Chad Silverstein explains why leaders hear more lies than anyone else: people tell them what they want to hear. The fix is a small group of trusted advisors willing to give hard feedback, and a leader willing to actually listen without getting defensive or bitter.
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If you're leading anything, you have a lot of people around you who will tell you what you want to hear. You're probably the last to find out something that's important. You're lied to more than anyone. It's kind of the gig if you're going to be a leader. You just have to accept it. It's actually normal. And when you're looked at as an authority figure, people are going to treat you different. And then when you're not the authority figure, it would change. And I've experienced that firsthand, so I can tell you it's real. And at the end of the day, you need to have a few people who will tell you the hard truth, and you have to be able to accept it. You have to be able to absorb it and then do something with it. And typically most people will just get bitter and they are overly sensitive and emotional about it, and they have to fight that tendency. And sometimes you're not going to want to do anything with the feedback, but when you have good feedback from people that you trust that are helping you see something you can't, then you actually have to do whatever it is that you're deciding that you have to do.