Leading Like a Human: Dismantling the Myth of Rational Leadership

In this episode of the Impostor Syndrome Files, we’re talking about one of the biggest blind spots in leadership today—the difference between leading from fear and leading with trust. So many of us were taught to prioritize logic, results, and control in the workplace. But the truth is, we’re emotional beings, not rational machines. And when we ignore the emotional side of leadership, we unintentionally create environments where fear—not engagement—drives behavior. My guest this week is Thomas Gelmi, a global leadership expert who helps organizations strengthen what he calls “human skills”—the emotional intelligence and self-awareness needed to lead with empathy, humility, and trust. In this conversation, we talk about why so many leaders get promoted despite emotional blind spots, and how this disconnect impacts psychological safety, performance, and retention. We also explore the emotional cost of high pressure, what makes 360 feedback so powerful, and how leaders can begin shifting from fear-based habits to more confident, connected leadership. If you’ve ever wondered whether emotional intelligence really matters in the workplace, this episode makes the business case—loud and clear.

About My Guest

Executive Coach Thomas Gelmi has been a trusted advisor to leaders and their teams for more than two decades. His programs, which have attracted roughly 10,000 participants from nearly 90 countries, reflect his adaptability and appeal across cultures and industries. Thomas works in four languages and his clients range from global corporations to SMEs and private individuals worldwide.

Thomas draws on an extraordinary biography with exciting milestones, such as his many years as a Maître de Cabine, leading cabin crew at Swissair, and eight years as operations manager of an international leadership development company. In addition to his extensive professional experience, he also gathered years of experience as a trained caregiver, providing psychological assistance to victims in crises, accidents, and other extreme situations.

Since 2020, Thomas Gelmi has been a member of the prestigious Forbes Coach Council, an invitation-only community of leading business coaches whose members are selected based on their extensive and diverse experience. He is a long-term member of the International Coaching Federation (ICF), whose values and quality standards guide his work.

Thomas Gelmi was born in 1968 and lives near Zurich, Switzerland.

~

Connect with Thomas:

Facebook (Personal): https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1281120751

Facebook (Business): https://www.facebook.com/thomas.gelmi/

LinkedIn: http://ch.linkedin.com/in/thomasgelmi

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thomasgelmi

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@thomasgelmi

TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@thomas.gelmi

Forbes Coaches Council: https://councils.forbes.com/profile/Thomas-Gelmi-Executive-Coach-Author-Speaker-Movadis-AG/218c4216-aa76-4b18-9223-b8f3e345da87

~

Connect with Kim and The Impostor Syndrome Files:

Join the free Impostor Syndrome Challenge.

Learn more about the Leading Humans discussion group

Join the Slack channel to learn from, connect with and support other professionals.

Join the Facebook group.

Schedule time to speak with Kim Meninger directly about your questions/challenges.

Connect on LinkedIn

Websites: https://kimmeninger.com

Transcript

Kim Meninger

Welcome, Thomas. It is so great to have you here today, and I'd love to start by inviting you to tell us a little bit about yourself.

Thomas Gelmi

Thank you so much for inviting me to your show, Kim. It's my pleasure to be here my story. Oh, how much time you have. Okay, now, all joking aside, my story is a colorful one, and it's not, certainly not a straight line or a linear, you know, career like, like some may have, it's more of a zigzag. It's been more of a zigzag path that has a red threat, though, in retrospect, and maybe I'll get there, but, but let me maybe start by telling you what I do today and then how I got there, right? [That'd be great.] So today, I've been in the domain of leadership development for over 20 years, almost 25 years now. So I work with people in leading positions in organizations of any kind, across industries, across cultures, been working worldwide, helping them rediscover and further develop what is often referred to as soft skills. I call them human skills, or even essential skills, right? Maybe we can talk a little bit more about that further down the conversation. So how did I get there? Well, I earned my first money when I was 16 by cutting people's hair. So I did an apprenticeship three years as a hair stylist because I wanted to work with people. I wanted to do something that has to do with creating something beautiful, right? Maybe also work with my hands. And so I chose that, and I did it for three years, and then I thought, hmm, yeah, nice, but that cannot be it for the rest of my life, right? So I did a bit of job hopping, I would say, trying out things, not really sure, what was mine to pursue. And I ended up working for a circus for one and a half years and touring around living in the trailer. Interestingly, they, they were looking for a press spokesperson, and that's what I also did sometimes when I work there. So what I really did was everything, right? It's a small it was a small circus, and we're only touring in Switzerland, but I learned, you know, working with my hands, but not in by cutting hair, but really hard labor, right, lifting stuff and going climbing up the masts to hang up the, the spotlights and stuff like that, and driving a big truck with a hanger. So, very important lessons for me, good life lessons, but it was a transitory thing. Right from the beginning, it was clear that this is also just one experience. And then luckily, I applied for a job as a flight attendant for the former Swiss Airline, Swiss Air, because they were looking for cabin personnel, and that was the first time when I really, really thought, Wow, that's a perfect match. I speak four languages, so I could use the languages I love working with people. I'm a service-minded person by nature, so and I love traveling, so I got the whole package, and I quickly moved up into leading cabin crew. So I became an in-flight manager, or person how it's called, for some airlines, and, and then the airline grounded, went bankrupt in 2001 shortly after 911 and that was the moment when I thought, good, another chapter that I close, and I'm going to open a new one, which eventually then got me into what I do today, first as an, as an employee for eight years, and then I started my own business. So looks like a bit of hopping, you know, from one corner to the other, but the red threat looking back is always people, people and having conversations, having meaningful, deep conversations with people, which I already did while cutting their hair.

Kim Meninger

Yeah, those are always the deepest conversations, right?

Thomas Gelmi

Yeah, and sometimes conversations you don't actually want to have, but you have to, because you're like, you're there.

Kim Meninger

So can we talk a little bit about the people side of leadership development, which sounds so ridiculous, because obviously leaders are people, but it seems like something that we're still trying to figure out.

Thomas Gelmi

Yes, yes. I'm glad we can talk about it because we have to talk about it. I cannot stress that enough, you see the work of a manager happens in a triangle between the manager the tasks and the people that accomplish the tasks. So there's a task side, a factual, rational facts and figures side, that's called management. You manage tasks, you manage processes, etc, etc, and then the people side is called Leadership, because you can't manage people well, you can manage a payroll, you can manage headcount, right? But you have to lead people. And talking about this human side of the managerial role, the leadership side seems so. Seems a lot like common sense. Many of the things that I focus on in my work could be considered common sense. The problem is, or the challenge is, that, when we look into organizations and we observe how people work together, how people lead others or manage others, common sense is often not so common. So what seems logical like? For example, if someone has an issue or a concern and wants to talk to me. I should be listening. I should be taking the time. I should be listening. And I should be listening with the intention to understand the person how they're doing with regards to what they're talking about. And, of course, the content logical, right? And that's what we do when we talk to our best friends or they talk to us, right? So empathy and willingness to understand and curiosity come very naturally in these situations, in a business context, in the work environment, where pressure is up and time is low as a resource, right? A lot of pressure, little time. So everybody's driven, driven, driven, stressed out. This doesn't come so naturally, right? And then you, if you observe a little bit in your meetings, you can observe, or you can see that many people are not listening to understand. They are listening to answer, or they are listening to win, and the only thing they're doing is they pretend to be listening while they're actually waiting for it to be their turn. Again, that was a very simple example, but that's, that's why we have to talk about it.

Kim Meninger

Yeah, yes, you're absolutely right. And you know, not, not to over-complicate this conversation, but one of the things that I think about a lot, I have a degree in psychology, and that's really how I see the world. And I think we tend to, I joke sometimes. we tend to assume that the people that we're working with, including ourselves, are operating from a rational place, but we're not. [No, we're not.] We're operating from a place of fear a lot of the time, a lot of insecurity, that's happening, and that's what drives so much of our behavior, and a lot of even just what you're talking about is I'm not listening to understand because I need to prove myself, or I need to defend myself, right? Or, you know, there's all these other drivers under the surface, and that gets really complicated when you're working with people and you're assuming that they're all making rational decisions.

Thomas Gelmi

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And there's, there's actually proof for that, from a neuroscientific perspective, and also from, from a psychological perspective, of course, that we are not thinking beings, rational thinking beings that also have emotions somewhere down in the basement that only come in our way, right? Especially in the business world, it's exactly the other way around. We are emotional beings more than anything, that also, evolutionary speaking, developed the ability to think rationally and the ability for language and numbers. Much later, much, much, much, it's more re much more recent thing, right? So, in fact, emotions are the driving force most of our moment-by-moment decisions we make unconsciously and based on our emotional state. And you mentioned fear, right? Yes, in the in the worst case, we are in a state of fear, anxiety, emotional stress, and this drives our actions and behaviors. In the best case, it's a different emotional mix that drives that drives us, including a different biochemical state in our body, with different, different substances being predominantly present in our body, as in emotions like excitement or, or, or passion or enthusiasm, joy, curiosity, Not all of them are emotions, but this the state we're in, and this is what I often immediately my leadership development programs or my coachings with, with leaders, call the emotional balance sheet, like a bank account, any relationship we have, and also any event like our conversation here today, for example, has an emotional value, an emotional balance sheet. And this balance sheet can be positive or negative. It's in the plus when we experience predominantly positive, predominantly pleasant emotions. And it doesn't have to be yeah and sunshine and lollipop and roses, right? It doesn't have to be that extreme. It's enough if both of us feel at ease, and we feel there's respect for each other, there's trust, and we're safe. We're both safe in this conversation. That's good enough for us to be in a positive emotional balance, balance, right? If the balance sheet is in the red zone, in the negative meaning, we both experience predominantly negative emotions, or emotional stress, to be more precise, because we feel We're like, we're treating this treated disrespectfully, or you talk to me, or I talk to you from a one-up position, like I know it all. You know nothing. Let me tell you how it works. This creates an emotional state of inferiority and, and it's not going to have the same effect, right? So people who feel at ease and who feel safe show a completely different behavior, as opposed to people who are managed by fear and on and are in constant emotional stress, which is the norm For many people in much too many organizations, right? And because of that, because of that, I mean, if, if you think about it for just one minute, it's totally logical what we're talking about, however, it is very often completely neglected, because managers want to be rational factual. You can also hear it when you listen to people how they say, Yeah, let's have a rational conversation. Let's focus on the facts, right, as in, let's leave everything that's emotional out of the equation, because that's bad. It isn't. It's actually the key, and it can be the game-changer, right? Of course, what these people think of when they say that is, stay away with emotional meltdowns or emotional outbursts. Yeah, of course, nobody wants that. Nobody wants that. But that's not what we're talking about, all right? So, yeah, very, very relevant. That's why I call them human skills.

Kim Meninger

So can you talk a little bit more about that? Because I think what I have an MBA. I was taught, you know, leadership. I was taught all of the different functional aspects of management. We were not taught about emotions, how to manage our own, how to manage others. So when you talk about the, the key being to bring those emotions in, right? [Yeah. What are we missing? What are we doing wrong?

Thomas Gelmi

We think it's not important. You know, I just recently saw a snippet of an interview with Elon Musk, and he was asked what the greatest weakness of humanity is, and he literally said the biggest weakness of humanity is empathy. No comment on that. So that's the biggest mistake we make. Yeah, we think humans are machines. And, and if we, if we keep everything that's emotional out of the equation, that's when we can focus on the work. That's when we can perform, that's when we can win the race, right? It's exactly the other way around. It's exactly the other way around. The more our digitalization progresses, the more we get digital, the more we have ways of exchanging data, the more artificial intelligence penetrates the businesses, the more we need to pay attention to the human side, because 100% of customers of any organization are human beings, and 100% of all employees in any organization are human beings. So, you know, I tend to say, regardless of whether you're in a B to B business or in a B to C business, it's always H to H, human to human. Hence, the principles apply the human principles apply, and they are more than anything emotional, and that's nothing new. We're not reinventing the wheel here. Daniel Goleman wrote emotional intelligence in 1995 and he already then said that many managers were great individual contributors and have a high intellectual intelligence, but Many are not successful because they lack emotional intelligence or many fail because of that. You know, up to 70% of all change projects in organizations fail, according to McKinsey, why do they fail? Exactly because the human side of it, the human side of change is ignored. And you know, if there is change or transition on the outside, the change that's happening that I have to go through as a human being, which nowadays is constant, constant change. There's also something happening inside me, and that's called transition. And change can be fast, but transition is usually slow. It lags behind, and that part of helping people go through the inner transition, when confronted with change, is ignored, neglected. People are left alone. People are left alone, right and, yeah, a lot of damage is caused because of that, or by that, a lot of mental health issues originate in one way or another, from the neglect of and ignorance of emotional intelligence, and it's important. And finally, maybe, to close the answer to your question, what are we doing wrong? We're not developing these skills. These are things that should be taught in primary school, actually in kindergarten. Yeah, and primary school, and all through, all steps in our education system and career paths the development of personality, and the longer I am in this field of leadership development, the more often I get confirmation that leadership development is not about learning methods and techniques and having tools and developing skills in how to apply these tools. Leadership Development is personality development, nothing more, nothing less, because if you develop a leadership personality that includes emotional intelligence. The tools and methods and techniques are just add-ons you could you can even go without [yes] because people will follow you.

Kim Meninger

So how do you get people who either don't see the value of what we're talking about, or maybe fear making this kind of change, because it makes them more vulnerable in a way that they've probably been trying to protect themselves from. And it really can't as I'm listening to you and thinking about, how do we do this work successfully. So much of it has to start with ourselves, right? And so what's the, I hate to say it this way, but what's the what's the business case for these people who you know, maybe Elon Musk is an extreme example, but for people who truly believe empathy doesn't belong in the world.

Thomas Gelmi

Well, the business case is very simple. People who feel engaged and empowered and motivated and who feel good about themselves and who feel confident will always be more productive than people who function under fear and do what they have to do because they're taught, they're told to and that do the minimum they have to do so that they don't get into trouble, but not an inch more. That's a big difference, and that in itself, is a business case because in the end, bottom line is about productivity and profitability. That's one another. One is the challenge that many organizations have worldwide, to find the right people and to bind the right people, or, like when you found them, keep them so employee engagement and loyalty. And I mean, if you want to attract good people, you have to make promises. Of course, when you have them on board, you have to fulfill the promises, keep your word and create a climate of psychological safety in which people thrive and blossom and flourish like flowers, right? And that has a lot to do with leadership, and very often, the lack of leadership and the lack of emotional intelligence in leadership leads to good people leaving the company, not because they don't like the job, but because they're leaving their manager because it doesn't work on the relationship level, and they're not being treated according to their level of maturity and as human beings. So that's the business case. This is not about, you know, well well-being, and, and, and sugar coating, you know, and avoiding tough conversations, etc. It's the opposite of that. It's about creating an environment in the climate that is safe enough for people to have the tough conversations, to speak up when they have a different opinion, to say, I need support. I know I don't know what to do next, to admit a mistake, and it's safe because we're learning from it. And this is based on facts, right? Google has done an extensive study. Was called the project Aristotle global study with, I think, almost 200 teams where they, where they analyze the main drivers and success factors for high-performing teams. And of course, they came up with all sorts of things like diverse. Diversity in a team, for example, right? Different, different personality styles, different experiences, different competences, yes, etc, etc. But number one, number one is a climate of psychological safety. Basically what I just described and closely after is empathy. And empathy, it's known that teams with a high level of emotional intelligence, high level of empathy also have a higher collective intelligence, so more creativity, more innovation, more problem better problem-solving. It's all tied to that. It all comes back to that. And so you ask, How can we get there, right? How do we can we create or develop these things in leaders? Well, everything, every change, starts with awareness. And in this case, it's problem awareness and, and problem awareness based on humility, meaning understanding that I might be at least part of the problem. I, as a leader, might be part of the problem, and, and, and the courage to say, Okay, let's look at this. And the tool, very concretely I often use for that is so called 360 degree feedback process where a leader, who's my coaching client, for example, collects, of course, I do that for them. We collect feedback, but from the main stakeholders that work with that leader, and we, we summarize that feedback in a in an anonymized way, so that it's safe to give this feedback. And I look at this and go through it and do a debriefing with the leader, and then, you know, drawing conclusions and setting focus areas for a coaching process. So that's, that's one thing, and then the other thing is to just raise awareness by talking about it as often as, as we can like in this opportunity that you're giving me to talk about this. And I just had, I have a Tiktok channel, you know, and I just, I just posted a short reel, I think, three weeks ago now, where I where I named the main reasons why good people leave an organization. The Post has reached 1.4 million views in the past three weeks, and I think over 30,000 comments of people who basically all say the same thing, yes, that's exactly why I left. That's exactly my story. You just nailed it. These are exactly the reasons why I left, and they all have to do with this. You know, lack of purpose, not being treated fairly, leaders, not acting on, you know, toxic team members, or even being toxic themselves. You know, spreading fear negativity and creating, actually, a climate of psychological danger or psychological threat. So, so it's, it's, it's huge. It's a big, big, big topic, and it would be so easy, well, maybe not easy, but simple to change it simple, but not easy. And that's why I support people with, with coaching right and development programs that support this change.

Kim Meninger

Yeah, I'm glad you brought up coaching, and I'm glad you brought up the 360 because I think that's a really great starting point for anybody who's thinking about evaluating their own leadership ability where there may be opportunities to do some work, right, is really starting with ourselves in that way.

Thomas Gelmi

Exactly, exactly, and yeah, it takes, as I said, a bit of humility and courage, humility, courage and discipline. Right then, but, yeah. But the challenge there is that if you're a manager and you made it like up to where you are today, and you've reached a certain level in the organization. Hmm. It is very tempting to say, well, I made it up to here. Can it be that wrong? Can it? [Exactly right? Must be doing something right.] I must be doing something right. And now you're, you're telling me I need to change. Not so sure, right? So, so yes, and I totally get it that you can become successful, quote-unquote, or that you can move up the organizational hierarchy, the organization ladder, without being very emotionally intelligent, but by being dominant and, you know, walk over people and all of that, but not because This is required to become a successful manager and climb the ladder, not because it is important to have these qualities, but because these are the qualities that are often incentivized in organizations. That's the reason.

Kim Meninger

Yes, you're absolutely right.

Thomas Gelmi

We yeah, we even know that, you know, with more female leadership, that often brings in more emotional intelligence, etc, etc, there are positive effects on, on the business, like better governance, etc, etc, etc, right? So. [You're right.] I get it that someone thinks, Why change? And the key is to make them aware that they're not only successful because of how they do things, but also despite.

Kim Meninger

Despite is an important word there, yes.

Thomas Gelmi

So I am a manager, also despite things I say or do or how I treat people, but you know, the higher up in hierarchy you climb, the less you get candid feedback. The less are the people who honestly, openly tell you, you know what it would be really good if you could just stop that, because it's annoying everybody, and it's actually demotivating the entire team. So I thought I'd tell you that, yeah, because how can I change something if nobody tells me? That's right.] And that's where the 360 comes in because the 360 gives a platform, gives an opportunity for the feedback givers to do it in a safe way, and for the leader to collect it in a way that is helpful, that can be kind of a wake-up call sometimes, and that is, of course, structured in a way that makes it digestible, also with the support of a coach that leads the conversation. Right. [You're right.] These are the tools.

Kim Meninger

Well, and it also strikes me that for people you mentioned that the importance of humility, which I couldn't agree with you more. But there is something kind of scary about feeling like, Oh no, I'm doing things wrong. And what if, it strikes me that maybe the frame we can put around it is, what if I could be even better?

Thomas Gelmi

That's exactly yeah, and that's exactly how the entire process is framed. Of course, it's not about finding out what somebody's doing wrong. It's about uncovering blind spots and shedding lights onto further potential for improvement and more effective leadership and easier leadership like achieving results with less effort, right? Because you create less friction and less pushback and less resistance in people. So it's not and coaching and leadership development is not deficit oriented is very strongly resource oriented, like, how can I get even better than I would ever have expected?

Kim Meninger

Yes, exactly, exactly. And since this is your area of expertise, Thomas, where can people find you if they want to learn more about your work and just stay connected to you?

Thomas Gelmi

Yeah, well, there's various ways. You just Google my name and you'll find vast information. You can go directly to my website, which is Gelmi written with a G, uh, dot coach. You can find me on LinkedIn, on Instagram, and on Tiktok.

Kim Meninger

Well, those links will be in the show notes and thank you again. I really appreciate your insights, and I appreciate your work. Thank you.

Thomas Gelmi

Thank you. Thank you for the opportunity.