Welcome to the Inspirational Leaders Series, a collection of short interviews with sharp, impactful leaders that I know and respect—because the business world needs more refreshing people like them.
“My leadership superpower is followership. What I mean by that is, I strive to create team dynamics that are founded on trust, authenticity, deep relationship building, and mutual understanding”
👋Meet Élida Cruz, Vice President, Head of Design, Capital One Software. She has over 25 years of experience leading teams in agencies and large corporations to drive innovation, create new ideas, and deliver exceptional work. She’s delightfully passionate, mission-driven, and has an interesting perspective on what it takes to be not just a good leader, but an inspirational one.
What's your leadership superpower and kryptonite?
My leadership superpower is followership. I strive to create team dynamics that are founded on trust, authenticity, deep relationship, building, and mutual understanding. I do that by showing up authentically, as much as I possibly can. I share my intersectionality, history, heritage, what gives me purpose, what fills my cup—and ask the same of my team members. That creates an environment where people feel they can share themselves, and they know who I am. And we can relate on different levels, not just work. One-on-one time and getting to know each other is really powerful.
But you also need to know how to translate the business objectives into something tangible and relatable to the teams. How do you bring them along on that journey? How do you help them see the destination, and the multitude of paths to get there, but also create the conditions for empowerment and agency for those teams to figure out what that journey is. There isn't just one way. And so by doing that, and by building that trust and understanding, setting really clear expectations, not only for them but of what they should expect from me, I think that’s how you cultivate followership.
On the flip side, my kryptonite is when I am in an environment or a team dynamic where there is a lack of curiosity or openness and inclusion of different perspectives. I feel that when one is in an organization that has just one way of doing things, it is limiting. You don't get the most innovative and best ideas, if you're just making the donuts every day—going through the same motions, as opposed to having different perspectives and new ideas coming in. Openness to diversity also fosters a culture of belonging and inclusion, which is really important for people to maximize their impact.
You are highlighting the importance of leaders being grounded in their purpose, values, and self-identity—and making space for others to do the same through modeling.
I think that's really key. Do as I do, not, as I say, right? I need to show up in the same way that I hope my team feels comfortable showing up. That creates a connection. It's the advocacy, support, and sponsorship that comes along with that leadership that really engenders followership.
You talked about lack of curiosity as your leadership kryptonite. What's so important about curiosity?
Curiosity is what sparks collecting information and making informed decisions. Without curiosity, you won’t ask questions, dig deeper, reflect, or experiment. You're just getting the same information that you've been getting. But, if you ask curious questions, like, “Why this? Why this way? Why now? What’s the problem we're trying to solve? What is the question behind the question?”, it sparks a different way of thinking and problem-solving. That curiosity drives innovation. And, innovation is coming so fast, that we have to be constantly in that motion of always thinking about what could be next, and pushing toward that. One of the paths to get there is to stay curious.
What’s a leadership belief that you have changed your mind about?
I got into my first leadership roles based on the subject matter expertise and skills that I brought to the table. Now that I'm further along on that journey, I realize that is secondary to being a well-rounded leader. I focus more now on how I communicate, transparency, and the context that I need to provide to my team. I focus on how I want to bring the team along. How do I get them engaged? Ensure that their concerns or their aspirations are being considered? Create and advocate for opportunities for them? How do I clarify the broader context for the team so that they can do the best work possible, without my direction, because they have enough context to make informed decisions and the encouragement to stay curious and try new things? So I think the biggest change for me is that while my subject matter expertise and skills are important, they're not as important as the other aspects of leadership that I bring to the table.
What do you think a company needs to put into place to set the conditions and the environment for people to do great work and lead well?
The most important thing an organization can do is have a clear, succinct, easy-to-understand articulation of the destination. What is the vision and strategy? When you have clarity about the destination that we're working toward, and what we want that to deliver for our customers, our users, and our employees, it enables leaders to then craft how they want to get there—because, again, there isn’t just one way.
Plus, you need that culture of curiosity and openness to different points of view. How do we activate the collective brain trust of leaders and teams in pushing the objectives forward? And, you need to pair that with openness to trying new things. Successful companies have a test-and-learn, “Let's see how it goes and adapt”, culture. But, to succeed, that culture has to be grounded in a clear vision.
