Confident cultures start with courage: Insights from Advita Patel

Welcome to Vivowire, our new podcast about the life of work. 

Hosted by Barbara Booras, our Head of Customer Community and CX Events, we’ll explore the ideas, leadership habits, and cultural shifts shaping the modern world of work. 

Work is full of signals about who we’re supposed to be. From school to performance reviews to leadership expectations, people are constantly told how to behave, how to succeed, and what “good” looks like. But what happens when all of that guidance pulls you further away from yourself?

That’s one of the central questions in this episode of Vivowire, as Barbara Booras sits down with communications consultant, speaker, and author Advita Patel for a thoughtful conversation about authentic confidence, inclusive leadership, and the everyday behaviors that shape workplace culture.

Advita is an award-winning communications consultant, international speaker, founder of Comms Rebel, and co-author of Building a Culture of Inclusivity. Her work sits at the intersection of inclusive culture, leadership, communications, and confidence. In this conversation, she also gives listeners a preview of her new book, Decoding Confidence, which explores the habits and mindsets that help people lead with greater self-belief and integrity.

Watch or listen

You can watch this episode of Vivowire here, or alternatively catch it on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Here are the key takeaways

1. Many people spend years succeeding by conforming – and lose themselves in the process

One of the most powerful moments in the episode comes early, when Advita reflects on the first 15 years of her career. By her own account, she did everything that was expected of her. She took the courses, followed the rules, and mirrored the behaviors of leaders around her. On paper, that looked like progress. In practice, it came at a cost.

“I lost my identity,” she says. “I forgot who I was.”

That captures something many professionals will recognize. Work often rewards adaptation, but there is a point at which adapting becomes self-erasure. Advita describes how, after years of meeting expectations, she hit a confidence crash in 2018 and began to question not only her abilities, but whether the profession itself was really for someone like her.

What changed was not the external environment overnight, but her relationship to it. After a difficult conversation with a friend who challenged her to stop dwelling on what was unfair and ask instead, “What are you going to do about it?”, she had what she describes as a genuine lightbulb moment. From there, she began researching confidence, culture, and imposter syndrome – and eventually built a body of work around confident workplaces.

Her insight is a useful one: while many obstacles in work are real, meaningful change often begins when people stop waiting for permission and start doing the deeper work of understanding themselves.

2. Real confidence is rooted in self-knowledge, not performance

Advita makes a compelling point that confidence is often misunderstood. Too often, people confuse confidence with polish, loudness, or charisma. But as she explains, those outward signals can be misleading.

“A lot of people mistake loudness for being confident,” she says. “And in fact, the opposite is often true.”

That idea runs throughout the conversation. For Advita, confidence is not about dominating a room or becoming a different version of yourself. It is about knowing who you are, understanding your values, and acting with greater alignment. When people haven’t done that internal work, they tend to absorb other people’s definitions of success and imitate what they see around them.

That is one of the reasons her BELIEVE framework is so compelling. It reframes confidence as a set of habits rather than a personality trait. In her telling, confidence is not something a lucky few are born with, but rather it is something people can build through behaviors such as learning, empathy, integrity, vulnerability, and intentional energy management.

This is also what makes the conversation especially relevant for leaders. The problem is not simply that individuals lack confidence. It is that many workplaces still reward performance over authenticity, certainty over curiosity, and mimicry over reflection.

3. DEI is not disappearing – but performative DEI is being exposed

Advita’s perspective on the current state of DEI is one of the clearest and most memorable parts of the interview. While she acknowledges the fear, fatigue, and backlash surrounding the topic, she rejects the idea that inclusion is over.

“I don’t think inclusion is over or failing,” she says. “I’m actually on the pathway of believing that performative DEI is being exposed.”

That distinction matters. In her view, organizations can no longer rely on slogans, awareness days, or brand-level statements that are not matched by meaningful action. The real work now is quieter, more behavioral, and more deeply embedded in everyday culture.

That means looking closely at how decisions get made, whose voices are heard, who feels safe enough to challenge, and whether leaders are creating the psychological safety that inclusion depends on. It also means accepting that inclusion is not only the responsibility of formal DEI programmes. It is shaped in meetings, check-ins, promotions, moments of disagreement, and the small signals people receive about whether they belong.

Her framing is useful because it moves the conversation away from performative gestures and toward cultural substance. It is less about public positioning and more about the lived experience of employees.

4. Inclusive leadership happens in everyday moments, not just big initiatives

One of the strongest practical threads in the conversation is Advita’s insistence that leaders do not need massive budgets or elaborate programmes to make a difference. What they do need is awareness, consistency, and a willingness to pay attention.

She points to simple but revealing questions: Who are the quiet voices? Who is not being asked? Who is trusted automatically, and who is not? Who gets promoted, and who gets overlooked?

These are not abstract questions. They reveal how bias shows up in everyday workplace life.

Advita also shares one of the most useful prompts leaders can ask: “What do you need from me to be able to do your best work?” It is a simple question, but one that can change how supported, seen, and valued someone feels.

This is a helpful corrective to the idea that culture change only comes from grand strategy. In reality, culture is often shaped in repeated, everyday interactions. The strongest leaders are not just the ones who sponsor initiatives from afar. They are the ones who create belonging in the moments that seem small, but are anything but.

5. Quiet people are often underestimated – and that bias needs to be challenged

Advita’s most emphatic opinion comes when Barbara asks whether quiet employees are leadership material. Advita’s answer is immediate and unequivocal.

“Oh, absolutely they are. They are 100% leadership material.”

Her argument is that many organizations still define leadership through a narrow and often extroverted lens. People who are reflective, measured, or less visibly assertive are frequently overlooked because they do not match someone else’s mental model of confidence or gravitas.

That bias has real consequences. It affects promotions, opportunities, and who gets seen as having “leadership presence.” As Advita points out, this often says more about the leader doing the judging than the employee being judged. Too many people are assessed against a like-me standard rather than a fair and thoughtful definition of leadership.

It is a sharp reminder that building confident, inclusive cultures is not only about helping underrepresented people speak up. It is also about challenging the assumptions that decide whose voices are valued in the first place.

Final thoughts

This episode of Vivowire is about far more than confidence in the narrow sense. It is about what happens when people stop performing who they think they need to be, and start building the self-awareness, courage, and conviction to lead more honestly.

Advita Patel brings both personal candor and practical insight to the conversation. Whether she is talking about inclusive culture, leadership bias, vulnerability, or the need for a “personal board of directors,” her message is consistent: better workplaces are built when people understand themselves more clearly and lead others more intentionally.

For anyone thinking seriously about culture, confidence, or inclusion in 2026, this is a conversation that will leave you with plenty to think about.