The Audition I Didn’t Know I Was In

I didn’t realise I was auditioning.

Not for a job — I already had one.

Not for credibility — I believed I’d earned that too.

I was auditioning for belonging.

To be liked.

To be chosen.

To be let into rooms where influence lived.

And the thing about auditions is this: you don’t show who you truly are. You show who you think they want. You soften your edges, quiet your instincts, and read the room more carefully than your own values. Slowly, almost invisibly, you trade authenticity for acceptance.

That’s where this story begins. Not with conflict or collapse, but with ambition, admiration, and a very human desire to matter.

At the time, I didn’t yet have the language for what I now believe deeply:

Leadership is not a solo performance, it is a relational act, built on trust, courage, and psychological safety.

I was about to learn that lesson the hard way.

The House Was Never Just a House

It started with a house. A real one.

A big house, perched high, confidently overlooking everything beneath it. The kind of place that doesn’t need to announce success — it embodies it.

I was there to collect my franchise equipment. Fresh into a new chapter as a franchisee within a national education organisation, I expected a practical handover. What I walked into instead felt like a glimpse into another world.

The setup was polished. Professional. Powerful. The conversations were fast, full of shorthand and inside jokes. The people around the leader moved with ease, comfortable in proximity to influence.

I remember thinking, bloody hell… this is impressive. And then, quietly, I want to be part of this.

Not because I wanted power. Not because I wanted status. I wanted to learn. To grow. To belong. To matter.

I didn’t get tricked. I walked in willingly.

But what I didn’t yet understand — and what I now see with painful clarity — is this:

The closer you get to performative power, the more it starts performing on you.

Admiration, left unchecked, becomes imitation.

Becoming a Leader for the Wrong Reasons

From that moment on, I was in motion.

Every “yes” felt like opportunity. Every long day felt like commitment. Every mile travelled across the country felt like proof that I deserved to be there. I worked relentlessly — not just to deliver, but to be seen delivering.

I wasn’t chasing excellence. I was chasing approval.

The version of me that emerged — let’s call him Performance Andy — wasn’t dishonest. But he was edited. More agreeable. Less challenging. Constantly scanning for cues about what leadership wanted from him.

And the system rewarded that.

I became National Training Officer, then Director, then Shareholder. I travelled nationally, built training systems, grew networks, supported franchisees, and helped generate significant value for the organisation. I was proud of that work, and rightly so.

Each promotion felt like confirmation:

They see me. They trust me. I belong.

Leadership research tells us this is a dangerous moment. Identity-based leadership theory shows that when belonging is conditional on performance rather than values, leaders begin to shape themselves to the system, instead of shaping the system itself.

Climbing the wrong ladder doesn’t feel wrong… until the wall it’s leaning against begins to crumble.

Giving Everything Except My Boundaries

As my influence grew, so did my investment.

Not just time and money, though I invested both — but my creative capital. Ideas. Strategies. Frameworks. Ways of working I’d developed over years. I gave them freely because I believed in the bigger picture.

I was paid. But I was also giving away parts of myself in the hope that one day it would all feel aligned.

Looking back now, I can see the truth clearly:

I outsourced my self-worth to a structure that didn’t know how to hold it.

I thought I was being loyal. I thought I was being a team player. In reality, I was ignoring my own limits.

Brené Brown says it best:

“Fitting in is not belonging. Fitting in is becoming who you think you need to be in order to be accepted.”

I wasn’t belonging. I was fitting in.

And the person I became during that period fills me with dread now, because authenticity is not optional in leadership. It is foundational.

The Echo Chamber: When Leadership Replicates Itself

One of the hardest truths I’ve had to face since stepping away is this: narcissistic leadership doesn’t just harm people directly — it replicates itself.

These systems don’t just create followers. They create echoes.

I saw this clearly in someone I worked closely with. Someone brought into the organisation not because they challenged the leadership, but because they admired it. A fan. Almost a mirror. Same language. Same certainty. Same confidence, but without curiosity.

At the time, I mistook this for alignment. For loyalty. For shared ambition.

I see it differently now.

Leadership research shows that when power is centred on ego rather than values, organisations produce minions, not leaders. People who learn that proximity matters more than integrity. That success is measured by money and positioning, not collective progress.

There was no celebration of others. No joy in shared success. Every conversation bent toward personal outcome. Every decision filtered through “What’s in it for me?”

And underneath it all sat fear.

A deep aversion to risk. A terror of losing. Loss aversion in its purest form, where playing safe feels smarter than growing forward. Big talk. Small courage.

Edgar Schein warned that culture is shaped by what leaders reward and tolerate. In narcissistic systems, people quickly learn that questioning is dangerous, vulnerability is weakness, and empathy is optional. Over time, those behaviours spread.

What made this particularly painful was the performance of friendship. Warmth on the surface. Monitoring underneath. Attention masquerading as care.

Narcissistic cultures breed surveillance disguised as connection.

I don’t write this with anger. I write it with sadness.

Because this is what happens when leadership is modelled as dominance rather than service. When success is measured only in money. When happiness is found not in shared achievement, but in the relative failure of others.

Leadership is contagious. And when the wrong behaviours are rewarded, they spread.

When the Music Stops, the Silence Is Deafening

Then came the changes.

Uncertainty. Strategic shifts. My role no longer secure. I was told to apply for a new role, despite being told I would “definitely get it.” If the outcome was predetermined, why the theatre?

I ignored the warning sign.

I got the role. It wasn’t right for me. And the person brought in above me — a new CEO — was set up to fail almost immediately. Not because he lacked ability, but because the system around him was broken.

This role existed because of an acquisition I had no involvement in. The company acquired was rotten from the inside: fraud investigations, compliance failures, reputational risk. Within weeks I was handling inspections and crisis calls at weekends.

Peter Senge reminds us:

“Today’s problems come from yesterday’s solutions.”

This was exactly that.

When Systems Break, So Do People

I stayed quiet. Silence had become my protection.

I didn’t want to be seen as difficult or disloyal. Meanwhile, I was being held accountable for problems I hadn’t created, while the areas I had built were stripped away.

Then COVID hit.

I delivered furlough conversations, redundancies, and reassurance I didn’t believe in. Every conversation felt like a moral injury.

And leadership — the leadership that spoke publicly about values and wellbeing — disappeared.

Ronald Heifetz wrote:

“Leadership is about staying present in the heat.”

They didn’t stay.

Breaking Point: When Leadership Nearly Cost Me My Life

Eventually, I broke.

I tried to take my own life.

I didn’t break because I was weak. I broke because I had been consumed.

I was no longer a person. I was a resource. And once depleted, I was quietly discarded.

The damage wasn’t loud. It was slow, procedural, psychological. Narcissistic leadership doesn’t shout — it extracts. And when you resist, punishment becomes administrative.

You don’t get attacked. You get erased.

Whilst this wasn’t the only reason for me breaking, it was this experience that ultimately made it snap — the straw that broke the camel’s back.

The Philosophy Forged in Fire

And yet, somehow, I am grateful.

Because this experience forged my leadership philosophy.

I believe leadership is fundamentally about helping people become who they do not yet believe they can be. It is not a solo performance. It is relational. Built on trust, psychological safety, and Adult–Adult communication.

Leadership is the transfer of emotion and the creation of meaning.

My role is to set direction, build culture, nurture capability, and develop leaders who will one day surpass me. Legacy matters — not titles, not awards, but the impact we leave on people.

I surround myself with people smarter than me who don’t yet believe they are, help them believe, let them follow first, learn next, and eventually lead, while I lead from behind.

That is leadership.

If You See Yourself in This

You are not weak. You are not ungrateful. You are not broken.

You are responding normally to an unhealthy system.

And stepping away might just save your life and your leadership.

Take Two Minutes. Right Now.

Breathe. Feel your feet on the floor.

You are here. You are learning. You are leading.

And your leadership — rooted in care, courage, humility, and humour — might just be the example someone else needs.

Thanks for reading.