A New Way of Working: Why I Started Authentic Unlimited

From cor­po­rate masks to hu­man con­nec­tion and the need for au­then­tic­i­ty more than per­fection.

We spend a huge por­tion of our lives at work—yet for many, it feels more like per­form­ing than liv­ing. We nod, smile, and hold back the very ideas or ques­tions that could spark real change, wor­ried about step­ping on toes or ap­pear­ing “un­pro­fes­sion­al.” Af­ter years of wit­ness­ing this slow drain, I re­al­ized: it’s time for a new ap­proach. That re­al­iza­tion led me to launch Au­thentic Un­lim­it­ed.

A Mo­ment of Reckon­ing

Through­out my ca­reer in cor­po­rate learn­ing and or­ga­ni­za­tion­al de­vel­op­ment, I’ve seen teams with great “mis­sion state­ments” and en­gage­ment scores on pa­per—yet be­hind the scenes, bright ideas stay mut­ed, gen­uine tal­ent gets side­lined, and peo­ple end up ex­haust­ed from wear­ing masks all day.

I even­tu­al­ly asked my­self: Why are we hid­ing so much of what makes us bril­liant,
cre­ative, and hu­man? And more im­por­tant­ly, what if we didn’t have to?

Work Made Hu­man^TM

The re­sult is Au­then­tic Un­lim­it­ed, built on a sim­ple but pow­er­ful premise: Work Made Human^TM. It’s about ditch­ing the per­for­mance masks, em­brac­ing our real strengths and vul­ner­abil­i­ties, and tap­ping into true col­lab­o­ra­tion.

In es­sence, it means:

• Un­mask­ing: Let­ting go of pro­tec­tive habits (like nev­er speak­ing up or al­ways pleas­ing oth­ers).
• Em­brac­ing the 3 Cs: Build­ing deep­er Clar­i­ty (on who we are), forg­ing Con­nec­tion (so trust and re­spect be­come dai­ly re­al­i­ties), and har­ness­ing that en­er­gy for real
  Col­lab­ora­tion (where bold ideas don’t just hap­pen—they flour­ish).
• A Cul­ture of Safe­ty: Rec­og­niz­ing that, as even Google found, psy­cho­log­i­cal safe­ty isn’t a lux­u­ry—it’s the foun­da­tion for any team’s gen­uine suc­cess.

It’s not about fix­ing any­one. We’re al­ready full of po­ten­tial. We just need to cre­ate
en­vi­ronments where each per­son’s au­then­tic con­tri­bu­tion is wel­comed—and that starts with see­ing each oth­er (and our­selves) as ful­ly hu­man, not just job ti­tles or cogs in a process.

Why Now?

The work­place has fun­da­men­tal­ly shift­ed, cre­at­ing both chal­lenges and op­por­tu­ni­ties:

1. En­er­gy Is Pre­cious
   • Main­tain­ing a façade—what I’ve come to call “The Mask”—drains us. Aban­don­ing that act chan­nels en­er­gy into cre­ativ­i­ty, in­no­va­tion, and hon­est prob­lem-solv­ing.
   • With hy­brid and re­mote work adding new pres­sures to “ap­pear en­gaged,” peo­ple are more ex­haust­ed than ever from main­tain­ing pro­fes­sion­al per­for­mances.
2. Peo­ple Crave Re­al­ness
   • Gen­uine in­ter­ac­tions build trust far more ef­fec­tive­ly than any forced team-build­ing ac­tiv­i­ty. Once we tru­ly see each oth­er’s strengths and con­cerns, col­lab­o­ra­tion moves be­yond po­lite co­op­er­a­tion into some­thing trans­for­ma­tive.
   • Lead­ers re­port that main­tain­ing team co­he­sion and cre­ativ­i­ty is hard­er than ever, es­pe­cial­ly across digi­tal spa­ces. Real connec­tion has nev­er been more cru­cial.
3. A Chang­ing World
   • The past few years have shak­en up what we ac­cept as “nor­mal” at work. Peo­ple want work­places that ac­knowl­edge their human­i­ty—where it’s safe to speak up, test new ideas, and ad­mit when help is need­ed.
   • Or­ga­ni­za­tions are los­ing valu­able tal­ent not pri­mar­i­ly over salary, but be­cause people don’t feel seen, val­ued, or able to contribute mean­ing­ful­ly. The old mod­el of rigid pro­fes­sion­al­ism isn’t just drain­ing—it’s be­com­ing ob­so­lete.

Where We’re Head­ed To­geth­er

In­tro­duc­ing The Mask & Be­yond

• Many of us hide be­hind pro­tec­tive pat­terns (Mut­ing, Ap­proval-Seek­ing, Se­cu­ri­ty-Driven, Kryp­tonite) just to feel safe. Rec­og­nizing The Mask is the first step to more real team­work.

The Three Cs Frame­work

• Clar­i­ty en­sures in­di­vid­u­als and teams know their strengths, roles, and shared vi­sion— re­duc­ing con­fu­sion and con­flict.
• Con­nec­tion nur­tures psy­cho­log­i­cal safe­ty and re­spect for di­verse tal­ents, fu­el­ing healthy con­flict and deep­er trust.
• Col­lab­o­ra­tion emerges once there’s clar­i­ty and trust, al­low­ing new ideas to flow, roles to adapt, and teams to solve big­ger prob­lems with­out fear.

Hon­or­ing In­di­vid­ual El­e­ments

• Each per­son’s unique dri­ves, or “El­e­ments of Au­then­tic­i­ty^TM,” sur­face more eas­i­ly when The Mask is dropped. This aware­ness en­sures tasks, lead­er­ship, and in­no­va­tion align with real strengths, not forced ex­pec­ta­tions.

Put sim­ply: by un­mask­ing, fos­ter­ing the 3 Cs, and play­ing to each per­son’s au­then­tic strengths, we cre­ate Work Made Hu­man^TM, a cul­ture where no­body has to “fake it” to be­long or suc­ceed.

What You Can Ex­pect Here

1. Straight Talk
   • Prac­ti­cal shifts over cor­po­rate jar­gon. We’ll ex­plore how drop­ping the usu­al guard and step­ping into more can­did dis­cus­sions can rad­i­cal­ly im­prove en­gage­ment.
2. Sto­ries Over The­o­ries
   • We’ll high­light real ex­pe­ri­ences—both my own wake-up call and the teams I’ve guid­ed—show­ing how au­then­tic­i­ty sparks pow­er­ful re­sults.
3. In­spi­ra­tion & Ac­tion
   • From mi­cro-shifts in your dai­ly rou­tine to or­ga­ni­za­tion-wide frame­works, we’ll look at how you can un­mask a bit more each day, in­di­vid­u­al­ly and with your team.

The Jour­ney Ahead

Launch­ing Au­then­tic Un­lim­it­ed feels like step­ping into day­light af­ter be­ing cooped up indoors. I’m thrilled to part­ner with lead­ers, teams, and in­di­vid­u­als who want more than just clock­ing in. Be­cause if we in­vest in show­ing up as our­selves—cel­e­brat­ing each
oth­er’s unique strengths, build­ing real trust, and col­lab­o­rat­ing with open­ness—imag­ine the trust, cre­ativ­i­ty, and mo­men­tum we can un­leash.

My hope is that this first post sparks a mean­ing­ful con­ver­sa­tion about bring­ing more hu­man­ity to the work­place. In up­com­ing posts, we’ll ex­plore The Mask in de­tail, how psy­cho­log­i­cal safe­ty aligns with im­por­tant re­search (like Google), and how the Three Cs plus your unique Ele­ments of Au­then­tic­i­ty^TM can shape a thriv­ing, gen­uine work cul­ture.

Be­cause I be­lieve that when we un­mask and get real, we don’t just do bet­ter work—we live bet­ter lives.

Next Steps

• Ex­plore Our Frame­work: Cu­ri­ous about how The Mask, the Three Cs, and the El­ements of Au­then­tic­i­ty^TM all fit to­geth­er? Check out our site to see how it all con­nects.
• Reach Out: If you have ques­tions or per­son­al ex­pe­ri­ences around au­then­tic­i­ty at work, I’d love to hear them.
• Stay Tuned: This blog will keep bring­ing “no-fluff” in­sights and real sto­ries of how people who stopped fak­ing it end­ed up thriv­ing—and push­ing their or­ga­ni­za­tions for­ward.

Here’s to a fu­ture of work that’s not just “pro­fes­sion­al” but gen­uine­ly hu­man, en­er­giz­ing, and trans­for­ma­tive.

Thanks for read­ing,

Joe Mar­ques

Founder, Au­then­tic Un­lim­it­ed — Be real. Con­nect deeply. Make a dif­fer­ence.