What’s Holding You Back from Being a Great Leader?
Timestamps are as accurate as they can be but may be slightly off. We encourage you to listen to the full context.
Podcast Summary
Executive coach Muriel Wilkins reveals how high-achieving leaders unknowingly sabotage their own success through "hidden blockers" - unconscious beliefs that once served them well but now limit their potential. (03:38) Based on her analysis of over 300 executives across 20 years, Wilkins identifies seven common blockers including "I need to be involved," "I need it done now," and "I can't make a mistake." (08:04) The key insight is that these aren't personality flaws but learned beliefs that can be changed through a three-step process: uncovering the dissonance, unpacking the belief's origins, and reframing it for better outcomes. (19:30) Wilkins emphasizes that successful leaders must learn to coach themselves and adapt their mindset to meet the complex challenges of modern leadership.
- Main Theme: Leaders often hit invisible ceilings not due to external factors, but because of limiting beliefs that worked in the past but now hinder their effectiveness at scale.
Speakers
Muriel Wilkins
Muriel Wilkins is a seasoned executive coach with over 20 years of experience counseling high-powered executives and senior leaders. She is the host of the popular "Coaching Real Leaders" podcast and a frequent contributor to Harvard Business Review. Wilkins has analyzed patterns across more than 300 leaders to identify common limiting beliefs that hold professionals back from reaching their full potential, work that forms the foundation of her latest book "Leadership Unblocked" and her HBR article "The Hidden Beliefs That Hold Leaders Back."
Key Takeaways
Success Can Create Future Blindness
Many high-achieving professionals develop "hidden blockers" - beliefs that helped them succeed in the past but now limit their potential. (03:38) These beliefs become so habitual that leaders aren't even aware they're operating, creating a dangerous blindness to what's holding them back. Wilkins discovered that these beliefs become more problematic as leaders advance and need to manage at scale. The irony is that the very mindset that got you promoted might be what prevents your next breakthrough. Leaders must regularly audit their core beliefs to ensure they're still serving their current role and responsibilities.
Beliefs Drive Behavior More Than External Circumstances
Wilkins found that sustainable behavior change requires addressing the underlying beliefs, not just the actions themselves. (05:24) When leaders focus only on changing behaviors without examining the driving beliefs, changes are typically short-lived. For example, telling a micromanager to "delegate more" won't work if they still believe "I need to be involved in everything." The coach emphasizes that beliefs are learned narratives we tell ourselves, and like any learned behavior, they can be unlearned and replaced with more effective alternatives that better serve our current context.
The Seven Most Common Executive Blockers
Through analysis of over 300 executives, Wilkins identified seven recurring limiting beliefs: "I need to be involved," "I need it done now," "I know I'm right," "I can't make a mistake," "If I can do it, so can you," "I can't say no," and "I don't belong here." (08:04) These blockers become more consequential as leaders advance in their careers and need to operate at greater scale. What's particularly insidious is that these beliefs often have evidence supporting them - the perfectionist leader may indeed catch more mistakes, but at the cost of team paralysis and missed opportunities for innovation.
Reframing Requires Meeting People Where They Are
One of the most damaging blockers is "If I can do it, so can you," which assumes everyone brings identical capabilities and approaches to the table. (10:24) Effective leadership requires meeting people where they are, not where you think they should be. This blocker prevents leaders from developing their teams properly because it skips the crucial step of understanding individual strengths, learning styles, and developmental needs. Leaders who overcome this blocker learn to guide people to the right answer rather than simply providing it, building organizational capacity instead of creating learned helplessness.
Self-Coaching Is the Ultimate Leadership Skill
Wilkins measures coaching success by whether leaders can eventually coach themselves through these limiting beliefs. (26:02) The process involves recognizing dissonance, identifying the underlying belief, and consciously choosing a more effective reframe in real-time. Leaders who master this skill become more nimble and can course-correct faster when old patterns emerge. This self-awareness also enables them to better coach their teams, creating a multiplier effect throughout the organization where everyone becomes more conscious of the beliefs driving their actions.
Statistics & Facts
- Wilkins analyzed over 300 leaders across 20 years of executive coaching to identify the seven most common limiting beliefs. (07:02) This research revealed consistent patterns across leaders of different genders, demographics, and industry sectors, all of whom held managerial positions or higher.
- The seven identified blockers become more consequential as leaders advance through the leadership pipeline, with their impact amplifying when trying to lead at organizational scale. (07:45)
- Leaders who hold the "I know I'm right" belief often have evidence supporting their position - they frequently are correct and possess an ability to "see around corners." (22:05) However, this accuracy becomes counterproductive when it alienates stakeholders and prevents team development.
