Are we too protective?

The outside in…

The senior leadership team is in their monthly meeting. As we zoom in, we watch as one member consistently puts her points forward in self-assured declarative statements. She tells you why she is right. She reminds you of her prior experience that puts her in a unique position to know. She lays out a pretty thoughtful plan. She hasn’t expressed any doubt, asked any questions (that she doesn’t already know the answer to). The people around the table know to expect this and they tolerate it because, actually, she is right a lot of the time. The team leader is internally scratching his head because he knows that important conversations are being shut down as a result of this dynamic.

 

The inside out….

Over the years, our life experiences act like irritations in the mollusk shell and we slowly coat ourselves with the nacre that protects our vulnerabilities. Layer after layer, year after year, we feel more protected, more girded against the many ways in which life can touch our soft spots and make us feel unsafe. And like the nacre, we start to see the beauty in that protection. We become resilient. Those coatings stop serving as a protection and start to define who we are. We would sooner lose our nacre than walk outside naked. Eventually, others never really get to see who we are in all our humanity, we sacrifice intimacy and connection. And sometimes, we even forget to set aside the shell when we are alone.

 

What if I told you the woman in the team meeting has always been under-estimated. Her gender or her color or her accent has triggered more biased events than she cares to recall. Her nacre is pride. It is proving. It is aggressive self-promotion.

 

The way forward…

The woman is trapped in her protection. She is so worried that she will be viewed negatively that she is missing how she is actually being perceived.

Her work is to start to crack her shell just enough that she can look inside.

Her work is to allow herself to feel vulnerable occasionally and understand she won’t fall apart.

Her work is to eventually risk sharing that vulnerability. It might look like saying, “I don’t know” occasionally. It might look like holding her tongue even when she thinks she should speak. It might mean taking a risk and asking for feedback from her colleagues on how she could improve their working relationship. 

Are you on that team?

What is your work?