Courage
What is the most courageous thing you’ve ever done? For me—and really, for Kris and me—
it was walking away from “secure” careers and betting on ourselves and Leadership Harbor. We left good positions, good salaries, and careers we had invested years building. We didn’t leave because we hated what we were doing. Quite the opposite. We left because we believed we could make a greater difference.
Our stories are frighteningly similar. Years earlier, Kris and I had joined Maxwell Leadership because we recognized two principles that challenged us: Everything rises and falls on leadership, and the hardest person you will ever lead is yourself. We weren’t initially looking for an exit strategy. We were looking to grow. We invested thousands of dollars, countless hours, and a great deal of energy learning to lead ourselves better so we could become better leaders within the organizations we were already serving. Then something unexpected happened. About two years after joining Maxwell Leadership, Kris was asked to step back into a previous role and, essentially, not use many of the leadership skills she had been developing.
Four years later, almost the exact same thing happened to me.
That hurt. The disappointment wasn’t simply that our careers took a different direction. The hurt came because we genuinely wanted to make a difference in those organizations. We had invested in ourselves so we could invest more effectively in the people around us. Yet, eventually, we had to recognize something important: we could control our growth, but we could not control whether someone else would allow us to use it.
That left us with a decision. Before leaving my corporate career in late 2021, I talked with financial professionals about whether we could afford for me to make the leap. In one of those conversations the Advisor looked at our investment portfolio and said, in essence, You’ve done well. You can use this as a springboard to do something you really want to do. That sounded encouraging! Another financial representative looked at essentially the same situation and offered a very different assessment: You are risking your financial future. Well, that sounded a little less encouraging! Same people. Same portfolio. Same decision. Two very different perspectives. Which one was right? Maybe that was the wrong question. I’ve written before that one data point is dangerous. Good leadership doesn’t mean finding the one person who tells us what we want to hear and then blindly following their advice. Good leadership gathers counsel, understands the risk, knows its values—and then owns the decision.
That is where courage enters the picture.
Courage is not the absence of risk; it is acting when your values tell you the risk is worth taking. I left my corporate career late in 2021. Then came 2022, and the market dropped significantly. Great timing, Brian! Was that frightening? Absolutely. Did it suddenly make the cautious financial advice seem more relevant? You bet it did. But here is where perspective matters. Markets go through corrections. Difficult seasons come and go. The market recovered, and over the following years our investments did extremely well. More importantly, though, we had made a decision that aligned with our values and the life we believed we were supposed to be building. That doesn’t mean every courageous decision works out exactly as planned.
Courage is not a guarantee of success.
If it were guaranteed, it wouldn’t require courage. It means we understand that there is also risk in not acting. Today, one of the simplest—but most powerful—exercises we use at Leadership Harbor is helping people identify their values: personally, professionally, and organizationally. Why? Because values give us a foundation for making difficult decisions. When you know what you value, you gain clarity. Clarity provides direction. Direction makes action easier. And when leaders and organizations understand and actually live their values, something else happens: culture gets stronger.
Values cannot simply be words hanging on a wall.
They need to become filters through which decisions are made. Otherwise, they are merely decorations. Think about a difficult decision you are facing right now. Maybe it involves your career. Your business. An employee. An investment. A relationship. An opportunity you have been considering but haven't pursued because you cannot eliminate all the risk. Ask yourself: What decision have I been postponing because I am waiting for certainty that may never come? Then ask a better question:
What do my values tell me to do?
Gather counsel. Ask questions. Challenge your assumptions. Understand the downside. Remember that one data point is dangerous. But eventually, leadership requires a decision. You cannot outsource that decision to your financial advisor, your business partner, your spouse, your boss—or even your leadership coach. At some point, you have to own it. Courage! Believe in yourself. Take a chance on yourself. Know your values. Understand the risk. Make the decision. And then—GO FOR IT! Make it work.
Brian Peterson
Leadership Harbor Leadership Coach • Culture & Growth Consultant Helping leaders and organizations create Clarity, Direction & Results by developing people, strengthening leadership, and intentionally building culture.
Ready to grow yourself, your team, or your organization?
Email Brian Book a Conversation with Brian
Comments