‘Matt Hancock wants to be seen as the real him by appearing on I’m Celebrity Get Me Out of Here? It’s going to be interesting to see what happens when he leaves the jungle!’ laughs Adela Hussain, an entrepreneur and founder of Pitch to Press, a consultancy which helps people, especially women of colour, build their profile, be more visible, successful and happy at work.

‘People are turned off by celebrities – and businesses – who are inauthentic,’ she explains. ‘We are now in the era of authenticity. The pandemic has lifted the lid on society. With zoom calls, we took off our work armour and quite literally peered into the real lives and living rooms of the people we worked with. It couldn’t help but create a more authentic connection with our work colleagues. Now the pandemic is over, we are still craving that authentic connection.’

A consultant specialising in helping entrepreneurs and women of colour raise their profile at work and in business, Adela encourages her clients to become more visible and successful by stepping into the limelight.

Here Adela shares how we can all stand out, be authentic and happy at work.

What’s the link between confidence and happiness?

Often people think that when they become more confident, they will become happier. But it doesn’t work like that. Don’t wait until you feel confident to go for the opportunities. Go for the opportunity to learn, grow and become more competent. The more competent you become, the more confident you will become.

What stops people from putting their head above the parapet?

Many of us that have an inner critic holding us back saying, ‘You’re not ready, you’re not powerful enough, you’re not attractive enough, you’re not clever enough.’ But it’s not just the inner critic.

Culturally, you may have been raised not to put your head above the parapet, you may be a victim of tall-poppy syndrome or there might be some generational trauma or issues going on in your family about not wanting to outshine your father or sister, for example.

Don’t wait until you feel confident to go for the opportunities. Go for the opportunity to learn, grow and become more competent.

It’s important to get the root of what’s going on so that you challenge those beliefs or thoughts. Ask yourself, what do you need to believe about yourself or the world to start stepping up? What evidence and competencies do you need to build to prove that that’s true? Then start taking micro-actions every day to start to build your competence and confidence. Micro-action by micro-action, brick by brick, you can build the foundation of a new belief system and the authentic confidence in your abilities.

What mindset do we need to develop to step up into the limelight?

You could spend your whole life waiting, thinking that someone’s going to tap you on the shoulder and say, ‘You’re ready for this opportunity’. Stop waiting. It’s you that needs to decide that you’re ready and take your place, be seen and be a leader.

Try affirmations every morning. Start telling yourself a new story. Stop running yourself down and start backing yourself. If you don’t back yourself, why would anyone else? Start telling a new story not only to yourself but to others too.

What do you mean?

If you want to get confident in promoting your business or promoting a new project at work, go out and practice pitching to people who don’t really care, those not invested in you or your business. When you’re collecting your coffee from the barista, tell them what you’re doing in your business or tell them what you’re building at work. Get into the habit of talking about your business or your work in a positive way. Practice.

Go out and practice pitching to people who don’t really care, those not invested in you or your business.

But we’ve all met people who talk about themselves all the time and that’s a total turn off…  

Yes, it’s very unappealing when someone constantly talks about themselves.  It often comes from a place of deep insecurity, as they are usually trying to overcompensate for feeling unworthy. So, lead with your mission, not your ego. There is a huge difference between a person who talks about their mission and something bigger than themselves. It’s inspiring – it comes from a place of passion and your authenticity shines through.

What if you don’t have a mission?

Discover your ‘why’. Why did you set up your business in the first place or explore why you are working at your company? Who are you trying to help? Start there. Reach out and listen to your community or customers and connect and build your community by asking how you can help.

For example, my mission is to support women of colour to find a platform and be seen. For many of us women of colour, the issue is visibility. You don’t see people like you in the media. So, one of the things that I do is run a virtual summit where I bring in 50/50 representation of women of colour. We need role models, and we need to actively seek those role models and put those role models in a place where they are on a stage, sharing their journey, sharing their challenges, sharing how they’ve done things so we can support others to do the same.

That’s my mission and I can talk about it passionately from a very authentic place.

Intimacy means you are comfortable sharing the real you and personal stories about yourself. Trust increases when you can share your authentic story.

Why do some people shine in public and others don’t?

There’s something called the Trust Equation, which is very useful to know about when you’re about to step up into the limelight. The Trust Equation states that trustworthiness is equal to the sum of credibility, reliability and intimacy divided by a person’s self-orientation. 

Credibility reflects how competent you are. You need to show you know what you’re doing. Reliability is how dependable you seem. Do you do what you say you will? Intimacy means you are comfortable sharing the real you and personal stories about yourself. Trust increases when you can share your authentic story – let’s say you had a really difficult thing happen to you in your life, and you share it with your audience, people will trust you more. Self-orientation? Do you talk about yourself all the time? What are your motives, do you really care about others, have empathy?

It would probably be useful for Matt Hancock to have a little look at that equation!

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