The answer may not be what's easy for you.
It may be what made it easy for you.
The Conversation Took An Unexpected Turn
At our last Breakfast Club, we started with one simple word.
Power.
As expected, everyone around the table had a differnt definiton. Some saw it as influence. Others spoke about confidence, leadership, responsibility or the ability to make difficult decisions. Before long, we weren't talking about power anymore.
As people shared their definitions of power, along with stories from their careers, experiences and lives, I began to notice a pattern emerging around the table that everyone seemed to miss about themselves.
Again and again, people shared experiences, decisions and achievements that had become part of who they are. They weren't trying to make a point. They were simply stating the facts. What fascinated me wasn't the story itself. It was what the story revealed about the person telling it.
The Person Behind The Story
As I reflected on that conversation, what stayed with me wasn't what had happened. It was what those experiences had required each person to become.
Every story around that table was different. Different industries. Different careers. Different challenges. Yet they all had one thing in common. None of those experiences could have happened without the person first becoming capable of handling them.
Nobody was born knowing how to lead through uncertainty. Nobody instinctively knows how to build trust, navigate conflict, influence difficult conversations or make decisions when the outcome is unclear. Those qualities are earned, often through years of difficult experiences that most people never see.
That's why I found myself listening to each story differently. I wasn't just hearing what someone had done. I was thinking about what that experience had demanded of them. Was judgement had they developed? What resilience had they built? What kind of leader had they become because of it?
Perhaps that's the part we overlook most.
We become so used to the person we've become that we only talked about the experiences. We rarely talk about the person those experiences created.
The Market Sees Something Different
Everything we've talked about so far raises a bigger question.
If our experiences quietly shape who we become, what is it that client, investors, employers and decision-makers are actually buying?
Because it probably isn't the story itself.
