341. Why Great Work Alone Isn’t Enough: Closing the Leadership Perception Gap with Uma Subramanian

One of the biggest things standing between you and the leader you could become is not a skill gap, it’s a story gap. The story you repeat about yourself shapes what you attempt, how you show up, and what you decide is “just not you.” And at work, a second story is always running in parallel: the story other people believe about your value, your ceiling, and what they can trust you with.

I’m joined by leadership coach and author Uma Subramanian, founder of The Limitless Leader and author of *The Sought After Leader*. Uma shares her personal path from a 20-year career at Microsoft to launching her coaching business, including the tough lessons that came with her first manager role. We dig into why leading people feels so different from doing the work yourself, how assumptions quietly damage trust, and why the platinum rule matters more than the golden rule if you want your team to thrive.

We also get practical about growth. Uma breaks down her Bridge framework for limiting beliefs, showing how small actions create new evidence and help you rebuild confidence. Then we tackle the “perception gap” that keeps high performers overlooked and introduces her SOAR framework for closing it with integrity: strategic impact, communication and influence, authentic authority, and real relationships. If you’ve ever worried that sharing your wins feels like bragging, we reframe communicating value as service, so the right people can actually find and leverage your strengths.

If this resonates, subscribe on your favorite podcast app, share the episode with someone who needs it, and leave a quick review so more leaders can find the show.

🌐 Connect with Uma:
• Website: https://thelimitlessleaders.com/soughtafterleader
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/uma-subramanian-limitless/

📚 You can purchase Uma's book on Amazon:
• The Sought-After Leader: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0H7L9SSDZ/

Transcript

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Mick Spiers: 0:01

What if the biggest thing standing between you and the leader you could become isn't a lack of capability, but the story you have come to believe about yourself? Today, we're joined by , a leadership coach who helps ambitious professionals step beyond the limiting beliefs, behaviors, and perceptions that can quietly constrain their growth, and Uma knows this journey personally. Like many technically accomplished professionals, she discovered that being very good at the work does not automatically prepare you to lead the people doing the work. The rules change. Leadership asks us to understand people who don't think like us, work like us, or respond to the same things we do. In today's conversation, we explore identity, confidence, and the limiting beliefs that can stop capable people from stepping fully into their potential. Hey, everyone, and welcome back to The Leadership Project. I'm greatly honored today to be joined by . Uma is the founder and CEO of "The Limitless Leader" and the author of the book "The Soughugh-After Leader"and she has a fundamental belief that technical expertise alone is not enough to make a lasting impact. So we're going to be talking about these concepts. About what does it mean to be a sought-after leader? That's an interesting term already. And we're going to say, what does it mean to be a limitless leader? I'd like to explore that term as we go through the conversation. But a lot of it's going to be about the transitions that we need to make if we are going to have a lasting impact as a leader. So, without any further ado, Uma, I would love it if you'd say hello to the audience, give a little flavor of your background, and then what inspired you to create"The Limitless Leader" and to write this book "The Soughed After Leader".

Uma Subramanian: 2:02

Thank you so much, Mick. I will go back to 2001 when I came from New Delhi to Microsoft in Seattle, where I had a 20-year career. Really enjoyed it. I came in with the mindset that if I put in the work, if I take ownership of my career, and you know, took massive action, I will be able to, you know, achieve the results and have a good life. I mean, that was the thing that I carried with me, and that came from picking up "Think and Grow Rich" by Napoleon Hill, the book, when I was as a teenager back in New Delhi, and it worked for 20 years. I had an amazing time at Microsoft, and literally when I celebrated my 20 years at Microsoft. I posted my very first LinkedIn post saying that I'm really excited, and you know, even after 20 years, it feels like day one for me, and I'm you know full of ideas, full of energy, and somehow it led me to get a call from a tech startup, and that led me to leave Microsoft right after my 20 years and join the tech startup. I had a great one year at the tech startup. I went there to head developer community and evangelism. Did that for a year, and I was built a strong team. We launched the global community across the world, and we had developers joining in. But unfortunately, there was some leadership change, and suddenly after a meeting where I was insulted by my leader, I ended up resigning, and I was at this point thinking, "Okay, what do I do next? Do I go back to Microsoft or some company like that, and you know, do what I do? And the thing that came to me at that point was, I had when I became a manager for the first time at Microsoft, I actually struggled with it making that transition from individual contributor to manager. And so I had to really work on myself and learn and relearn a lot of things, unlearn and relearn a lot of things about how I lead and how I do things, and over time. I was able to you know work with coaches and read every leadership and management book I could find, and just work on myself for several years after that to get to a point where I felt really comfortable working with people and leading people, and my teams loved me, and so that kind of gave me the confidence when I was when I was when I was at this point in my life where I was thinking, what do I do next? That I realized we are all you know limitless. That was a pattern that I saw in my life throughout. If I you know when. Reflected back, and I said, "I think you know, no one should stop us from reaching our full leadership potential." And I really decided I will use my voice and time from that point onwards to help others unlock their limitless potential in leadership. And I came up with the name of Limitless Leaders, and literally started Limitless Leaders, and started coaching and mentoring. First, I started with women, but then we had men showing interest, and you know wanted to join the program, so we expanded to all genders, and that's pretty much how I ended up starting Limitless Leaders. And at that time, even my idea was, I wanted to help others become great leaders, effective, confident leaders that can go and you know achieve what they want to achieve in the leadership ladder. But as I started doing that, I had this one client that ended up quitting her job even after doing excellent work and continuously learning and growing herself, that kind of stopped me on the tracks, and I realized, oh my gosh, I felt like, of course, a failure to me. She had come to me as you know and hired me as her coach, but here she was, even after doing amazing work and growth and all that, she had to quit, and so that was something that really impacted me deeply, and but put me on this journey where I was like, there is something missing here. If people, you know, these brilliant people, talented people, doing amazing work, and you know, delivering results, leading high-stakes initiatives, being team players, and still they were not sometimes getting the opportunities and the promotions. And I set out to find what is that missing piece. And what I discovered is that it's not about performance, it's not talent or capability, it's not even effort because all of these people were working really hard. But what I found was the missing piece was in addition to performance, there was sometimes a gap between the contribution, the impact that you're creating, and the reputation or the what people could actually see about you. So there was a gap in the value and the leadership you were creating, and what others could actually see and trust, and I then coined the term perception gap, which is what I call this now. Is there is a perception gap in the value you're creating and the value others can see, and when that happens, and when that is not closed. That's when we end up not getting those opportunities. People don't bring up our name in conversations where big decisions are made, and so then I switched my coaching approach and philosophy and everything the work that I do to how do we close this perception gap? And again, after studying really successful people that were accelerating in their careers that did not seem to have this perception gap, and also reflecting on my journey and you know people around me, I was able to come up with this four pillar framework that actually closes the perception gap, and I started then implementing that, coaching my clients, shifting my approach to help them close the perception gap, and we started seeing amazing results. And that's what led me to then say"Okay, I think this is a book that I have to write so that I can help people realize what the perception gap is and how to close it with integrity." Not playing politics, not you know self-promoting or bragging, but doing it the right way, where they can actually close the perception gap.

Mick Spiers: 8:54

Okay, wonderful. There's three things I'd like to unpack from the first things that I've heard there, and we'll we'll go one at a time. But I'll tell you what all three of them are. So first one is that transition into your first leadership role. I'd like to unpack that a little bit more. I'm going to explore what does this word mean, this limitless leader. What does that mean to you? And then perception gap. That's the three things that I take from that. So let's go back. And by the way, you are far from the first person that's ever struggled with the transition from individual contributor to manager. In fact, I'm going to say it's most people do struggle with this transition. So, but tell us more about your personal experience. What was the biggest challenge for you?

Uma Subramanian: 9:38

Yeah. So when I I made many mistakes. First one being, I came in to this team and I thought I had to just change how everything was happening, and I think I pushed change too aggressively. Immediately stepping in that was the first mistake. The second thing was, I think I also had this notion of I was a super high performer at Microsoft, and I was, and managers told me that was you know like my skip level manager asked me three times if I would take up a manager role, and I kept saying no because I thought I was more technical and not the manager, you know, material, and I kept saying no. And then second time, the timing wasn't right. I was just having my first baby, and then the third time, when he asked, that's when I said yes and took up the role. And I, side note, I became pregnant with my second child immediately after taking the role. So it was just really stressful. Like I went through pregnancy, you know, childbirth, maternity leave, all of that during my first time as a manager, which added to the stress and all of that as well. But what really happened was because I was very well, like respected, and you know very highly rewarded within the organization. Before I was even made a manager, I had this thing that I have to now make everyone like me, like not like me, like like me, you know, like I want them to behave exactly, right? Like I have to make everyone act like me, behave like me, do things like me. That was again something that was deeply embedded, and I, as I reflect back now, I know that was what was kind of one of the drivers for me as well, which I now realize I was just totally so wrong. So I had to learn over many months and maybe a few years that it's not about making people act like me and do things like me, but it's really understanding each person as an individual, their strengths, their weaknesses, and then you know bringing out the best in them. So all those shifts took a lot of time for me. Like I had to work with coaches, read tell the books. It took some time, and I also had some difficult, you know, team members and some peers that I struggled with during this time as well, and I didn't have the. Even though I had support from my manager and my peers and stakeholders, and many of my direct reports just loved my style, I would say 85% like doing right things, like I was a caring, people-oriented person, and I was doing many things right. But I was doing some of these things also that were not, you know, the right things at that time. But what I focused on was on that 15% So I was just really impacted by why is this one person not happy? You know, under my leadership, and I took it and took it to heart, and yeah. So I made it like all you know really big challenges as well. You know, bigger than now with with the understanding, I think, and maturity. I would have behaved and you know acted on many fronts differently. Like definitely, there was you know many mistakes I made, but also I didn't have the maturity or courage to see that you know as a manager, my job is not to make everyone happy or like like me. Not everyone in the team is going to be happy. Like those were not things I knew at that time. I thought if one person in the team is unhappy, that means I'm failing as a manager, and so I just carried all that pressure and burden. It was one of the most difficult and stressful times of my like entire career. But thankfully, I see. I meant I sought out help and started working on myself and saw you know the other side of it as well, which has been a pretty good journey. But I I will say that those were some of my challenges.

Mick Spiers: 13:52

Yeah, really good, Uma. I'll reflect back on some of the things you're saying there. First of all, I'm glad that you reached out for help because a lot of people get stuck in that cycle and they don't pattern interrupt by getting some help. So well done, and everyone listening to that, you know, if you're in these patterns, there's people that can help you break those patterns. The second one is to say it's very, it's very human. It's biological, even because of our fear of social rejection and social isolation. It's actually human to be a people liker. Let's call it what it is. But we also need to understand that it's not necessarily serving us. So I'll share something personal of myself that when I read employee satisfaction surveys, my eyes immediately go to the negative comments, even when there can be 95% positive comments. My eyes go, oh, oh my God! I've upset this person, and it's natural. Okay, so you don't ignore that, but it's it's also natural. There were a few other things that were threaded through there, Uma. One was the acknowledgement that you're a human being that's living in a broader organism of other. Other conditions that are happening around you, so you're going into your first leadership role when there's life changes happening around you, and by the way, you're this one leader, and then you've got peers that are around you, like you're a living organism that's living inside an organism. So to understand that is also really key. The mistakes that you made-I'm going to say this is quite common. Sometimes it appears in two very distinct ways, and you're the second category. Many people go into that first leadership role, and because they've not been shown what it means to be a leader, they start mimicking the behavior of the leader before them, and they're no longer themselves, and they might even mimic behaviors that they didn't even like, but they think that that's the role model of what a leader needs to do. That's one model. You're the second model. They come in like a whirlwind and go right. I need to make a change here, and they go too fast, and they're running at 100 miles an hour, and the team is still walking it, walking at two miles an hour, and you haven't brought the team along for the journey. So that's quite a common mistake as well, Uma. So I'm trying to say that's that's very human as well. And then the final part is really key, and I think you are the exact illustration of this one is the discovery that humans are not machines, that humans are not deterministic, right? So you're in your world, in the software world. If you put the same inputs into a software program, you get the same results back. Turn around to you're now leading a team of seven individuals. Guess what? They're erratic. They don't perform. They don't react to the same stimulus in the same way. Worse still, like so. So what works for one individual has a counterproductive effect for another individual. But worse still is those people are evolving, so that person that you thought you worked out the secret source, oh, okay, know how to get the most out of this person. Three months from now, it doesn't work anymore. So we're also we're also evolving. So tell me more about your discovery around this. Is the one I want to unpack a little bit further. Humans are not deterministic; they're seemingly erratic. You must have been pulling your hair out. Tell us your experiences with that.

Uma Subramanian: 17:26

So that's the one that I think I really learned from my leadership coach John. Like that was one of the things I learned only after like reading lots of books and you know really like wanting to understand what is it that I'm missing, like what you know, what are some of the things that I need to be doing, and I think it was working with my coach John that every time I would come and you know talk about some of the things, he would be like, "Did you ask them, like you know, and how would they like to be communicated?" You know, and and things like that, and it's asking those types of questions.

Mick Spiers: 18:08

Very good.

Uma Subramanian: 18:09

Like that made me think that because I I think the biggest benefit that came out of it is I used to make judgments and assumptions. Like you know what people needed, or how people should, you know, what they would want, how they should be doing things, just asking that, you know, just making that mental reframe of have I really asked how they want to be treated, how they want to be, you know, offered help, offered support, like just making that shift, I think was the biggest thing. And really, what happened over time is I stopped making assumptions and judgments. I mean, that's been the biggest gift from my coach. Actually, yeah, that's one of the biggest gifts from my coach. And what then? What really happened is it was all about asking people and understanding people, right? Because if I'm not making assumptions and judgments, I have to ask, and I have to really you know get the information from them. So that whole like, I was not even a good listener before. I honestly like I was not a good listener. So I think all of those things, you know, just really good listening, talking to people, understanding them, and then I realized, okay, once I understood them, it just automatically made sense how I should, you know, work with them and communicate with them. So it was just, you know, got easier and easier that way. But I would say that was how it happened, at least for me.

Mick Spiers: 19:42

Yeah, very good. So to play some of that back to you, I mean, one of the challenges here is that where a number of us are taught from a young age to treat other people the way you want to be treated-the golden rule.

Uma Subramanian: 19:54

Yes.

Mick Spiers: 19:55

But that doesn't work.

Uma Subramanian: 19:57

That does not work exactly. It

Mick Spiers: 19:59

doesn't work. We need to go to the platinum rule. Treat other people the way they want to be treated, and then people often ask. And you, you've nailed this, Uma. Then people often ask, but how do I know what they needed? You ask them.

Uma Subramanian: 20:13

You ask them. Yeah.

Mick Spiers: 20:14

You ask them, and then give them a good damn listening to right. And one of the ones that you brought up, I love this one. Is you know, how do you like to be rewarded? Because you might be giving someone a reward where it's their worst nightmare, right? So one of the stories I sometimes share, Uma, is about giving someone an award at at a town hall meeting or a company all hands meeting, and for for some people, that's their greatest moment of their life. It's like I was the CEO, and everyone is applauding. And then there's another person that's going,"How do I get out of here? And what what did I do to deserve this?" So the same reward is having the complete opposite effect with two human beings. And if you don't ask them, you don't know. You don't know.

Uma Subramanian: 21:01

Exactly. Exactly, and that was, I think, one of the biggest shifts in how I started leading people. I think that had the most significant impact, and also one of the things now I help my clients with is making that shift. That's one of the biggest shifts we focus on as well.

Mick Spiers: 21:18

Excellent. Okay, so second stanza of what we picked up in the intro. What does it mean to be a limitless leader, Uma?

Uma Subramanian: 21:27

So the word limitless even came to me only pretty recently, like maybe four years ago, when I was when I had just resigned from that job from the the startup role, and I was going on a walk with my dog Mia, and was just my whole life just you know flashed in front of me. I was thinking about what the kinds of things that I have done. I had a little bit of a tough childhood, but we just you know took ownership. We figured out you know things. Things were hard, but we still went ahead and you know figured out our path on our own, and you know ended up. I ended up at Microsoft, and you know we found my husband, children. Like I was just reflecting on everything, and I realized, oh my goodness! Like one of the things that has been a throughline in my journey is I've been limitless because life put me in a lot of limiting situations. But what was unique about me, or the way I responded to those limits, was always thinking big, not accepting those limits, and somehow figuring out a way to come out of it, and that that was just a thought that just really you know a realization that just came to me in that park. And the moment that thought came to me that I'm limitless, the next thought that came to me was wait a sec. If I'm limitless, I mean I'm not you know any special like privileged person or so with with special background or anything like that. In fact, I did not have any of those special things, and I feel limitless. Like I honestly felt limitless at that moment, and I said, if I can feel limitless, that means everyone in the world is limitless as well. And then the thought came to me. But wait, I don't think many people know that many people are still stuck in you know limits, and they get stuck and they don't know how to come out of it. Yeah, and that's really when I said, okay, in that park, like just all of these things happen. Like I don't know how, but just one thing after another, and I realized, okay, I am actually going to help other women, younger women, other women realize their limitless potential. And because this leadership was something I had worked on myself for years, and I had seen a huge difference in how I started leading people to the fact that when I left Microsoft, which was again, people never thought I would leave Microsoft. Like I literally had an amazing 20-year anniversary party, and people thought, "Oh, she's going to be here and you know retire sometime." But I ended up quitting right after that, which was totally unexpected. And my team, you know, even like some male members cried that, and they said they would never have a manager. You know, like me, and I know that's not true. I'm sure they have great managers, but that's what they said at that time. And then the same thing happened at the startup. I had you know 50 people, like five teams, and it was a sudden. I mean, after a meeting, I ended up resigning. So, again, the TP, you know, was a shocking thing for the team, and I had you know people come and tell me the same thing. You're like, Uma, I don't think we're going to have you know a manager like you. So, all of that kind of gave me the confidence, and kind of I think it fell into place in that moment, and I, I did. Okay, I'm going to start Limitless Leaders, and I want every woman to unlock her limitless potential in leadership. I literally came up with the name Limitless Leaders, and I went back. My husband was this was during COVID time, so he was working from home. I told him I'm starting Limitless Leaders, and just you know started working on that. That's really how it happened.

Mick Spiers: 25:23

Really good, Uma. So I'll tell you what I'm taking away from that. One is the word"lasting impact". If you're having an emotional impact on people when you when you leave and change jobs, that that means mission accomplished. You've had a lasting impact on those people, and about how you made them feel. To think about Maya Angelou's famous quote. You know, people may forget what you said, they may forget what you did, but they never forget how you made them feel. You clearly made them feel something and had a lasting impact. I'm so glad that I followed my curiosity on this word, limitless. Now I can see thousand percent where you're coming from. We're all walking around. I shouldn't say all. Many of us, most of us, are walking around with limiting beliefs. And I'll just throw some out there. If if we tell ourselves often enough, the story we tell ourselves about ourselves inside our own brain is super powerful. But we get to decide whether that's a positive story or a negative story, so if we walk around going, I'm just not good at presentations, or I'm just not good at leading people, it might be just you know that parent kind of statement. But if you keep on saying that, your brain believes it, and it becomes you are the one that limited your growth. No one else. You, in your own brain, at that point, you put that limiting belief there, and you believed it. And if you believe it to be true, it becomes true. So Henry Ford's

famous quote: 26:53

"Whether you think you can or you think you can't, you're probably right. And so now, now I'm getting it. Now let me ask you this, because there's going to be people listening to this and go, "Yeah, I do that all the time." If someone is in that pattern, Uma, and they do have a long laundry list of limiting beliefs, how do they start breaking the pattern?

Uma Subramanian: 27:19

I have a framework for it, I call it the Bridge Framework, and so it's about really, you know, pausing. Like when we get those limiting beliefs, limiting thoughts, I ask that we pause and we really look at, you know, is this thought or belief serving me? And if it is not serving you, right, then you want to figure out a way to find a more slightly more empowering thought, and replace it. And then you find little. I mean, and then you take a little bit of action that you know aligns with that action. And then when you take you know those little baby steps. You want to keep looking for evidence, new evidence that this new reality is what you know is working. And then as you do that, it kind of solidifies, and eventually the old belief goes away, and the new belief comes in. I can give you a more. I know this was really abstract, so I can give an example. So one of the examples I can think of is, let's just even take the presentation example. Like you know, I'm not a good presenter, right? Let's say that's my belief. If I keep thinking that I'm not a good presenter, what am I going to do? I'm going to overthink, over unnecessarily, you know, become more nervous. I'm going to show up, you know, worried, scared, anxious, and I'm not, and most likely, maybe, won't end up doing a good job of presenting. So we clearly know that it's not going to serve me if I keep thinking that it is not serving me, so that's the first step of you know just really becoming aware of is the belief or is the thought that I'm having repeatedly is it serving me? So once we understand that okay this is not serving me, then we want to think about okay what would be something that I can think of this. That would, you know, is this believable? You know, I, you know, I can accept it because if it's totally, you know, suddenly if I start thinking that I'm a great presenter, obviously, you know, our belief, our brain is not going to believe that, and we're not going to be able to do anything. But what is something that's believable, that makes sense for this situation, that I can hold on to, that will get me, you know, moving forward in the direction that I want to. So I can think of like the thought that you know I can maybe start believing is if I put in the work. I can, you know, become a better presenter. Or if I keep presenting and taking, you know, maybe even trying one idea, you know, one improvement every presentation. Or if I get 1% better every presentation, then I can, you know, keep getting better and better. Right? Even that thought. If I just even switched from I'm not a good presenter to I can get better little by little if I just try one idea. That itself is kind of putting me in that positive place where I can now take action and I can try things and I can you know keep moving forward in the direction that I want. So and then when you go do that, when you go make that presentation, and let's say you just decided to focus on one thing, hey, maybe I will just, you know, work on the opening. For example, you know, I'll just work on really making sure that I hook people right in the beginning, right? You just work on that. You go do that, and let's say you got someone, you know, giving you a compliment, saying, "Hey, I loved the story that you kicked off with, or something like that." So you you watch out for these little evidences, and not necessarily externally, can even be internally. Like, how did you feel? Did you feel great? You know, just delivering that, right? So not just relying on external evidences, but internal as well. And once you collect those evidences and you pay attention to them, it kind of solidifies, and then your new belief and your new thought pattern becomes okay. If I keep working on myself, if I keep improving my presentation skill, I will keep improving, and that is kind of you know something that I have lived and experienced in my own journey. I used to think I'm not a good communicator; like that was one of the you know early beliefs I had, and now you know I've just over time switched or reframed that to you know communication is something that I will be working on. You know, probably till the last day of my life because it is a skill that's just you have to continue to work on.

Mick Spiers: 32:10

We're all a work in progress. Yeah. Okay. Very good.

Uma Subramanian: 32:13

Exactly. Exactly. But I know that you know if I just keep working on it, I will be improving slightly every single day.

Mick Spiers: 32:24

It's a powerful framework, Uma, and it's in the book, the bridge framework. So, and so for those that pick up Uma's book, "The Soughugh-After Leader" you'll you'll see the full framework there. But I'll play you back a few chapters of what I'm taking out here, Uma, and this is something that if you're listening at home, you can start doing this today. You can take the baby steps of doing this. So the first element was to challenge whether this belief or thought is serving you or not serving you. That's a that's a very powerful question. If I put it in my own words, what you're then doing next is reframing it to a statement that might serve you better, right? So the reframing. So, and I'll give a really simple one. It could be shifting from "I'm not good at presenting" to "I'm working on my presentation skills." It's the same. It's such a subtle change, but now, now it's actually a forward-looking progress. It's not a static statement of not I'm not good at presentation. This is almost Carol Dweck growth mindset stuff now, where we just say I'm working on my presentation skills. Okay, and then then what I'm seeing is a little bit of working on what can I do that's working just outside my comfort zone, not free postcodes outside my comfort zone, but something that's just outside my comfort zone, where I can grow. So I'm not going to go from a mental thought of I'm not good at presentations to doing a keynote speech with an audience of 10,000 people. I might start with, you know what? I'm going to give a little speech, a little three-minute speech. Doesn't even have to be big. I'm going to give a three-minute speech at the team meeting next week of seven people. Comfort zone. It's not that far out of your comfort zone. Maybe a little bit, but it's not so far out of your comfort zone. And then the next part I saw Umar start to use confirmation bias to work for you instead of against you. Now, confirmation bias. If you stick at the "I'm not good at presentation." You will see every evidence that backs up that belief that you're not good at presentation, and you will ignore the contrary indications, the contrary evidence. But if you look for the confirmation bias of the positive statement "I'm getting better at my presentations" you will start seeing the evidence that you're getting better, and you'll start quieting down the noise that says that you're not getting better.

Uma Subramanian: 34:55

Exactly, that's the game changer. Yes, that is the game changer.

Mick Spiers: 34:58

Yeah. And then Brendan Bouchard's got this framework he has called the competence confidence cycle, and they build on each other. So you try something and it works once again just outside your comfort zone. So you build a better confidence, and then you it gives you the confidence to try a little bit more, you build more competence. So the competence, confidence, competence, competence, and before you know it, you know, three months from now, you're giving a presentation, a 15-minute presentation in front of 20 people. We're still not on the stage yet doing a keynote, but look at look how far we've come already.

Uma Subramanian: 35:38

Exactly, love that.

Mick Spiers: 35:41

All right, I love your term, limitless leader. We all have them. We all have some kind of limiting belief in in our brain. If we don't challenge them, we'll we'll never move past it. Really good. All right, let's go to our third stanza: perception gap. What is the perception gap, Uma?

Uma Subramanian: 35:58

So what I started noticing is you know when when we start our journey as a young child, we learn that if we work hard, right at school, we get really awesome grades. We will do really well in school and life, and that's kind of an initial programming that we all, I think, most of us are taught, and so we come in, we take that, we see that working at school. You know, we do excellent at school, we get good grades, we end up in good schools, in colleges, and you know, so that kind of works in that initial stage, and then we bring the same thing into our careers, and even when we start out early in our career, it works. We work hard, we deliver results, we get promoted, we get the results, and so it works for some time. But what happens is when you reach that mid level, to you know, you're now looking to like leadership roles, you know, director, VP type of roles, and especially when you have, you know, 15 years of experience, 10 years of experience, when you reach that kind of mode, you've had a bunch of promotions. You know, this has worked. So what you know, we end up thinking is we have to just do more of it, right? So we think, okay, now I need to, you know, if I still continue to work hard, deliver results, I will get noticed. I will get the recognition, and everything will happen. But at that level, what happens is the the kind of there is a set of like unwritten rules, and those things, those rules are not generally, you know, documented and communicated everywhere, but those are the things that are actually playing in you know people's minds. And you know, when they're making decisions, they are starting to look for something else when they are looking for those promotions to leadership roles and you know bigger high stakes opportunities. And what is what I found is when we just focus on doing great work and delivering results, the people making decisions in the rooms about promotions and things, if they don't know that you cannot, yeah, I mean, if or if they think that you are a great, reliable executor, like you know, you're great at what you do, your current role. But at the same time, they don't know that you can actually create the future, that you're strategic thinker, that you can actually you know move and inspire people to action and do all of that kind of stuff. What happens is they think you're limited to your current role. You're not the person that you want to promote to a leadership role or to drive the organization forward, and that gap is what I call the perception gap. Is somewhere between your contribution and your reputation. There is a gap, and unless we close that gap, and you know we move beyond being great and you know doing great work, we do some of these, or we we do them so that and we do it in a way that it's also visible to people that you can think strategically, that you can communicate and influence people, that you know you have like genuine relationships with people, so you can you know work and get along with people. If those things are not visible strategically and to the people that are making the decisions, then you know your name doesn't come up. That's really what I saw, and so when I discovered the perception gap. I was able to look back at my own life, and I was able to see many, you know, little pockets of, you know, time and experiences where I, like, you know, had that perception gap, and probably that's the reason why I didn't get some of those opportunities, and I could make that connection. And I also saw that you know it was there everywhere. I talked to people at all levels in individual contributors, mid level, early career, even season weekpiece, and I, you know, everyone was able to relate with it. You know, when I was able to describe it, they had all felt it. They were all feeling it. Many were stuck in it as well, and there was this one small group of people though that were able to just by the way of how they operate, how they think, how they carry themselves, and what kind of impact they were creating. I saw them. There was no perception gap. These people were called into meetings. They were called into opportunities from them easily, and just studying them then, you know, led me to create my soul framework, which is S O A R. S stands for elevating your strategic impact. So you are really understanding what the organization needs, what's keeping senior leaders up at night, what do our customers need, and play you know like basically creating value at that highest, most strategic level, and you also invest in your own communication skills and influencing people, so you can actually when you come up with those big ideas, you have to get other people to get on board, align with you, and make things happen. So you know, really investing in outstanding communication, so you're able to do that, and building, and in that way, building a very genuine, authentic brand and authority in the space. And last but not the least, building genuine relationships across the organization at all levels. So you have people that are also making decisions in in those rooms when you're not there. As you said, everyone has a story, right? Everyone has a story about themselves, but they also have stories about others. So when people that are making decisions, let's say a promotion conversation is happening, people are when they think of let's say Uma, they already have a story about me, about you know what I do and you know how I would operate. So also making sure that you know the way we operate, the way we carry ourselves, and the way we create impact within the organization is visible and clear to just people across the organizations and decision makers. So that when your name comes up, it's aligned, it's consistent. Everyone knows the value you bring, and they know that you're someone that can create the future and take the organization forward, and so they take up your name. That's really the idea behind the sought-after leader.

Mick Spiers: 42:52

Really good, Uma. If I play back some of it, I can see the extrapolation from the limitless leader, but now it's not the story we tell ourselves about ourselves inside our own brain. It's now what is the story that others believe to be true about us, and is that a limiting story or is it an expansive story? And I'm going to throw some things at you and say that it's about showing that there's more to you than what the label and the jar indicates, and it's the belief that you can do more than what we believe that you can do. So I was thinking of stories that I've seen in the workplace of someone that's been incredibly proficient at their job. They might be I'm in railway signaling, so I'm going to use a signaling engineer this time. They might be a brilliant signaling engineer that is wonderful at control tables and data and all this kind of stuff, but the executives of the company have a view that, oh, but Uma, I could never put her in a complex negotiation with a customer. She doesn't have it. That's a belief. Do you know that to be true? But it's a belief, and there needs to be a pattern interrupt that helps them see that it may not be true. That it may not be true. I'm also going to say to you the perception gap. I've seen it work the other way. I've seen someone that's very charismatic, and the care that you get I don't know intoxicated by their charisma. They're in your saw framework. They might have outstanding communication and influence, but the substance isn't there. You know, so I've seen the opposite happening as well, where someone's perceived benefit is greater than than their actual value, right? So their reputation is bigger than their actual value. So can happen the other way too.

Uma Subramanian: 44:38

Yes, 100% and I have seen that too. And people that come to me, my clients, like they have all faced that. You know, someone less qualified, you know, doing, creating less impact, getting promoted, and all that. But what I believe is, yes, unfortunately, that is also a reality. But what I believe and what I. Would love for everyone to realize is yes there are some shortcuts like that you know where sometimes just because you're charismatic and you know you have excellent communication and influencing skills you can get some success with it but when we take like the the entire soul framework, the four pillars of really educating our strategic impact, outstanding communication, authority, and relationships. When we do it in that genuine, authentic way, and focus on you know creating undeniable value for the organization, moving the business forward. If that's our first pillar, and we do that. Then, you know, it happens like in such an authentic way that everyone has respect and you know love for what you do and an appreciation, and you're creating impact much more. I believe in the right way that than you know, just being getting some quick wins just because you have one of the pillars working for you.

Mick Spiers: 46:08

Yeah, very good. Okay, so the saw framework is in in the book as well. So once again, I encourage people to get the book. It's a great model for you to start leaning in as to how you might pattern interrupt some of these things. So now we're talking about limiting beliefs that others have about the story they tell themselves about you and and how do we reframe some of that now a big part of this is being able to communicate our value Uma that's a huge element of it building those relationships because people like to do business with people they know like and trust. So, if you're not communicating your value, how can they know, like, and trust you? But then, once you have those relationships, you can then start creating more impact and creating more impact together. And I'm going to say it becomes a virtuous cycle again, similar to what we were saying before about competence and confidence. But become a virtuous cycle with these people. The curious

question I have for you: 47:03

How do we communicate our value in a way that doesn't look self-serving? Doesn't look like you're big noting yourself or you're just self-promotion. Like self-promotion is not great. So how do we communicate value in a in a way that is not self promoting and doesn't give people that oh oh that Uma she always talks about herself how do we do that?

Uma Subramanian: 47:30

Excellent question and this is the biggest shift I had to go through myself in my own journey as well because I had the exact same belief that oh I don't want to be talking about myself. It sounds like self promotion, but what I learned is when if we don't communicate our value, and if we don't make other people know what value we can bring, what we can do for them, how can they leverage us? How can we serve them if they don't know what we can do? That was the

biggest shift for me: 48:05

is realizing that you know communicating your value is not self promotion or bragging, but it's really service. When you're communicating, they know what you can do for them, and they can leverage you. So, to give you an example, I post on LinkedIn. I know I communicate like all the time on like social media and stuff, and I would reach out to potential leads on LinkedIn as well, and you know have conversations. And one day, I realized some of these people that I would DM on LinkedIn, they would then come on a call with me, and in the call, sometimes they would like end up in tears as they're sharing their story because they're in so much pain. And then you know that's if I did not reach out and if I did not communicate, you know what I do, and you know they had not decided to come on the call with me and decided to get help. How would I be able to help, right? And so that was one of the things that was a turning point for me as well. Realizing that if we don't communicate our value, if we don't you know tell people how we can serve them, they wouldn't know, and they would not get the help they need, and we wouldn't be able to make that impact. So that is one mindset shift. I, you know, have I mean personally, I have gone through that, and many of my clients that come to me, they have the same kind of you know belief system. So that's one thing that we work on, is reframing the communicating your value as service. That that's one of the things. And the second thing is, I also at the same time I want to be very clear. When I talk about communicating my value, I'm not talking about just going and telling. Everyone, you know what great work I've done.

Mick Spiers: 50:03

I'm the best. I'm so good, what now?

Uma Subramanian: 50:06

Yeah, that is totally not it. So it is coming from the my criteria is I will share a story or I will share something. I will communicate something if it's truly in service of someone that other person needs it, and if it's going to be helpful, then you communicate. But you don't communicate for your self-serving needs. Like, oh, I want to, you know, look like I'm an expert, so I'm going to say this. It's totally not that. That's also work that I have personally gone through, and a shift that I have personally gone through, and something that I really believe when I coach as well is not to you know my my belief is not that you know you have to go and tell your manager and your skip level and all the people around you like what great work you're doing, but you know communicate to them what is helpful for them to know how you can help them, how you can help the organization, and from that point of view, then it it is from that perspective, then it's really helpful for them to know what strengths you have and how you can help.

Mick Spiers: 51:13

Yeah, really good. Let me play back some of the things I'm hearing there. So one is a limiting belief that if I if I do go around communicating my value, that I might be seen as big noting myself. One of the ones that I'd reframe here, Uma, as I as I come to your point about service, would be people aren't mind readers. They're not mind readers, and we have actually, I'm going to say, most organizations have very poor corporate memory as well. So if you're having a trouble with a topic right now, there's a good chance if you if you're in a larger organization, if you look around the organization, you're going to find someone that knows the answer. But if you don't know what people are capable of, you don't know. So if you're not communicating this value, people can't tap in and go, ah, you know what? Uma's going to have a. She's got experience in this. She did this seven years ago in her last company, but no one. But we've all forgotten, right? So there's an element there. People aren't mind readers. And then I love what you said about the service. It's then to reframe it to go, oh, I see the company is trying to do this at the moment. I've got some experience in that from previous. Can I help? Is not going around saying I'm the greatest programmer that's ever walked the earth. No, it's can I help?

Uma Subramanian: 52:35

Yeah, exactly, exactly. Yep, that that is exactly.

Mick Spiers: 52:40

Yeah, really good, and and I'm going to say one more. Throw it to you. I think some people are too shy to celebrate their wins, and once again, it's the fear of I'm not going to look humble. I'm going to look like I'm big noting myself. I'm going to say that you can celebrate your wins with humility by sharing that, oh look, you know, the team and I have achieved this thing. It's wonderful. It didn't go perfectly. We learnt some lessons along the way. What went well was this went well. If we did our time again, we probably would have done this a little bit different. That's still celebrating a win, but in a in a humble way, and it shows that you're a learner. It shows that you're a learner. So, so I think there's ways. If you're the kind of person that holds yourself back from celebrating a win and communicating your value, there are ways that you can reframe it that doesn't sound like you're ignoting yourself. How does that sit with you?

Uma Subramanian: 53:38

Yeah, 100% And these are some of the things I have personally learned because I had exactly those types of thoughts, and I had to work on them. Even taking compliments was, you know, is another thing that's really hard. For it's been sometimes I would just you know shrug it off if someone gives me a compliment. I cannot you know there was a time when I would just not be comfortable even taking compliments, but those are things that I learned again. Same kind of you know reframe and with help I realized you know if someone's giving a compliment, really taking it, accepting it, and you know with thanking them is a good way.

Mick Spiers: 54:18

Can say thank you. Just say thank you.

Uma Subramanian: 54:21

Yeah, exactly. Sort of yeah. know just shrugging it off or you know transferring the compliment to them, saying you know complimenting them immediately on something, those strategies or tactics tactics I used to employ.

Mick Spiers: 54:36

All right, I'm going to draw us to a close now. This has been a wonderful conversation. If I was to put it into two bookends, well, I mean, we did start with a great conversation about transition into leadership, but the two big bookends that I'd say here, the limitless leader and the fact that you have your own limiting beliefs, and if you never challenge them, you will never get beyond them. And the way to get beyond them is a bridge. So there's. It's a thing called a bridge framework in illma book that can really help you to challenge that belief. Is it serving you? How can you reframe it? How can you go just outside your comfort zone to start trying a few things and then use confirmation bias to as a positive way of seeing the the evidence that no, you are working on this and you are getting better. That was fantastic. So challenge your own limiting beliefs. Bridge is stanza one. Number two is challenge the limiting beliefs that others might have of you by communicating your value. So everyone else has limiting beliefs about who you are, what you're good at, what you're not good at, and the only way to challenge those limiting beliefs is to communicate your value. But you can use things like the SOAR framework to show that you've got more, more to you than what the label on the jar may indicate. But you can do it in ways that are still humble. They're not. It's not big noting yourself, and it's in the service of others. It's to show that you've got something that can solve the problem that they're currently experiencing, and you can do this. And if you can bridge those two things, I'm going to use that bridge again. Get over yourself. Get over your own limiting beliefs, and then help others to see that you have more to you than what they might think, then your career is just going to is going to skyrocket. Uma, thank thank you so much for joining. I'm going to take us now to our rapid round. These are the same four questions that we ask all of our guests. So, what's the one thing that you know now, Uma Subramanian, that you wish you knew when you were 20.

Uma Subramanian: 56:45

That everything is always working out for us. Everything. I mean, you know, all the setbacks, challenges, the good things, the bad things. Everything is really taking us in the direction of where we need to go.

Mick Spiers: 57:00

Okay. Oh, very brief. add our brains are wired towards catastrophization. Our fear of loss is so much greater than our appreciation of gain, and we just need to remind ourselves that that thought that came into your head, you know, that doom and gloom thought. Do you know it to be true? It's like yeah, yeah. Okay, very good. Thank you. What's your favorite book?

Uma Subramanian: 57:25

I will have to say "Think and Grow Rich" by Napoleon Hill because that book changed my life. I still keep it by my bedside. I you know flip through it and read chapters time and again.

Mick Spiers: 57:37

Very good. Okay. All right. What's your favorite quote?

Uma Subramanian: 57:41

I'll say from the same book, "If you set your mind to something, you can achieve it" and I really believe in that.

Mick Spiers: 57:49

Yeah, well done. Okay, and finally, there are going to be people listening to this that are probably are in that limited leader situation, not not limitless, and probably people that don't know how to communicate their value in the right way, Uma, or they're stuck with a limiting belief about what it means to communicate their value. They want to know more about you and your work, and to lean into this. How do they find you?

Uma Subramanian: 58:16

I'm on LinkedIn on a daily basis, so LinkedIn would be the first bed, the link. My profile has a link to my website. There is ways to contact me through my website as well, and of course, the "The Sought-After Leader" leader, is on Amazon. So I think those are different ways of moving forward from this point and connecting with me. And I would love to connect with anyone. You know, you can DM me, ping me on LinkedIn. Would love to have a conversation.

Mick Spiers: 58:47

Okay, wonderful, Uma. Well, thank you very much. Thank you for the gift of your time, your wisdom, your experience, your frameworks, and for for sharing them with us today.

Uma Subramanian: 58:58

Thank you so much, Mick. It's been a fantastic honor to be here with you.

Mick Spiers: 59:03

What a thoughtful conversation with Uma Subramanian. There are several ideas from this one that I'm going to keep reflecting on. The first is the shift from the golden rule to the platinum rule. Most of us were raised with a very well-intentioned principle,treat other people the way you would like to be treated, but leadership requires something more sophisticated, because the person sitting across from you is not you. They may have different needs, different motivations, different fears, different experiences, different ways of communicating and processing the world, so perhaps the better question is, how does this person need to be treated in order to be at their best? That requires curiosity rather than a projection. I also loved our discussion about limiting beliefs. How often do we hear someone? Say, I'm just not good at presenting, or I'm not strategic, or I'm not really a leader. That's just not who I am. And eventually, a description of our current experience becomes a definition of our own identity. The danger is that once we believe the story, we behave in ways that keep proving it to be true. Uma's work reminds us that confidence and competence can create a reinforcing cycle. Sometimes we develop confidence because we've become more competent, but sometimes we just find just enough courage to take that first action, and then build the competence through experience, and that allows the evidence to change the story we're telling ourselves. So here's my challenge for you this week: think of an area of your life or leadership where you regularly say, I'm just not. I'm just not confident. Just not good at difficult conversations. I'm just not that kind of leader. And I want you to add one small word. Yet, what experience could you deliberately create that would give you new evidence of what's possible by adding this word. Yet, I'm just not that kind of leader yet. I'm just not a strategic thinker yet. And then, what action could you take along that journey? So, thank you again to Uma for such a generous and thought-provoking conversation. And join us again next week when I'm joined by Jeanine Becker. Jeanine challenges one of the most deeply held assumptions many of us have about leadership, that good leaders should know where things are going and have a clear plan for getting there. We'll explore what leadership looks like when the world is uncertain, when the information keeps changing, and when the best answer may not yet exist. You've been listening to The Leadership Project. If today sparked an insight, don't keep it to yourself. Share it with one other person who would benefit from listening to the show. A huge thank you to Gerald Calibo for his tireless work editing every episode, and to my amazing wife Sei, who does all the heavy lifting in the background to make this show possible. None of this happens without them. Around here, we believe leadership is a practice, not a position, that people should feel seen, heard, valued, and that they matter. That the best leaders trade ego for empathy, certainty for curiosity, and control for trust. If that resonates with you, please subscribe on YouTube and on your favorite podcast app. And if you want more, follow me on LinkedIn and explore our archives for conversations that move you from knowing to doing. Until next time, lead with curiosity, courage, and care.