The first major promotion I DIDN'T get. Here's my story...

Needless to say, I was devastated. In fact, I was even more heart broken because someone else with MUCH less experience in the role, in the company and in life got it.

OK, lets rewind just a bit.

Firstly, this story is not of me as the victim. There is a lesson in it somewhere and I hope it resonates.

I was in a job that I loved and in a Company that I loved even more. I woke up every morning excited to go to work and couldn’t understand why others didn’t look forward to a Sunday morning. It was all so exciting. We were growing rapidly and I was thrown into all sorts of projects. Basically, if you showed the slightest capacity and talent to take on just one more piece of work, you were on it.

I was delighted to be assigned more work. Mind you, none of it came with a pay rise. But I didn’t care. My talent and abilities were acknowledged and recognised. That was all that mattered.

Early starts, late finishes, no time for meals, death by meetings, work on weekends, unplanned extensive travel – this was my normal.

Again, I absolutely loved it and I thrived.

Until of course, I was passed up for that promotion.

Enter, character no. 2 – let’s call him Tom.

When I was first introduced to Tom, he came across as such a lovely… KID! That’s right. He had recently graduated from university and magically got this new role for which he had the qualification on paper, but not one iota of experience. But he was lovely. Excited and keen to learn. This was perfect because I was keen to teach.

And so it began. I began to impart my learnings and experiences.

Tom was a great learner! He soaked it all in. In fact, he learnt so much that I soon noticed that he would ask me for my opinion and then verbatim share it as his own (note the sarcasm). And he successfully impressed his bosses, senior management… almost everyone.

A few shorts months later (yes, a few months), I learnt that Tom had been promoted. He was promoted to a role that required several years of experience in the lead up to it but not for Tom, he was simply handed the role. In addition to that, Tom was then assigned to every new exciting project that our department was involved in. Afterall, he was learning.

I was crushed. Not just for myself, but for several of my peers who were also equally qualified and well experienced for that role.

This was the first time the system had failed me.

I went home that day and couldn’t stop thinking about it. I was really broken but knew that I had to respond differently. Even back then, as devastated as I was, I knew that I had to make a different choice.

I could a)either throw my toys out of the pram or b)play the long game.

That decision right there, was the beginnings of me as I am today.

I decided that I’m going to push myself even harder.

I decided that I will volunteer to take on more projects.

Why?

Because I knew that I couldn’t respond the way that disappointed people typically do. I wanted to be better and have different results.

I decided that I need to figure a way to take my power back and own my employability in order to begin to create my own reality.

I had no idea how to do this or even where to start but it was that choice that I made that day which has impacted me the most today.

We all have times where we are defeated by our circumstances. For me, it was a simple promotion that made me realise how much of my power I had given away. My worthiness (of recognition through a promotion) was in the hands of another person or actually, several people and some of these people didn’t even work closely enough to assess my true worth.

So, why am I sharing this with you?

I often hear so many anecdotes of folks in the employment workforce who are unhappy for a whole host of reasons. And all their reasons are 100% valid.

But then what? How does that move them forward?

It doesn’t.

It is especially in those moments that we have to make a conscious choice to take our power back. Make the decision to change the trajectory of your life and be willing to do whatever it takes. And it takes a LOT!

After now doing what I do for just 2.5 short years, I am so grateful that I didn’t get that promotion. It led me to the discovery of my true powers and to develop a skill set that I never thought I needed. It helped me to develop grit and resilience to carve my path and write my own story.

I am just getting started. And, so can you.