People have forgotten how to be themselves at work. That's the thing I cannot unsee anymore: In meetings, workshops, even 1-on-1s - everyone's managing how they appear, avoiding judgement, signalling competence. The exhaustion starts before the conversation does.I write about the gap between who we are at work and who we are when we put down the professional mask. Every week, I share one personal story from my life and a podcast conversation with someone who dared to write their own script, choosing authenticity over performance. The podcast is called Unprofessionalism. Each episode comes with a 1-page summary, in case you'd rather read than listen.
The Value of Candid Feedback || 🎤 EP 25 on The Courage to Be Fully Human at Work with Mariam Halfhide
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Hi Reader, I sent a former client my new pitch deck and asked for his candid feedback. He replied fast. And candid he was! A long list of bullets that took me weeks to digest. He asked me if I collaborated with AI on it. Ouch. And pointed out that my uniqueness in the way I operate and facilitate didn't come through. In its current format, I would blend into the background of other leadership training providers was his conclusion. I first brushed it off, thinking that leadership training in 15 different languages should be a sufficient differentiating factor. It's ok not to be too different, otherwise I might scare big corporates off. I was telling myself that I wanted to build a boring business. A simple model without drama, no heroics, nothing that depends on me performing miracles every quarter. Boring, to me, was the goal. What I hadn't noticed is that somewhere I'd confused building a boring business with making it sound boring. Those are not the same thing. One is a strength. The other is just voiceless. And voiceless is exactly what the deck was. I'd written "leadership training" — because that's what I thought we offer and corporates buy. That's what the category says, that's the phrase that sounds credible in a room full of procurement people. But it isn't what we do. Thanks to the feedback I received, I realised that what we actually offer is training people skills for people who work with people. As soon as I wrote this down, I felt lighter and excited about our offer. It's specific, it's a little odd, and it's mine. I'd swapped it for the safe one without even noticing the trade. Why would my pitch deck sound so vanilla? Because the moment I opened the deck template, the professional reflex took over. And that reflex said: sound like your category, because sounding like a category reads as serious. Specificity feels risky. Sameness feels safe. So I reached for the language everyone reaches for, and it made me indistinguishable. That's what professionalism does. I do see the irony! If anyone should be immune to the vanilla-deck reflex, it's me. And I wasn't. The pull is automatic. It caught me on the one document where I most needed to sound like myself. The only reason I caught it is that someone refused to be polite. He's a former client who knows precisely what everyone else sounds like and luckily he knew that this wasn't me. He could have said "looks great, good luck." I did get that response from others. It would have been easy to listen to them and reject the odd one. I decided to do the opposite. The deck still isn't rewritten but the transformation has started. 🎤 Waiting for you on the Unprofessionalism podcast:This week's Professional Risk, inspired by Mariam Halfhide Telling someone honestly how their behaviour affected you, instead of hiding behind professionalism, blame or silence. This episode invites you to reflect on:
Most of us were trained how to behave professionally. Almost none of us were trained in how to handle frustration, disappointment, or hurt. So we hold it in, stay composed, and let it surface later as a clipped reply, a quiet withdrawal, or blame aimed at someone who never heard from us the true impact of their behaviour. The more “professional” we try to look, the harder an honest conversation becomes. Mariam Halfhide does the opposite, on purpose. When something gets to her, she doesn’t swallow it, and she doesn’t fire back — she steps away, settles herself, then goes to the person and tells them plainly how their behaviour landed on her, without assuming they meant harm. She’s found that these conversations end with more trust than they started. Across feedback, leadership, altered states and emotional regulation, she keeps returning to one question: how do you become more honest without becoming less trustworthy? Would you dare? The next time someone’s behaviour unsettles you, could you tell them how it landed on you — as a person, not a process — instead of letting it leak out as a rant or complaint? About the Guest Mariam Halfhide works at the intersection of AI strategy and human connection. Having lived and worked across many cultures, she brings a sharp perspective on adaptation, belonging, and the courage it takes to choose a workplace where more of yourself is welcome. 🎧 Click here to listen to the interview📥 Download my 1-page summaryThat's it from my side. I hope to see you next week! Myriam
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What does it cost to be yourself — at work?
People have forgotten how to be themselves at work. That's the thing I cannot unsee anymore: In meetings, workshops, even 1-on-1s - everyone's managing how they appear, avoiding judgement, signalling competence. The exhaustion starts before the conversation does.I write about the gap between who we are at work and who we are when we put down the professional mask. Every week, I share one personal story from my life and a podcast conversation with someone who dared to write their own script, choosing authenticity over performance. The podcast is called Unprofessionalism. Each episode comes with a 1-page summary, in case you'd rather read than listen.
Hi Reader, And suddenly it clicked into place. It took me almost half a year, more than thirty conversations, to finally land on an important nuance regarding unprofessionalism: It's more than courage, humanity, and authenticity. What really matters is the professional risk. An action only counts as unprofessional if it would trigger a "But you cannot do that!" from those around us. When I quit my day job to move to Amsterdam and redesign my life, that was courageous. It wasn't...
Hi Reader, This weekend I went through my wardrobe and threw out all skirts and dresses I'd kept for years. Since I left my day-job. I told myself to better keep them in case I still needed them - for client meetings, in-person events, important professional occasions. I kept them because they were expensive brands, great quality, still fitting. Fitting. My body yes but not my soul. A week earlier, I was in a bridal store, looking at myself in a dress, and the person I saw wasn't me anymore....
Hi Reader, The first thing I ask my podcast guests is to tell me a story about a time when they've been unprofessional. One story that was part of my keynote last week was when I was hosting an online workshop for a luxury German automotive company. I was still young but had embraced the concept of "connection before content" and so I opened the session with my now famous Turn to Your Neighbour moment. Not even one minute into the 1-1 breakout, I get a personal message from my client:...