Authenticity at Work: There Is Nothing to Do Except Be

Authenticity at Work – Reflection at Networking Event

Sometimes the moment of truth arrives quietly.

It doesn’t come as a crisis or a grand awakening. It comes mid-sentence - while your mouth keeps moving and your mind whispers, "This isn’t me, what am I doing?!" That’s what happened to me at a recent networking event.

It hit me mid-sentence

I was standing in a reception room somewhere in Leeds, making the usual small talk before a panel of inspirational key-note speakers. Someone asked about my background and without thinking, I slipped into the familiar script.

I spoke about twenty years in education, my work in school improvement, how my consultancy was born from a desire to support others. I’ve told that story countless times. But this time, as the words left my mouth, something strange happened.

It was as if I’d stepped out of myself and was watching from the ceiling. I could hear my voice, confident and polished, but it didn’t sound like me. It sounded like someone performing Nadine, not being her.

The moment of dissonance

I smiled in all the right places, nodded when expected, but inside I was thinking, When did I start quoting policy instead of purpose? I used to speak about people: the brilliance that sits behind job titles, the humanity behind the system.

And yet there I was, talking Ofsted, frameworks, accountability. Not wrong. Just hollow. Like I’d been distracted and began thinking authenticity at work meant looking credible rather than feeling true.

Losing centre is quiet business

It doesn’t happen with a crash. It seeps in through small moments: when you start softening your language to fit the room, or when your truth feels too much, too personal, too risky.

I’d started my company to help others hold on to their centre. To remind them that it’s possible to do the work well without losing themselves in it. And yet, here I was - well-dressed, well-spoken... and well off my own centre.

That’s the thing about authenticity at work. It’s not a posture. It’s not a LinkedIn headline. It’s how quietly aligned you feel when no one’s watching.

Authenticity at work isn’t performance. It’s how quietly aligned you feel when no one’s watching.

A subtle decision

Still mid-conversation, still nodding, I made a promise to myself:No more shrinking into what sounds right. No more speaking in borrowed language.

I don’t mean rebellion, I mean return. To the version of me who can talk about performance data and still ask, "How’s your heart?" To the level-headed woman who sees the person before the role and the soul before the system.

That night, I sat on the edge of my hotel bed and exhaled. It wasn’t a dramatic turning point, just a homecoming. Sometimes authenticity at work looks less like reinvention and more like remembering.

What changed after that

Once I stopped trying to sound like everyone else, the air cleared. My words became lighter. My work felt easier. Even my emails began to sound more like… me.

I still talk about standards and frameworks, but now they’re anchored differently. It’s not DfE first, humanity later, it’s both - side by side. It’s holding the line without losing the pulse.

That’s the kind of integrity I want in my work. Not performance, but presence. Not perfection, but wholeness.

If you’ve ever felt yourself slipping

Maybe you’ve had that moment too - mid-meeting, mid-sentence, mid-career - when you suddenly catch yourself performing competence instead of living truth.

If you have, it doesn’t mean you’re lost. It means you’ve noticed. And noticing is how we find our way back.

Authenticity at work 

It isn’t something to market. It’s a quiet, daily practice. It's the courage to keep sounding like yourself, even when the room rewards the opposite.

Sometimes it begins with one simple whisper: I’m going to lean into my own path again.