The Invisible Hand

 Reading time: 5 minutes

1. Something Feels Off, but You Can’t Name It Yet

You’re experienced. You know your job. You want to lead well. And yet… something keeps getting in the way. You hesitate when it’s time to speak. You say yes when you mean no. You wait too long to act. You overthink what others forget in five minutes. You hold back your best ideas—or rush to fix everyone else’s mess.

Nothing dramatic. Nothing obvious. But day after day, these small choices add up. And somehow, you’re not moving forward the way you expected.

Initially, you might blame your workload, the team, the pressure. But deep down, you suspect it’s something else. A quieter force, harder to name, like an invisible hand pulling the strings from the inside, keeps you stuck.

That’s what this article is about. It is about those familiar patterns within you, that you know so well, that you accepted them to be YOU.

Still, they’re not. Once you learn to spot them, you’ll see how much more is possible. These patterns do not define you, and once you learn to spot them and understand their meaning, you are free to break from them.

2. It’s Not You. It’s Just the Voice You’ve Learned to Listen To

Every manager has an internal voice that sounds like reason. It tells you to be careful, to wait, to say something nicer, to double-check before you decide.

Sometimes this voice is very critical and makes you your worst enemy. Other times, this voice doesn’t shout. It whispers, and talks to you in a friendly manner, and often it almost fools you into that it cares about you. And because it feels familiar, you trust it.

But mind it: that voice is not always working in your favour. In fact, it’s often the source of the hesitation, the overload, the stress you can't quite explain.

Psychologists call it a saboteur - a mental habit built long ago, meant to protect you. But in the world of leadership, often this protection is misplaced and comes at the cost of progress.

The good news is that the saboteur is not who you are. It is just a behavioural shortcut, a pattern, a default setting of your response to external challenges in an attempt to establish your emotional and sometimes even your physical safety.

It learned its job early - maybe when you got praised for being the smart one, the helpful one, the perfect one, the one in control or the one smelling the danger faster than the others. So it stuck around.

Now, it shows up as self-doubt masked as caution. Or perfectionism disguised as high standards. Or silence pretending to be diplomacy. It can even show up as over-functioning. You fix things that aren’t yours to fix. You chase performance but don’t feel it’s enough. You’re always “on.”

That voice isn’t bad. It’s just outdated. It was built for safety, not leadership. And the more you identify with it, the harder it becomes to lead from clarity and courage.

More good news? You can change the relationship you have with that voice. But first, you need to know what it sounds like.

3. Ten Inner Patterns That Steer You Off Track

Each saboteur has a voice, a tone, and a logic that once helped you feel safe, capable, or in control. And each person has met with all ten saboteurs because this is human nature.

However, for any person in a leadership role, awareness about these patterns is extremely important. Because these saboteurs tend to distort reality and silently sabotage one’s decisions, relationships, and results. In leadership, it is better to be your wise self in control and not any of the following saboteurs. 

Here’s what they sound like—and what they cost you:

The Judge

“I should’ve known better.”

“They are never on time with their part.”

“Nobody is listening to me because I have not been invested with formal authority.” 

 You focus on what’s missing, what went wrong, or where someone disappointed you. Including yourself. It sharpens your inner critic and makes you see people as problems, not partners.

Impact: You become harder to approach, and your team stops taking initiative. It will be hard for you to initiate and maintain collaboration and you will try your best to shield yourself and be prepared in case others will attack you.

The Avoider

“Let’s not stir the waters now.”

You downplay tension, delay difficult conversations, or stay silent when something feels off.

Impact: Problems fester. Confusion grows. And trust erodes quietly.

The Controller

“If I don’t stay on top of it, things fall apart.”

You micromanage, override others, or drive too hard. Your high standards mask anxiety.

Impact: You burn out, and so tend to do people in your team or your neighbourhood (think of your loved ones).

The Hyper-Achiever

“Only results matter.”

You chase goals relentlessly, but you link your worth to success. You hide vulnerability and push through.

Impact: Your team sees the ambition but not the human behind it. Empathy weakens.

The Hyper-Rational

“Feelings cloud logic.”

You rely heavily on facts, systems, and analysis. You stay detached and avoid emotional dynamics.

Impact: Colleagues may see you as cold or distant, and resist alignment even when your logic is sound.

The Hyper-Vigilant

“What if this goes wrong?”

You scan constantly for risks, threats, or worst-case scenarios. You’re always bracing for impact.

Impact: You create a climate of anxiety, where confidence and trust can’t take root.

The Pleaser

“I’ll take care of it.”

You say yes too often, carry others’ weight, and avoid conflict to keep harmony.

Impact: You build dependency, lose focus, and quietly resent the load you carry.

The Restless

“Next!”

You’re always chasing the next idea, opportunity, or challenge. Stillness feels like stagnation.

Impact: Your team struggles to keep up. Projects lose momentum. Priorities blur.

The Stickler

“There’s a right way to do this.”

You obsess over details, correctness, or structure. You hold yourself and others to rigid standards.

Impact: Progress slows. Delegation suffers. Innovation stalls.

The Victim

“No one sees how hard this is.”

You feel unappreciated, overwhelmed, or misunderstood. You carry a quiet sense of being stuck.

Impact: You drain energy from the team and isolate yourself from potential support.

4. How These Patterns Distort Decisions and Drain Leadership Energy

Leadership isn’t just about what you decide. It’s about how you get to that decision.

When a saboteur is in charge, the process behind your choices shifts quietly, but significantly. You still move forward, but not from clarity. You move from fear, pressure, or a deep need to prove something. And over time, that costs more than you think.

You think you're avoiding conflict: you are actually avoiding clarity.

You think you're being strategic: you are actually stuck in perfection.

You think you're driving results: you are actually bypassing connection.

Let’s say the Controller is loud in your mind. You’ll feel a constant urge to double-check, push harder, and override opinions. You might get the project done faster, but people stop giving their best ideas. You won the sprint but lost the trust.

Or imagine the Pleaser pattern at play. You delay giving feedback to protect someone’s feelings. You overextend, stay quiet in meetings or volunteer for things that aren’t your job. The team sees you as supportive, but they also stop seeing you as strategic.

How about the Stickler? You hold tight to rules and structures, and do things “the right way”. At first, it looks like discipline. But slowly, it becomes rigidity. You correct people in meetings. You rewrite slides late at night. You expect apologies for any misfit attitude of a junior. You focus on process over progress. You think you’re safeguarding quality or tradition. But what you’re doing is prioritizing strict compliance over connection. Impact? Your team may follow your standards, but they stop sharing ideas. They stop taking risks. They stop collaborating. You don’t just raise the bar—you raise the tension. And in the long run, you get perfection on paper, but disconnection in practice.

Even the Hyper-Achiever, which many senior managers secretly admire, has a hidden cost. Yes, it fuels performance. But it also drives a constant anxiety that you can’t show. You feel like you have to earn your place, again and again. That pressure leaks into how you communicate, lead meetings, and handle setbacks. People feel it, even if they can’t name it.

And that’s the biggest challenge:

These patterns don't just affect how you feel. They shape how others experience your leadership.

When your decisions come from a reactive space, they carry tension. When you lead from a need to fix, avoid, prove, or control, your energy shifts. Your presence becomes heavier, more abrasive, or, sometimes, too invisible.

The result? People second-guess you, hold back, they match your energy, not your intention. And you end the day exhausted, wondering why things still feel off, even though you did “everything right.”

5. Why Managers Must Decode These Voices

You can’t fix what you don’t see. Most managers are trained to optimize processes, manage people, and deliver outcomes. Few are taught how to notice the silent forces that shape their own thinking, feeling and behaviour.

Yet those forces - these saboteurs - are active every day. They shape how you respond to pressure, how you build trust, how you speak up (or don’t), how you see success, collaboration and trust, and how you make decisions when the stakes are high.

Knowing your saboteurs doesn’t make you fragile. It makes you clear. Because once you can name the voice, it loses power. You stop reacting. You now can choose because you know it is only a brain-prioritized mechanism of self-defence.  

And that is what leadership really is. Not only acting but choosing how you show up, moment by moment. From presence, not pressure. From vision, not fear. From values, not ego.

This isn’t about fixing yourself. You’re not broken. It’s about upgrading the internal system that drives your decisions so it works with you, not against you.

If you lead others, this shift isn’t optional, it’s essential. The more senior your role, the more your mindset sets the emotional tone for the entire team. And over time, that tone shapes the real culture of the organization, regardless of the inspiring words you’ve chosen to display on the walls.

Start by getting curious. Which of the ten patterns shows up most often for you? Where do you feel drained, stuck, overextended—or oddly quiet? There’s likely a saboteur there, shaping your behaviour from the shadows.

Or even better. Download the brochure below, read about these saboteurs and take the test to receive your personalised report (link at the end of brochure).

Bring them into the light. That’s how you reclaim the energy, clarity, and authority that your role and your people deserve.

And if you’d like a free debrief on your results, let’s talk. No pressure, no strings, just a meaningful conversation that might shift how you lead, for good. Book at the link below.

Or reach out directly on LinkedIn if you prefer a more personal exchange. I would love it.

Your next level of leadership starts with seeing “the invisible hand” that’s been running the show behind the scenes.

Share this article with any friend or colleague you feel will benefit. Remember, in management, you need strong and knowledgeable allies.

Until next time, keep thriving!

Alina Florea

Your Management Performance Coach   

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