Chicago Booth Review Podcast Do You Identify as a Leader?

Chris Collins: I think we see that a lot with our students who are constantly having to make choices either about their career or what they take or what they don't take, because they can't do it all. And that is part of identity work, which is not just opening doors, but closing doors.

Hal Weitzman: Most of us want to be seen as moral, likable, and smart. But beyond that, how does our identity shape the way we interact with, manage and lead others? Welcome to the Chicago Booth Review Podcast, where we bring you groundbreaking insights in a clear and straightforward way. I'm Hal Weitzman. Today, Chicago Booth's Chris Collins tells us about his approach to identity and leadership. What is that connection? Why does it sometimes hold us back and how can we use it to improve our work? Chris Collins, welcome back to the Chicago Booth Review Podcast.

Chris Collins: It's very nice to be here.

Hal Weitzman: Well, we're delighted. We had such a fun time with you last time talking about emotions that we had to get you back to-

Chris Collins: You say that, you said emotions. I don't know. I don't know if you [inaudible 00:01:04].

Hal Weitzman: Well, I'm emotional remembering our conversation, which was wonderful. But we wanted to have you back, talk about a different theme that you teach about, which is identity and leadership. Why is identity useful for understanding leadership?

Chris Collins: Yeah. This is one of those complicated terms that means a bunch of different things to different people. Not too long ago, sometime probably in the last six months, I actually went to a database of academic articles and I just did a search for articles that were indexed on the idea of identity, limited down to peer reviewed journals. And there were tens and tens of thousands, actually over 80,000 articles. Huge number.

And so it means a lot of different things to a lot of people, but I think that one of the reasons that it's so important is that it really speaks to two aspects that are super important to us. On the one hand, it has to do with how we find our social place, how we find, articulate, frame it for ourselves and others, how we fit in. And then at another level, it has to do with just sort of how we organize ourselves relative to the challenges that we experience. And it operates at both of those levels, both of which I think are really powerful.

Hal Weitzman: How we organize ourselves, say more about that.

Chris Collins: I don't know if self-regulation is exactly the right idea, but it's a point of constancy and continuity in how we approach things, right? To be the same person or to how we want to be and who we want to be in a situation and who we are to each other, that there's some continuity into that. And actually to deviate away from that is difficult, is problematic for us. And so it is a way in which we organize ourselves in social context.

Hal Weitzman: I see. So what do people throw into that bucket? I mean, you're talking about academic literature, which maybe is using the term in lots of different ways or maybe in imprecise ways, but what do people throw into the bucket that you would call identity that is this constancy, this dependable thing, versus personality or character? How do we distinguish what it means to have an identity?

Chris Collins: Personality is a huge topic and it may be subdiscipline in psychology and it's so big, it's like how we're all the same, how we are similar and different to each other, how we're truly unique. Within that, identity could serve a part. But if I sort of push that apart and sort of say, hey, if we're talking about personality, typically what people mean is that there's some kind of disposition, some kind of trait, some kind of quality that you carry with you, and that's with you across situation and time. And those dispositions, at least according to the theory, are partly organic. We arrive where they're genetics associated with them, presumably, and those genetics interact with the environment to be further refined. So both environment and genetics play a role.

The heart of identity, I would say, is maybe identification, which is entirely social. It's not that I'm born with a particular identity that unfolds in some natural organic way. It's more that I grew up in a sociohistorical moment. The social environment that I find myself is like source material for me, figuring out who I am and who I could be. And can I assemble a culturally recognizable version that works for me in the context? So big picture thing, but that's how I might differentiate it.

I'd sort of say identity kind of, and all those articles probably includes two major strains. One might be a social strain, and we're sort of thinking about social demographics and membership in groups. And so my religious community or a racial group or a nationality and how I incorporate these into myself. Another social level might be even just situated. In this situation, you're the interviewer, I'm the guest, we play a particular role, our identities are kind of framed by the moment, right? But it's definitely social.

So that's one thread. And then there's another thread, which is a little bit more personal. And that's what I suspect we're going to end up talking about today, which is I might have a narrative about who I am, where I've come from, and I might espouse a set of values or concerns that are animating my life and organizing it, aspirations, places I want to go. And even below that, maybe at an unconscious or a preconscious level, there might be elements of ... And people might call it an ego-synthetic set of constructs that help me knit together and interpret the kinds of things that I'm experiencing that I might be able to surface and make conscious, but a lot of times it's happening underneath the service. But this identification is happening at all those four levels. With social groups-

Hal Weitzman: It sounds like something that I choose.

Chris Collins: I don't know. Let me ask this. An identity that you've chosen.

Hal Weitzman: Yeah. What is an identity that I've chosen?

Chris Collins: Yeah.

Hal Weitzman: Well, I think all your identities you choose to certain extent, don't you? I mean, nowadays, you could choose anything. So if you could choose anything, then anything you choose, you've chosen.

Chris Collins: You could choose anything?

Hal Weitzman: Pretty much. I mean, you can't change maybe your racial character, but you can certainly change your nationality, you can change your sexuality, you can change a lot of things, change your political identification. I mean, anything you're doing, you've either chosen or you've failed to choose. You've somehow made a choice in some sense. So I think a lot of what I would think of, I would think I've actually chosen to do. Is that wrong?

Chris Collins: Well, what I'm sensing is that you're collapsing things that I might say are distinct. One is sort of like, hey, I grew up in a Presbyterian church. I'm not Presbyterian at the moment, but let's say I'm a practicing Christian, right? How deeply do I identify with that? How central is that to how I think of myself and how I define myself? So I can occupy a status. I know some people sort of say, "Oh, I belong to this religion or I belong to this nationality," but that's not a huge part of how I think about myself and I don't see it necessarily as incorporated or evident or tied to how I carry myself. So there's sort of like, oh, being able to be categorized in a thing. And then there's another question about like, "To what degree have I internalized aspects of that? And am I eager to sort of say I am like that, I identify with that, I value it, I've absorbed it as an animating and organizing concern for myself?"

Hal Weitzman: I see. So you're describing it in a positive way. This is my identity that these are things I choose to highlight. Is that right?

Chris Collins: Yes. And I think there are a lot of aspects, for instance, that I don't think people are very conscious of. How does one become aware of their identifications might be a question. I had an experience, I was about 37, you got two young kids, and I saw a picture about when I was 40 of this moment when I'm 37, and I'm at the beach, and I'm looking at myself and I'm like, "Oh my God, I am so out of shape. I look horrible." And I'm kind of revulsed by what I see. And at that moment-

Hal Weitzman: That's every day of my life. I feel like that, but go ahead.

Chris Collins: At this moment, I was encountering a version of myself that had strayed very far from an ideal that I identified with. And I don't think I was totally conscious of until I saw that.

Hal Weitzman: So your identity was for someone who was in better shape?

Chris Collins: Yeah. Yeah. Or just athletic or just active. That actually has been a big part of my life. I didn't realize till I was 40, that I'd really owned that and felt very strongly about it. And so these things, do we choose them? Did I choose that?

Hal Weitzman: You're making me think of when someone has to do a public apology and they say something like, "This is not who I am." It's almost like in the moment of crisis, they are forced to, or they try to realign with something that they wanted to be or that they wanted to come across as.

Chris Collins: And I think in those moments, I do feel like the discrepancy draws our attention. It's actually in a moment where we become emotional. I was revulsed at what I saw. There are identities too that we repudiate and those tend to be places ... It's almost like this. It's almost like a thermostat of meaning, right? And you know how a thermostat works.

Hal Weitzman: Thermostat of meaning?

Chris Collins: Yeah. We set it at 68 and there's this thing going on where it's comparing what the temperature is relative to that set point and it's constantly dynamically adjusting it. Well, we have certain meanings that we've internalized that are super important to us and we are always absorbing, "Where am I relative?" And it's very complicated because we have multiple things that we're concerned about, multiple identities that matter, but those moments where we stray too far, that's the moment often where we're like, "Ow, this is painful. This hurts." And to stray too far from something I really idealize might sadden me.

Hal Weitzman: And so I want to press more on that, this idea of straying from what's comfortable or what you have in your mind's eye as your identity, because you obviously teach leadership and I'm guessing, I'm just extrapolating from listening to you speak that some people ... This relates to imposter syndrome. Some people just don't see themselves as being a leader, so they therefore don't do it and they never become it. And others are given leadership roles and really think that they're just charlatans and that they're not really leading and it feels uncomfortable and doesn't feel like them. Whereas there are people who from a very young age see themselves as leaders and will either feel cheated that they haven't been given those positions or will just be very confident when giving them and kind of feel like their identities come home.

Chris Collins: Yeah. Yeah. I do feel like there's a ... One of the things this might relate to is just sort of how we take to the roles that we have or take to abilities that we might or may not have. I thought I was really good at mathematics, studied mathematics in undergraduate. And about my junior year, I started to encounter mathematics that I could not succeed at, and it shifted how I thought about myself. And I was looking for ways to get those last couple courses of my major in.

So there is this issue, but relative to leading, you can imagine some people who feel very good and comfortable in a spotlight and feel like, "No, that's me. That's a space where I excel in." And others who sort of say, "Oh God, that's awful. I want to be as far from that as I possibly can." That definitely affects how people see themselves.

I find that though, the most common conflict that I see when I work with either professionals, alums, students, is this sense of how I view myself is at odds somehow with what my role asks of me. One example of this, maybe not directly from ... Well, it's work related. He's a super nice guy. And I think a deep part of him really identified with this idea of being close, connected, being the nice guy, being the friend. And it made him hard to contradict people, to disagree with people. And it was so classic because he knew this about himself and he had this job offer and he got the offer and he's sort of like, "I'm going to be really tough. I'm going to be really hard. I'm going to come back with an aggressive counter offer."

So he goes away, I'm like, "I'm dying to hear how this turns out." He shows back up and I'm like, "What happened?" He's like, "I got it." And I'm like, "Tell me more." And he's like, "Well, I threw out a number and he immediately agreed to it." He's like, "So I didn't go far enough. I couldn't even go far enough to elicit a disagreement." The tension that he felt about deviating from being the agreeable one was really hard and just figuring out how to calibrate that.

So whether it's giving feedback to people or taking a hard stand something, I think a lot of times leading is standing alone. It's about stepping out into a space where you're a sole voice or a sole proponent of a point of view, not that you want to stay that way, but the willingness to do that, that's really uncomfortable and it can press people in ways that just violates other identity commitments that they hold and makes it very hard for them to do.

Hal Weitzman: If you're enjoying this podcast, there's another University of Chicago Podcast Network show that you should check out. It's called Nine Questions. Join Professor Eric Oliver as he poses the nine most essential questions for knowing yourself to some of humanity's wisest, the most interesting people. Nine Questions with Eric Oliver, part of the University of Chicago Podcast Network.

Chris Collins, in the first half, we talked about identity and how identity shapes us, shapes our expectations, our choices. And we started just before the break, getting into this idea about when identity comes into conflict with what we're doing, what we're being asked to do. One example being imposter syndrome, I'm being asked to lead a team, "I don't think of myself as a leader or I don't want to do what it requires because it somehow conflicts with my identity." That's just one kind of conflict, right? There's sort of imposter syndrome. What are the other ones that might bring our identity into conflict with a role or a project or an initiative that we've been asked to lead?

Chris Collins: Yeah, I think sometimes changing circumstances. I was talking with a doctor. He worked in a community health clinic and the MO there was that patients came as a doctor, you worked explicitly in the clinic. He ended up moving with his partner who had a great job elsewhere. And so setting up his career in a totally different state. And again, went back to community health. And what was interesting in talking with him was is that the role of a doctor was really different.

You actually got out of the clinic. There was a lot of outreach to different populations in the community that for whatever reason, that made sense for the population served by that clinic. And this was anathema to him. He was sort of like, "No, as a doctor, I'm here. I'm not out there. I'm here." And that was a huge adjustment for him. And it was a way he had defined who he was, how the role was set up, and that required some adjustment to get through. And he ended up staying there for quite a while, but it was a couple years of discomfort, kind of undoing his sensibility about the limits and the boundaries of it.

I find sometimes that when we're working or we're encountering different styles, maybe the most ... Encountering any kind of difference I think can call into a question deeply held commitments, right? And we could talk about that definitely in cross national boundaries work. We could talk about that working across different groups. But the most simple version that I think everyone has experience with is just encountering someone who has really different way of doing the work.

One of the ways this comes up a lot with the students that I work with is that there's this love of efficiency. And efficiency is really great in a lot of ways, but just this sort of sense, I am really attached. And we just had this meeting and it sucked because it wasn't efficient. We didn't move through it in an expeditious or an organized manner or the manner that I consider to be organized. And they've identified deeply this is the right way to do it. It feels right to do it this way and to not do it this way really feels wrong.

And maybe at times, there are times where efficiency is the best approach, and there might be other circumstances where actually a little bit of inefficiency is necessary to get to where we need to go, right? So that's another place where I see some of the things that we become deeply attached to, not just intellectually, but emotionally. Kind of show up and can get in the way of our ability to really connect with other people in our environment and work productively.

Hal Weitzman: Okay. Generally, how do you advise people to manage these conflicts?

Chris Collins: Yeah. I think part of it is, and it is, I just described a situation where I didn't realize something about myself till I was 40, right? Even though it had been with me my whole bloody life. So I do feel like there's some work to sort of really start to ferret out. What are the things and ways of being that I'm really attached to that are really important to me.

And some of the best opportunities are to encounter violations of those desires, those values, those priorities, because that puts them in strong relief. So as we encounter those, it's our natural temptation or natural inclination to feel frustrated. And I'm not actually saying don't feel frustrated, feel frustrated, but also get to what the frustration means. It means like, oh, there's a deep sensibility that I have here that I'm committed to that isn't being honored or we're really far from that. Now, I see that more clearly, I can start to ask questions about it. Is that the most important priority in this situation? Maybe it is, maybe it's not. Either sensibility will give me a little bit more acumen and a little bit more knowledge in terms of how I move forward in terms of responding to the frustration.

Hal Weitzman: You said at the beginning that you described identity in quite positive terms. And I guess what I'm still wondering about is this sort of imposter syndrome thing where identity can hold you back. I'm not a math person. I read the job description, that's just not me. So identity, this is why I'm very skeptical of authenticity, because sometimes authenticity is a way of, I don't authentically not speak German, for example, I'm just too lazy to learn or haven't had the opportunity to learn German, but there's nothing authentic about my inability to speak German or any other language I can't speak.

So in the same way, if I feel that my authentic self is to be someone who doesn't lead, then maybe that's right. And maybe it just would be so uncomfortable that I shouldn't do that, but maybe it's just that I haven't been given the chance and the opportunity and I have a lot to give. So I don't know, how do you feel about ... Because the identity isn't fixed, presumably. It develops, it evolves. How would you counsel someone who feels held back a little bit by their identity?

Chris Collins: Yeah. Yeah. No, I think you're right. And when we talked about that sort of like a thermometer of meaning, it's something that's pulling you back, but pulling you back to something, right? It's pulling you back to whatever that set point of is you're using as self-definition, right? And what if part of that self-definition is that, "Oh, I'm not the one who manages the team. That's not a space for me." And that's the question of like, well, it can be a positive channel, it can also be a constraining one.

And I think you're right. I think you're right. And I do find that, that's one of the challenges. It's a homeostatic model. It's sort of like, "Hey, we're maintaining a set point. How do we change the set point?" On the thermometer, I can just go over and turn it. And not quite so easy if we're talking about something that I've deeply invested in emotionally and intellectually as the right way to being or as a way of being in the world.

And one of the ways that I've encountered this, I've worked with athletes and sort of tracked their sense of themselves. And it's interesting, there's a college runner who I was working with, she ran cross country at sort of an elite level and she has a memory of herself as that runner. And then she has a memory of herself a couple years out of school. Now, she's working full-time and she can only run so much. And then she has a memory of herself getting runner as a married person and now her life is even more divided. And then as a mom and then after she broke her leg and so on.

And there was over time, you can see this reshaping of her identity, but there are a lot of times we don't have that natural progression in all these set points where we have opportunities to live into a different sense of who I am in the moment. And I think that's harder. And I think one of the things that we need to spend a little bit of time doing is sort of figuring out what I am attached to, what I'm opposed to, and be willing to look at that candidly and critically.

Hal Weitzman: Is this the same sort of self-evaluation you talked about with the emotions when we had that conversation, you said kind of list your emotions, identify them so at the very least you're aware of them. Is this same kind of thing an audit of your identity?

Chris Collins: Yeah, I think it has to be, but beyond that, I think there's a process of making choices. There is recognizing that you may not be able to honor all the things that are important to you in any given moment. And I found a lot of people who are willing to, for instance, step into managerial roles, even though they wonder whether either they're going to like it or they're going to be good at it, but they do it because there's something underneath that they care about. They really care about the team or they're very committed to the work that we do.

And so there is an internal kind of calculus that we go through in terms of, how do I prioritize among priorities? What are the ways in which I work with that? And it does involve making choices, and that's really, really hard. I think we see that a lot with our students who are constantly having to make choices either about the career or what they take or what they don't take, because they can't do it all. And that is part of identity work, which is not just opening doors, but closing doors and sort of saying, "No, it's not going to be that, and it's not going to be that, but it is going to be this." So I often find that people are more willing to take a risk to step into a role that they don't feel totally equipped for or they have self-doubt about when it's attached to something that they genuinely and deeply care about. I think that can be a buoying and strengthening motive to move forward.

Hal Weitzman: How does that process, if you do that audit, your identity, how would that help you be a better leader or better manager of other people?

Chris Collins: Yeah. From my standpoint, you are an instrument and you're the instrument by what you lead. It's just you showing up, talking with people, using the vocabulary you use, using the gestures you use, using the manner that you use, right? It is you. And if you're not aware fully of the instrument that you're using to create an effect in the world, that's not great, right? So becoming sensitive to the way in which the instrument that is you is attuned is really, really important work, because those are the raw materials that you work with as you try and interact with people, work with people, influence people, provide a sense of where we might go, who we might become.

Hal Weitzman: Okay. So it sounds like something that we all should do as our homework after listening to this episode is, I'm serious, is to write down ... What do we write down exactly? How do we get to our identity? Write down our values, write down what makes us who we are, how would we start?

Chris Collins: Yeah. A couple of thoughts. I might start and start to think about a couple of people that you admire. When I start to think about people I admire, I admire them because in some way I identify with them and I want to channel some of what they have. And as you think about those individuals and try and think of five or six people, and it could be a parent, it could be a high school teacher, it could have been ... It doesn't have to be this sort of elevated business leader or public leader or whatever, but just the people that you've encountered. In fact, the better you know them, the better. It is for the exercise. But then be critical. Sort of say, it's not the whole person, but they had two or three things that I deeply admired and I'd love to channel. And that starts to sensitize you to some of the things maybe that you are very important to you and that you really value and that you're trying to embody in your own work.

Another way that I think that you can do it is to look at your job and your role and start to think critically about what are the parts where you have strong feelings either for or against about the kinds of things that your role requires of you. Because this is something you confront and you run into every day. And so those senses of joy in certain aspects of the work and frustration or irritation or apprehension and approaching other ones, those tell you something about the quality of attachment that you have or your feelings about those. So that's another way to very quickly do a simple audit and it doesn't take a lot of time. And even just by observing yourself over the course of a month, you can learn a lot about like, what are the things that I'm most attracted to and most strongly invested in the work that I do or in the characters and the people that I interact with?

Hal Weitzman: All right. Well, Chris Collins, another fascinating conversation. Always such a pleasure to have you on the podcast. Thanks very much for coming back on the Chicago Booth Review Podcast.

Chris Collins: Well, thanks for inviting me, Hal.

Hal Weitzman: That's it for this episode of the Chicago Booth Review Podcast, part of the University of Chicago Podcast Network. For more research, analysis and insights, visit our website, chicagobooth.edu/review. When you're there, sign up for our weekly newsletter so you never miss the latest in business-focused academic research. This episode was produced by Josh Stunkel. If you enjoyed it, please subscribe and please do leave us a five-star review. Until next time, I'm Hal Weitzman. Thanks for listening.