Hard Doesn't Equal Bad

I have to remind myself of this often.?Within Possip, we sometimes debate: Is the point of our product that the happiness and satisfaction rate of our customer’s parents/students/families is always high?

I have always felt that while a high satisfaction rate is great, the real fruit lies in something more important than perfection—and sometimes, even good organizations have hard times.

Hard Times

We’ve had a hard year at Possip.? In our Founding, we were exclusively focused on schools and districts.? This year many of them had financial challenges.? They faced funding shortages due to a combination of factors - declining enrollment, the ESSER cliff, and political climates.??

While our plan has long been to expand outside of K-12 education, we have been so focused on serving our customers that we were slower to move.? This year was the year we expanded.

So, it has been a year that has required new leadership muscles, new sacrifice, new challenges, and new opportunities.

It has been hard.

Hard isn’t bad

As I sit here, I know that hard doesn’t mean bad.? I looked at the Possip Team's sentiment rate recently, and I noticed something: an overall happiness rate that typically bounces between around 90% and 100% was now at 50%. I had to laugh as I realized that I, myself, was one of the people who had not answered YES to the question, “Are you happy working at Possip this week”.? I always charge myself to answer honestly, as it allows me to acknowledge that if I can have bad weeks with the organization I love and started, others can, too.

So as I end a year that was amazing, beautiful, and hard, I can say I count it all joy.

I’m an Enneagram 7. If you know anything about the Enneagram 7, we love celebrating others - people, organizations, things.? The idea of Possip (positive + gossip) is an Enneagram 7 company if there ever were one ;-).? Find and celebrate the positive.? Amazing! Another thing about the Enneagram 7, however, is that while we love positivity and celebration, we do not like to face pain. We try to avoid negativity and pain.? Well, by design, Possip pulls up the full truth - the positive, the constructive, the needs.

As I finish up a 2024 that found hard in it, I’m looking towards 2025 with a new and encouraged mindset that hard isn’t bad.??

Better comes from facing the hard

Just like exercise, writing, a puzzle, or a math problem, so much learning and growth and better comes from facing the hard.

So thank you, 2024 for the joys, the hards, the growth, and the learning.??

We’re even stronger for the future.