This morning I delivered a talk on Vulnerable Leadership to members of Ella Forums. One of the participants of the call was my long-time friend and the founder of Ella, as well as The Academy of Chief Executives before it, Brian Chernett. Brian sent me a message in the chat during the talk telling me to call him, he had a story to share with me.

My talk focuses on the disconnect between how we see leadership (leaders needing to be strong, resilient and leading from the front) and how we perceive vulnerability (weak, impacting the respect others have for us).

Brian mentors and coaches senior executives and he wanted to share a particular experience of his mentoring relationship with a CEO of a well-known British retail brand.

After three sessions, which seemed to be going well, Brian grew concerned that his invoices weren’t being paid. So he called the CEO and asked if there was a problem.

“Yes, there’s a problem with your invoices”, explained the CEO. “You have invoiced me for ‘mentoring and coaching services'”.

“Of course I have”, replied Brian, explaining that this was standard considering that was the service he was delivering.

“The problem”, responded the CEO, “is that my accounts team see the invoices. They will see that I’m being coached.”

I wasn’t shocked to hear this story at all, just disappointed. Despite all of the conversations about vulnerability, and its prominence in the media and books by the likes of Brené Brown and even me(!), we still hold onto our old perceptions of vulnerability equaling weakness.

Vulnerability is not a weakness, it’s a strength. Seeking out a different perspective and asking for and accepting help makes you stronger. We need to recognise this and change our mindset.

Brian explained this to his client, who paid happily. But we need to get to a place where we don’t keep on having to have this discussion. How many leaders are not seeking the support they need because they are concerned about how it will look?

Let’s embrace the help we need and shout from the rooftops about it, rather than pretending that we’re super-human and have all of the answers for ourselves.