take befitting risks and be creative for the company, which leads to positive outcomes and great productivity and innovation.
· Confidence Boost
People feel much more confident in their opinions and work if they’re being genuine at work. Being able to open up about your inner values and thoughts allows them to work more effectively and confidently, which ultimately leads to the company’s advantage.
· Effective Feedback
Workplace originality has proven to ensure honesty and genuineness among employees, leading to valuable and effective feedback and responses. This helps people to make some productive growth and do their best for the company.
· Success
It is evident, and as there is no secret, that following your passion will lead you toward success, and you will fail if you do work that you don’t enjoy. Most people explain passion as a driving factor toward getting more successful during your day and life. If you work on being your authentic self, this will allow you to do what you enjoy. This type of environment motivates everyone, and I believe it will also encourage you to do hard work and feel eager to achieve more.
I would like to add my all-time favorite quote which is tattooed on my shoulder as a symbol. “There is no end state to success, change is the only constant”. Was there a reason for me to share this quote? Not quite, just felt like it.
· Relationships
When you are your exact self, you display a sincere sense of honesty and trustworthiness when you present yourself to others. These qualities will help you build strong relationships with your clients and colleagues because these traits will build blind trust between you both.
Why does it have a compound interest?
Compound interest is the extra money that you earn on an amount you have in savings. If you have it in an investment account that is reinvested, you can make more interest. As a wise man once said, “All the returns in life, whether in wealth, relationships, or knowledge, come from compound interest. “Naval Ravikant. I cannot express well enough, how much I appreciate Naval, he is one of my mentors whom I have never met! Compound interest will help you to accelerate the growth of your money and investment over time. Our Legend has it that Albert Einstein once professed compound interest as the eighth wonder of the world. It will also grow your wealth with time because if you keep on saving, your principal will also increase, and you will get more interest in it.
And everything I stated earlier in the article, does not have a one-off reward, its reward will be compounding with time. At one point in the future, you will be like, “How the hell was I living before?”.
Positioning your career with your authentic self
It’s not easy to do work with authenticity or to be yourself at work. Most people are not authentic at work, and the question is why they are not genuine or why they are not themselves at work. This is because many people are doing some work only because of their family pressure or some other issues they can’t follow their dreams. The journey of authenticity starts with some next level of emotional intelligence and self-awareness. Some authentic people say that it’s not important how much you are getting paid for doing any work the main important thing is that are you happy. You should always be yourself while doing work so you can enjoy it, not do any work in which you are not satisfied that will not be good for your mental health as well as you cannot succeed while doing it.
Conclusion
If people watch you as authentic, they will believe you, value you, and look to you for support and guidance. Authenticity is about how you manage yourself, how you treat others, and the way you work and fit into your communal principles. It’s not about being nice-nice or two-faced bitch; it’s about being authentic. As you know, every person of old age will advise you not to lie, do bad things, and be real so that people will treat you nicely. All these pieces of advice are directly proportional to being authentic or being your real self and showing people that they can trust you. This will lead you toward success and make relations with others as they will start counting on you. This will also increase your community, and you will meet new people and can do your own work. Authenticity in the workplace is so important, as we have mentioned so many things about it. It would be best to go through it and understand what the word authenticity means because it’s an essential term for the future. I will end this article with some lines ;
“Authenticity is a group of choices that we have to make every day. It’s about the choice to look up and be real. The choice, to be honest. The choice to let our true selves be seen.”~ Brene Brown