Lauryn Hill sang, “How you gon’ win if you ain’t right within.” But what if you think you’re right within—and the evidence suggests otherwise?
You know your strengths. You’ve done the 360s. You ask for feedback—and you act on it. So why do you still hesitate before you speak? And why does your team hesitate before they do?
The disconnect isn’t in your intentions. It’s in the gap between how you see yourself and how your leadership actually lands. And if you’re reading this thinking, “Not me—I’m one of the self-aware ones,” you might want to keep reading.
Self-Awareness Equals Introspection (Or Does It?)
When you Google “What is self-awareness?”, you get over a billion results. Most of them will tell you the same thing: look inward. Journal. Meditate. Reflect on your values. Know thyself.
It’s not wrong. But it’s dangerously incomplete.
Organizational psychologist Tasha Eurich spent four years studying nearly 5,000 people to understand what self-awareness actually is—and what it isn’t. Her research, published in Harvard Business Review, revealed something startling: while 95% of people believe they’re self-aware, only 10-15% actually are [1]. Yikes!
The gap exists because most leaders operate under a faulty assumption: that self-awareness is a single thing you either have or don’t. But Eurich’s research identified two distinct, independent types of self-awareness, and her findings reveal being strong in one doesn’t mean you’re strong in the other.
Internal self-awareness is the clarity with which you see your own values, passions, aspirations, and reactions. It’s the introspection we’ve been told to prioritize—the work of understanding what drives you, what matters to you, and what you stand for [1].
External self-awareness is the accuracy with which you understand how others perceive you. It’s not about people-pleasing, performance, or perception management. It’s about knowing whether the leader you think you are matches the leader your team actually experiences [1].
Unfortunately, and this may be a shock for many, there’s virtually no relationship between the two [1]. You can know yourself deeply and still be oblivious to how you show up. You can read a room brilliantly and have no idea what actually matters to you.
As Eurich puts it: “The bottom line is that self-awareness isn’t one truth. It’s a delicate balance of two distinct, even competing, viewpoints” [1].
Which means the self-awareness you’ve cultivated to this point might be serving you less than you think.
Four Archetypes of Self-Awareness
If internal and external self-awareness are independent, that creates four distinct patterns—what Eurich calls the self-awareness archetypes [1]. These aren’t personality types. They’re diagnostic snapshots of where your self-knowledge is strong and where it’s missing.
The Introspectors (High Internal, Low External)
You’re clear on who you are. You’ve done the work—therapy, coaching, endless reflection. You know your values, your triggers, your non-negotiables. You’re comfortable with yourself and don’t bend to please others.
But you don’t challenge your own views or identify weaknesses by seeking feedback from others. You assume that because you know yourself so well, others must see you the same way. You’re confident in your self-perception, which means you rarely question it.
The cost? This can harm your relationships and limit your success [1]. Your team hesitates to disagree with you—not because you’re a tyrant, but because you don’t invite the kind of feedback that would show you how you are perceived. You’re leading from a place of internal clarity that no one else can fully access.
You can’t lead others through change you haven’t reckoned with yourself.
The Pleasers (Low Internal, High External)
You’re exceptional at reading the room. You know exactly how you’re coming across in any given moment, and you adjust accordingly. You can sense what people need from you and deliver it flawlessly. You’re so focused on appearing a certain way to others that you could be overlooking what matters to you [1].
But here’s the challenge: you’ve become so skilled at adapting to others’ expectations that you’ve lost touch with what you actually want. You make decisions based on how they’ll be received, not whether they align with who you are. Over time, you tend to make choices that aren’t in service of your own success and fulfillment [1].
You’re the leader who says yes when you mean no. Who takes the promotion that makes sense on paper but drains you in practice. Who builds a career that looks successful to others, but doesn’t feel like yours.
The Seekers (Low Internal, Low External)
You don’t yet know who you are, what you stand for, or how your team sees you [1]. You might be early in your leadership journey, or you might be in the middle of a transition that’s shaken your sense of self. As a result, you might feel stuck or frustrated with your performance and relationships [1].
This isn’t a deficit—it’s a starting point. Seekers often feel the discomfort acutely, but that discomfort is valuable data. Your question isn’t whether you are self-aware, but rather, am I willing to do the work to become so?
The Aware (High Internal, High External)
You know who you are, what you want to accomplish, and you seek out and value others’ opinions [1]. You’ve cultivated both internal clarity and external understanding. You don’t just tolerate feedback—you pursue it, because you know your weak spots are always evolving. This is where leaders begin to fully realize the true benefits of self-awareness [1].
Even The Aware struggles to sustain this balance when pressure mounts. When deadlines tighten and stakes rise, which self-awareness slips first? Do you retreat inward and stop checking in with your team? Or do you start performing for external approval and lose touch with what matters to you?
The Aware archetype isn’t a finish line. It’s a practice that requires constant recalibration.
Why This Matters for You
When leaders lack self-awareness (especially external), their teams often end up managing up—carefully curating what information they share, how they deliver bad news, and when they approach the leader. The team spends energy managing the leader’s reactions, weaknesses, or ego rather than focusing on the work.
Self-awareness isn’t an abstraction. It’s the difference between a team that trusts you enough to be honest and a team that carefully manages what you hear. Between leadership that energizes you and leadership that depletes you. Between decisions that feel aligned and decisions you later regret.
The leaders who struggle most aren’t the ones who lack self-awareness. They’re the ones who think they’ve already arrived.
If you’re an Introspector, you might be losing trust without realizing it—not because you’re a bad leader, but because you’re leading from a clarity no one else can see. If you’re a Pleaser, you might be succeeding by every external metric while slowly hollowing out from the inside. If you’re a Seeker, you might be stuck in a frustration that feels permanent but is actually just a phase—if you’re willing to move through it.
And if you’re Aware, the question isn’t whether you’ve figured it out. It’s how you sustain it when everything in your environment is pulling you toward one type of self-awareness at the expense of the other.
Research from Rhee and Sigler demonstrates that self-awareness can be developed through systematic intervention—but only if you’re emotionally invested and willing [2]. Their study of a two-year leadership program showed that participants became significantly more accurate in their self-assessments when they had access to repeated feedback, a learning culture that supported risk-taking, and structured opportunities to recalibrate their self-perception [2].
But there’s a critical nuance here: introspection alone won’t get you there. In fact, Eurich’s research found that highly self-aware people asked “why” fewer than 150 times across all interview transcripts, while “what” appeared more than 1,000 times [1]. The difference matters.
Asking “Why” invites rumination, defensiveness, and invented answers that feel true to our brains, but are often wrong [1]. Asking “What” keeps you objective, future-focused, and empowered to act [1].
But willingness is the threshold issue. You can’t develop self-awareness you’re unwilling to examine. And you can’t examine it if you’re convinced you already have it.
🍵 Small Sips: Self-Awareness Practices by Archetype
Shifting awareness, regardless of archetype, isn’t a quick fix. They require repeated practice(s) designed to surface the gap between how you see yourself and how your leadership actually lands – observational ‘muscle’ building.
For Introspectors: The Perception Check-In
Practice: What would change if you asked someone you trust (a peer, a direct report): “What’s one thing I do that surprises you (positively or negatively)?”
Tea Tip: The key is to listen without defending, explaining, or correcting. Just receive it. Notice what it feels like to hear something about yourself that doesn’t match your internal narrative. Notice where in your body you feel any sensations. Then sit with the information before you decide what to do with it.
For Pleasers: The Values Audit
Practice: When was the last time you made a decision that felt right to you/your needs/values—even if someone felt disappointed by the decision? How did you benefit from honoring yourself?
Tea Tip: Track your decisions for a week. Note which ones were driven by external expectations and which ones came from internal conviction. Then ask: if you keep making decisions this way, where will you be in five years? And will you recognize yourself when you get there?
For Seekers: The Uncertainty Mapping
Practice: Where in your leadership do you feel most uncertain? What might that uncertainty be trying to reveal to you?
Tea Tip: Instead of rushing to resolve it, map it. What specifically feels unclear? What would it look like if you leaned into the curiosity of not-knowing an outcome, instead of away from it? Sometimes the discomfort of uncertainty is the only honest signal you have.
For the Aware: The Pressure Test
Practice: How do you sustain self-awareness when the pressure mounts? What’s the first thing that slips when you’re stretched?
Tea Tip: Notice your patterns under stress. Do you stop asking for feedback? Do you start performing? Do you retreat into certainty when you should be staying curious? The goal isn’t perfection. It’s noticing when the balance tips so you can recalibrate before it costs you.
The Work That Matters
Self-awareness is cultivable. But it’s not a solo sport.
The emotional intelligence research is clear: self-awareness sits at the foundation of every other leadership competency—self-management, empathy, relationship building, influence [3]. You can’t regulate what you don’t notice. You can’t connect authentically if you don’t know how you land. You can’t lead with integrity if you’re walled off to the gaps between your intentions and your impact.
And if you’ve been spinning your wheels alone—if you’ve read all the books, done all the assessments, and still feel like something’s not clicking—it might be time to call in a partner who can see what you can’t.
Because the most dangerous gap in leadership isn’t the one between where you are and where you want to be; it’s the one between who you think you are and how you actually show up. And the people around you? They notice the gaps daily.
You can’t close a gap you can’t see.
Which archetype resonated most? Leave a comment. Or better yet, share this with a colleague who needs to hear it. Sometimes the most valuable feedback comes from someone brave enough to send you a mirror.
References
[1] Eurich, T. (2018). What self-awareness really is (and how to cultivate it). Harvard Business Review. https://hbr.org/2018/01/what-self-awareness-really-is-and-how-to-cultivate-it
[2] Rhee, K., & Sigler, T. (2024). Can you develop self-awareness? Only if you are willing. Journal of Leadership Education, ahead-of-print. https://doi.org/10.1108/JOLE-02-2024-0045
[3] Goleman, D. (1998). Emotional intelligence framework and competencies. EI4Change. https://ei4change.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/Emotional-Intelligence-Framework-and-Competencies.pdf
♨️ I’m The Executive Tea Lady™, and believe in steeping leadership differently. If that’s your flavor too, join the conversation in The Monthly BREW™, a newsletter for those who know leadership is more than a title. Grab a cup here: https://i-matter-coaching-consulting.kit.com/newsletter