The funny thing is I started getting this life lesson after I left corporate America to attend business school full time.
Before business school, I was working at a mass merchant retailer headquartered in the Midwest. Not one of the nationals but a pretty solid mid west player. When I interviewed for the job everyone loved me except for this one woman who told me within minutes of our interview that she didn't think I was a fit for the position nor the company.....that should have run me off...but the other five people that I interviewed with loved me. So....
A month and a half after I started the job, there was an org change in management and the one woman who told me that she didn't think I belonged....became my boss. For the next year and a half of my life I cried everyday and walked in the building praying that I didn't lose my job today.
This woman was a bully and I wasn't her only target but I was indeed a target. She was biased against the subordinates that didn't remind her of her. My one blond, thin, newlywed coworker was her favorite. She often said,"Denise*, you remind me of me." *Name changed to protect the innocent.
For months she worked her hardest to put me on a performance review which would be the beginning of getting me out of the organization. Every day I had to take more time to triple check everything I did and even then she always would try to find something I did wrong. So much so that she would ask my planning manager, "What did Felicia do wrong today?" She was evil! Pure Evil. She didn't let the devil use her, she was on the devil's payroll doing his work. The worst boss I ever had. One time she told me," Let's work to get you confident and competent in you position."
I was like this Bitch just called me incompetent. And that was the beginning of the fall of my confidence. Especially after trying so hard to do everything perfectly, and being blamed for things going wrong that were truly out of my control. Any good employee, after a while, starts questioning if they are competent or not when the work environment is extremely oppressive and your boss is bullying you and trying to get you out.
But in that moment, I couldn't see the forest for the trees.
Now, that I work for absolutely beyond wonderful people, who have more intelligence in their pinky toes than that evil witch will ever have in her whole body, I get it. Especially after listening to a few of my friends who are currently not in the most nurturing of environments, working for evil wenches, and constantly looking over their shoulder, waiting for the knife to be flung in their back.
What I now get is this:
Just because you are in a situation that is beating you down, the truth remains the same.
You didn't get to this place because you are mediocre. You are magnificently and wonderfully made. You have worked hard to get to where you are and the current situation cannot erase the fact that you have accomplished successfully graduating from undergrad for starters and two if you are reading this you probably have an MBA or going through the process of attaining your MBA. Either way you have to claim who you are and the talents you hold no matter what the evil people in this world try to tell you to beat you down. Don't internalize that mess.
I wish someone had told me this back in 2007 and 2008. I carried all this self doubt that I internalized from that wench with me until I had a nervous breakdown in the bathroom at school one day. It was the infamous week 7 in the core but still....I was about to quit business school...because I lacked confidence in my abilities....the same abilities that got me into a top ranked MBA program. Where they do that?
I say all this to say, even when everyone says you can't, you can. Even when you make a few mistakes, you are still great! Claim your greatness and forget the rest. You are magnificently, incredibly, wonderfully made and don't believe anything or anyone who tries to tell you that you are not!!!
Love,
FARE
