Fake it until you make it is something you hear a lot with regards to career moves and just generally in life. I think it’s something that is important for people to do, because we rarely FEEL like we are ready for the next thing.
I get the question a lot…can you fake it until you make it as a leader? It’s a good question and the answer is sort of.
The ways you can’t EVER fake it until you make it as a leader is around the “soft skills”. You can’t fake caring. You can’t fake wanting to help. You can’t fake empathy, sincerity or kindness. A large percentage of people can sense when you aren’t being genuine or sincere…so if you have to fake those things, this line of work probably isn’t for you.
The ways you can fake and grow into after you have become a leader are the more technical skills. Things like learning excel, how to calculate ROI, public speaking, building presentations, etc. Basically anything that is a tactical part of a leaders job, you can learn as you go. If you are looking to grow in excel, check out Youtube or Udemy for a tutorial. If you are looking to become a better public speaker, try toastmasters or volunteer to present more at meetings.
The bottom line is you can’t fake the human pieces of leadership but you can absolutely fake the tactical things.I hope this was helpful. If you have any questions or want to dive more into a topic, let me know. Thanks for being here!
