How a recent college grad changed my whole outlook on life

When I was a first-year associate at McKinsey, I was staffed on a consulting engagement for a biotech client. Within a week, it was clear to me that my manager, Sheila*, was a disaster. She never smiled, kept to herself and acknowledged our presence only when she needed to give instructions or review our work. She did not invite us to important meetings or update us on key developments in our project.

On one occasion, I finally got the chance to present my work to a senior McKinsey director who was spending a rare, prized half-hour with us. This was going to be my moment.

Our audience with him was all I thought of for forty-eight hours. As I launched into my presentation, Sheila stared at me unblinkingly, pursed her lips and made a rapid circling gesture with her forefinger. My very soul was pierced by her searing message: “Speed up, Hitendra! This is a senior director you’re speaking to. He has no time to waste. Do you really need to explain that pie chart in this much detail? He can read and think very fast. C’mon, be quick!”

My moment of glory was over in a flash.

My fellow associate Jeremy* and I bided our time on that project, envying our peers who had, by sheer luck, been assigned to more caring managers.

But something else was going on.

Martin*, the business analyst on our team, behaved quite differently from me and Jeremy. He would walk into the team room each day and lift our spirits with his broad smile and infectious humor. He would approach Sheila, speak to her in a soothing voice, perk her up by finding something to appreciate about her, and then nudge her toward the behavior he was seeking. Could Sheila make sure to include him in the client meeting where his research would be reviewed? Wouldn’t it be great if Sheila updated the team on Wednesday as soon as she learned of a certain decision? Why not hold a celebratory team dinner next week now that we’d reached a major milestone?

While Jeremy and I stewed over all the imperfections we saw in Sheila’s management style and wondered why we deserved it, Martin took active steps to make the most of a bad situation. He didn’t have better behaviors than me or Jeremy — he had better beliefs. I discovered that over dinner one day with him when we both dropped our guards a bit and had a heart-to-heart chat.

“Martin,” I said, “Sheila is a terrible manager. C’mon, you know it.”

“I know what you are saying, Hitendra. Like you, I wish things were different.”

“Then what gets you to accept her callous attitude? You are so nice to her all the time!”

“Well, here’s how I see it. I only intend to be at McKinsey for two years before I go for my MBA. I don’t want the ten weeks on this project to be a waste. I want to make the most of it. So, I look for ways to get what I think we all need from her.”

“And you do that so well, Martin. Were you just born with this gift?” 

He became quiet. I could see I had stirred him at a deep level.

“Hitendra, growing up African American, I learned early that some people won’t have the right attitude toward you. If you wait for those people to change, you might end up waiting forever. So, I started to take a keen interest in people, in what makes them tick, in how they perceive and react to me, in what I can do to get a desired result from them. That’s helped me in life to get the most out of others, and that’s all I’ve been doing here. You could, too, if you wanted to. It works.”

Martin wasn’t waiting around for the world to change.

During our ten weeks on the project, Martin had taken full responsibility for producing the outcome he wanted by working creatively to get the best out of Sheila. In contrast, I had been sulking, waiting for the project to end because I felt entitled to a good manager. Jeremy and I thought we were the wise ones — Jeremy with his MD and me with my PhD — but it was this freshly minted college grad who demonstrated the secret to success in an imperfect world. You can wait until people reform themselves, if they do, or you can take personal responsibility for bringing out the best in them.

Over time, I came to realize that Sheila’s heart had been in the right place. She genuinely wanted to help me and the team, but her deeply reclusive nature got in the way. She conducted a performance review for me at the end of the project, and there I saw how caring, insightful and fair she was at her core. Now and then, when I find myself over-communicating, Sheila’s finger-twirl plays like a video reel in my head and alerts me to be more mindful of my audience’s time. I am grateful for this part of her that has become a part of me.

Leadership is an inner choice — not an outer role.

When you define leadership as the discipline of bringing out the best in yourself and the best in others in all situations, in pursuit of a common positive purpose, then leadership becomes an inner choice you can make in any role. Because, in whatever role you play at work, why wouldn’t you always want to bring out your best — and why wouldn’t you want to bring out the best in others, too?

Take a moment to reflect. Is there a situation at work where you have been feeling constricted, conflicted or confused? What if, in that situation, you picked up the mantle of leadership as Martin did? How might that change your experience?

You might be thinking, “Hitendra, this is all fine, but work is only a part of my life. What about the rest of it?” Or perhaps you are not even formally employed at present. All good reasons for our next newsletter to delve into life — every nook of it. 

* Names have been changed to protect the innocent—and the guilty.

Note: Parts of this newsletter are excerpted from my book, Inner Mastery, Outer Impact: How Your 5 Core Energies Hold the Key to Success.