Know yourself before you learn from others

Have you ever tried to copy someone else, but then given up, because it just never felt like you?

A few weeks ago I caught up with Becky, an engineering manager who’d been through my 30 Day Communication Challenge.

She recently started paying closer attention to how other people lead, and changed who she was watching. Instead of the loudest, most dominant voices in the room, she looked for the people who lead the way she wanted to lead: the calm, respectful people who somehow got a room to listen without ever raising their voice.

She told me she picked up small things from them. One was simply pausing a couple more seconds before giving an answer. She tried it in her own meetings, and it worked. She noticed that her colleagues listened more intently.

Then she said the part I keep thinking about.

Before the challenge, she used to watch everyone. And because most of the people she watched were nothing like her, she had quietly come to a painful conclusion: that she could never be heard and seen as a leader, unless she became someone she wasn’t.
 

Maybe it’s not you. Maybe it’s your teacher.

Becky’s story got me thinking. How often do we get stuck, simply because we’re trying to learn from the wrong teacher?

Which led me to a bigger question. Who are the best teachers for us? Who do we actually learn the most from?
 

Why your brain learns better from people like you

For your brain to truly take in a new idea, especially one that challenges how you see the world, it first has to trust the person teaching it - both their intentions and their experience. Only then does the lesson sink in and stay.

Think of it like a locked door. Trust is the key. Without it, even the best advice just bounces off.

And the fastest way to earn that trust is to find someone you can relate to. There are two reasons this works.

The first is simple recognition. When you see someone who started where you are now, a part of your brain thinks, “Her path is possible for me too.” Suddenly their experience feels believable.

The second goes deeper. When you share something real with someone, like the same values, your brain reads them as safe rather than as a threat. Psychologists call this deep-level similarity, and it quietly lowers your guard just enough to let you learn.

So the honest answer to “who is the best teacher?” is this: it depends on you. You have to understand what makes you relate to someone, which means knowing your own values first. Then you can look at someone else and ask the real question: do we actually stand for the same things?

Before we go further, let’s clear something up. You might be wondering “But the people getting promoted around me are the loud, dominant ones. If I only learn from people like me, won’t I just stay stuck?”

I’m not telling you to ignore the people who aren’t like you. Watch all people in power, learn how the power dynamics work. But find at least one person who proves that your style, done well, can win too. That’s the person who finally stops you from trying to become a copy of someone you’re not.

Step #1: get clear on what you stand for

You can’t spot a teacher who shares your values until you’re clear on your own.

There’s an exercise built around exactly this in my book, The 5 Keys to Your Potential (it’s on page 174, if you have a copy). But if you want to start right now, reflect on these three questions:

• What did someone do recently that made you furious, or made you think, “How could they do that?” Anger almost always points to a value that’s been stepped on. If a colleague talking over you in a meeting made your blood boil, your value might be respect, or fairness.

• Who are you a little jealous of right now, and what exactly do they have that you want? Envy is a compass. We don’t envy things we don’t care about. If you envy the colleague who quit to travel the world, your value might be freedom.

• If you had to pick one thing you did in the last year that made you think, “Yes, that mattered,” what would it be? This shows you what feels meaningful to you. If it was helping a friend through a hard time, your value might be compassion, or loyalty.

Write down whatever comes up. Those words contain your values, what you stand for.

Step #2: check if they stand for the same things
 

Once you have someone in mind, you can get a feel for their values with two quick questions:

• What do they protect most fiercely: their time, their reputation, or their people? Someone who guards their time usually values independence. Someone who guards their reputation usually values achievement. Someone who guards their team usually values loyalty and connection. If you live for connection and they live for speed and efficiency, their way of leading and communicating may feel cold to you.

• When they talk about someone they admire, what are they praising? We tend to admire people who carry our own values. If they admire the rule-breaker who shook everything up, they value boldness. If they admire the steady hand who kept the team calm, they value order. Then ask yourself honestly: do I actually want to become the kind of person they admire?
   

The five-second gut check

If you’re short on time, there’s a quicker way. After you spend time with someone, ask yourself one thing:

“Do I feel lighter, or heavier, than I did before?”

Lighter usually means your values are being respected.

Heavier usually means something is clashing.

Why does this work? The neuroscientist Antonio Damasio found that your body often knows the answer before your mind does. His somatic marker hypothesis shows we carry physical signals, a tightness here or an ease there, that guide our choices faster than logic can. So that heavy feeling after a conversation is real information.

Once you’ve found them, here’s what to do

When you find the right teacher, learning from them feels easier almost straight away. But you can get even more from it if you watch them with real purpose. The next time you’re around them, notice:

• How do they handle a hard question they didn’t see coming?

• What does their “no” sound like? How do they push back without apologising for it?

• When someone else is talking, what are they doing with their eyes and their hands? And when they speak, how do they hold themselves?

Then pick one small thing, the way Becky picked up pausing for a couple of seconds before speaking, and try it this week. Adapt it until it feels like yours.

This is how real change happens. Over time, those small, genuine shifts are exactly what get you noticed for the next step up.

You don’t have to become someone else to lead. You just have to learn from the right someone.