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Within the opening pages of Authentic: The Myth of Bringing Your Full Self to Work, author Burey issues a provocation: commonplace directives to “be yourself” or “show up completely genuine at work” are not benevolent calls for self-expression – they’re traps. This initial publication – a mix of recollections, research, cultural commentary and discussions – attempts to expose how companies take over individual identity, transferring the responsibility of organizational transformation on to employees who are frequently at risk.

Career Path and Larger Setting

The motivation for the book originates in part in Burey’s own career trajectory: multiple jobs across business retail, new companies and in global development, interpreted via her background as a disabled Black female. The conflicting stance that the author encounters – a push and pull between standing up for oneself and aiming for security – is the engine of Authentic.

It emerges at a time of general weariness with institutional platitudes across the US and beyond, as opposition to DEI initiatives grow, and various institutions are cutting back the very systems that once promised change and reform. The author steps into that terrain to argue that retreating from corporate authenticity talk – specifically, the business jargon that minimizes personal identity as a grouping of surface traits, idiosyncrasies and hobbies, leaving workers concerned with controlling how they are viewed rather than how they are treated – is not an effective response; rather, we should redefine it on our individual conditions.

Underrepresented Employees and the Performance of Identity

Through detailed stories and interviews, Burey shows how underrepresented staff – individuals of color, members of the LGBTQ+ community, women workers, people with disabilities – soon understand to modulate which self will “pass”. A sensitive point becomes a drawback and people try too hard by working to appear palatable. The practice of “showing your complete identity” becomes a reflective surface on which numerous kinds of anticipations are projected: emotional labor, sharing personal information and continuous act of appreciation. As the author states, employees are requested to share our identities – but absent the protections or the reliance to withstand what emerges.

‘In Burey’s words, workers are told to share our identities – but absent the protections or the trust to endure what arises.’

Case Study: An Employee’s Journey

The author shows this dynamic through the story of Jason, a employee with hearing loss who decided to educate his team members about deaf community norms and communication norms. His willingness to talk about his life – an act of transparency the office often praises as “authenticity” – for a short time made daily interactions smoother. Yet, the author reveals, that advancement was fragile. When personnel shifts erased the unofficial understanding he had established, the culture of access vanished. “Everything he taught departed with those employees,” he states tiredly. What stayed was the exhaustion of needing to begin again, of being held accountable for an company’s developmental journey. From the author’s perspective, this demonstrates to be told to reveal oneself lacking safeguards: to endanger oneself in a structure that celebrates your openness but fails to codify it into procedure. Authenticity becomes a snare when organizations count on employee revelation rather than organizational responsibility.

Writing Style and Idea of Resistance

Burey’s writing is simultaneously lucid and expressive. She blends academic thoroughness with a manner of solidarity: an offer for audience to lean in, to question, to disagree. For Burey, dissent at work is not overt defiance but principled refusal – the practice of opposing uniformity in workplaces that require appreciation for mere inclusion. To dissent, in her framing, is to question the stories organizations narrate about equity and belonging, and to decline engagement in rituals that perpetuate unfairness. It may appear as calling out discrimination in a meeting, withdrawing of voluntary “diversity” work, or setting boundaries around how much of one’s personal life is provided to the institution. Opposition, she suggests, is an declaration of self-respect in environments that often reward compliance. It is a discipline of honesty rather than defiance, a way of insisting that an individual’s worth is not conditional on corporate endorsement.

Redefining Genuineness

The author also avoids rigid dichotomies. Authentic avoids just discard “genuineness” completely: rather, she calls for its reclamation. In Burey’s view, sincerity is not the raw display of character that business environment typically applauds, but a more intentional alignment between one’s values and individual deeds – a honesty that resists alteration by institutional demands. Rather than treating authenticity as a requirement to overshare or adapt to sterilized models of transparency, Burey urges readers to preserve the aspects of it grounded in truth-telling, self-awareness and moral understanding. According to Burey, the aim is not to give up on sincerity but to shift it – to remove it from the executive theatrical customs and toward connections and organizations where trust, justice and answerability make {