Willing Ascenders vs Cautionary Descenders
As the C-Suite Executive joins me on the phone, I can already tell this will be an unfortunate waste of time for both of us.
He breaks the disappointing news.
Counsel from his internal communications team has shut down the idea of his interview being used in my book. The conversation is pleasant as he offers up a friend from another business who would make a good sound bite instead.
He then wishes me well. I do the same to him. We both hang up.
Throughout the book-writing process of Return On Courage, I encountered a handful of phone calls like the above.
In almost every scenario, the brands that most would consider NOT courageous went down just like this. Fear of what I may ink ruled their roost, and because of that, they pass.
Then there was an entirely different group of willing business professionals.
These individuals openly shared their stories. They were just as open on the glorious positives as they were with their gloomy pitfalls.
There is a compelling insight here.
Willing Ascenders were open to being interviewed. These people embraced the good, bad, and ugly realities of their yesterday and today.
Cautionary Descenders were the ones who fearfully denied interview access. They said a lot by choosing not to say anything.
Willing Ascenders curiously played offense to evolve their business forward. Cautionary Descenders were almost always reactionary — protecting share, stuck in corporate politics, and forced into playing defense.
Though I never got the chance to ask, I’ve surmised that for most Cautionary Descenders it’s not that they don’t believe courage has a role in their organizations, it’s that they don’t believe they can successfully convince leadership to consider making the necessary but often brutally hard changes.
Stated simpler: The higher up the organization one got, the quieter the conversation became.
Indeed, it can be lonely at the top.
Which are you?
A Willing Ascender?
Or Cautionary Descender?
Don’t just look at the world differently. Do the world differently.
