📣 Take action: Shifting success culture

Can we change the career conversation from spotlighting only successes to normalizing – even celebrating – struggle? I think so. And I've just issued a challenge to get things started.

One of the most pervasive myths in today's working world is that challenges should be avoided. It's easy to look at feeds full of awards and accolades and think everyone else is crushing it, while your struggles are a signal something is wrong.

What's wrong is a system that still pretends everything is predictable. That talent plus plan should automatically equal excellence.

And particularly, pretending that setbacks and challenges are failures to be whispered about instead of lessons to celebrate.

'Kindness counts'

A few weeks ago, an educator put a free box of pads in the women's bathroom at work with the note: "(Our school) STRONG... because kindness counts." She had overheard staff asking to go home, because they were caught off guard, resulting in them having to take time off and the rest of the team having to cover the absence. "No one should have to go through that when there's a simple solution – kindness."

Before long, other supplies started showing up in the bathroom, like lotions. A week went by, and someone else refilled the box. Then other free supplies started appearing in other staff bathrooms, too.

She didn't add those other supplies or say anything about what she'd done. There was no meeting or HR initiative requiring people to contribute. She just showed her colleagues an example of giving what they could, and the ripples spread from there.

I love this story (which by the way is about my wife) because it shows how sometimes change can be as simple as setting a small example. That support and community can be created by sharing. And when it comes to our careers, I have an idea of where we could all share a bit more to improve everyone's experience.

Join the struggle celebration:

This week, I'm asking you to share your struggle to success story. You can repost my challenge on LinkedIn, or email me if you'd like to remain anonymous but still contribute your story. I'll thread those responses on LinkedIn and share some in a future edition of this newsletter.

Whatever you choose, simply fill out this template:

😰 The struggle: (What happened?)

😩 What I thought: (How did you respond?)

🤔 What I learned: (What did this experience teach you?)

🏆 The success: (How did that inform your career moving forward?)

It takes all of us, story by story, to dismantle the inaccurate and paralyzing vision of a world where everyone else has it all figured out, and instead shine a spotlight on the truth: that success isn't only about how amazing people are, but instead is the direct result of how adaptive and resilient we can be.

Kindness counts.

Happy navigating,
Bridget