Brené Brown
Reframing imperfection: Brené Brown’s revolution of vulnerability
Intro
Cassandra Brené Brown, more commonly known as Brené Brown, is a mother, researcher, professor, lecturer, motivational speaker, and a successful author and podcast host. Her success within these various roles accumulated to her being named one of Houston’s most influential women in 2009 by Houston’s Woman Magazine.2
Brené Brown has dedicated herself to learning and speaking about a range of topics, including leadership, courage, vulnerability, trust, shame, and empathy. She is currently a research professor at the University of Houston but has expanded her teachings to an international audience on various platforms. She is perhaps most famously known for her popular 2010 TEDx talk, “The Power of Vulnerability”, which today has over 50 million views.2 Her enthusiastic and engaging manner made her talk one of the most popular TEDx talks to this day, and her refreshing advice on the power of being vulnerable has been said to drastically alter people’s way of thinking. The TEDx talk gave its audience some valuable life lessons which will be explored in greater detail later in this article.3
Following her success as a TEDx speaker, Brown has since written five New York Times best-selling books: The Gifts of Imperfection, Daring Greatly, Rising Strong, Braving the Wilderness, and Dare to Lead. Each book guides people in the right direction towards success, although her advice may seem atypical to some, as it asks people to understand the power of qualities that are often viewed as negative or weak, such as vulnerability or shame. She reframes these qualities and instead suggests that allowing oneself to feel these emotions can be brave and courageous, vital qualities for a leader.
More recently, Brown is also the first researcher to ever have a Netflix lecture. Her lecture hosted at the University of Los Angeles, “The Call to Courage”, was released on the streaming service in 2019 to 190 countries, in 29 different languages.4 Such achievements give Brown a somewhat celebrity status, accompanied by adoring fans. She is praised for her straight-shooting advice, her feminist insights, and her ability to handle difficult topics with tact and humor. She is sometimes referred to as the leader of a self-help revolution, where people learn to live with their broken selves in a productive manner.5
Imperfections are not inadequacies; they are reminders that we’re all in this together.
– Brené Brown 1
About the Authors
Dan Pilat
Dan is a Co-Founder and Managing Director at The Decision Lab. He is a bestselling author of Intention - a book he wrote with Wiley on the mindful application of behavioral science in organizations. Dan has a background in organizational decision making, with a BComm in Decision & Information Systems from McGill University. He has worked on enterprise-level behavioral architecture at TD Securities and BMO Capital Markets, where he advised management on the implementation of systems processing billions of dollars per week. Driven by an appetite for the latest in technology, Dan created a course on business intelligence and lectured at McGill University, and has applied behavioral science to topics such as augmented and virtual reality.
Dr. Sekoul Krastev
Sekoul is a Co-Founder and Managing Director at The Decision Lab. He is a bestselling author of Intention - a book he wrote with Wiley on the mindful application of behavioral science in organizations. A decision scientist with a PhD in Decision Neuroscience from McGill University, Sekoul's work has been featured in peer-reviewed journals and has been presented at conferences around the world. Sekoul previously advised management on innovation and engagement strategy at The Boston Consulting Group as well as on online media strategy at Google. He has a deep interest in the applications of behavioral science to new technology and has published on these topics in places such as the Huffington Post and Strategy & Business.
