Lessons From Jill: About Life and Business

Recently I had the opportunity to make a presentation to my leaders at Microsoft. Part of the presentation required a section called “Teach Us Something” … this required thought and reflection. What do I know that they do not? What would enlighten them?

After some soul searching, I kept coming back to my daughter, Jillian, whom many of you know, who has a profound cognitive disability. Jill is 20 years old, and she cannot speak, cannot be alone, and will need care for the rest of her life. She is also the most amazing person I know, and she has taught me more than anyone else about life…. and business.

I hope that by sharing her lessons and mine, I can inspire you to think differently about your own challenges and opportunities. I am not writing this with the intent to garner pity or sympathy. I do not feel sorry for us for one minute of any day.

You might be wondering, given her challenges, how does Jill know about business? Well, the truth is, everything. Jill has been my inspiration, my motivation, and my teacher throughout my career and my life. She has taught me five valuable lessons that I want to share with you.

Lesson #1: Acceptance

You can do everything right, you can take your vitamins, give up sushi, get your rest. Sometimes outcomes just are not what you planned for, hoped for, or expected. Same goes with work and large pursuits with clients, with job opportunities, with strategies…sometimes the outcome is not what you expect. Amazing clients can move on, companies can change directions, your favourite manager could retire. That does not mean failure, it just means that is what happened. You learn to roll with it and focus on how you continue to thrive.

Lesson #2: Effective Advocacy

I must navigate an extraordinarily complex government system to ensure Jill is well supported and cared for. I see parents at meetings who just stand around and yell, but it does not work. Taking the time to understand the system, what are the key levers to pull, what are key words to use, what it takes to get something done, is crucial. As I made the move to Microsoft, a whole new company, and met all new clients over the past 2 years, I realized the importance of this muscle. I use it every day as I work with Microsoft and with my customers. Swimming upstream is tiring and does not get you far. Find the currents and understand what works.

Along with understanding the systems, I must use my voice for myself and for Jill. I have learned how to ask for what Jill or I or my team, or my client needs. Jill has taught me the importance of effective advocacy, of shaping a story, of influencing and persuading.

Lesson #3: The Value of Community

It was not an easy lesson for me to learn I could not do everything myself, and that I need the support and help of others. It was not easy for me to accept government support that felt like a ‘hand out’. I felt guilty when I was sick and my friends came over and said ‘go upstairs and sleep, watch tv, whatever… I will sit with Jill.’ But accepting help is something we all must make space for. The other side of that is I have also learned the value in giving back, and better understand why we all should contribute to our communities in any capacity that is right for each of us. I have volunteered for a local organization that serves people with cognitive disabilities for the past 10 years. It has been some of the more rewarding work I have done in my life.

Lesson #4: Empathy, Patience, and Kindness

When Jill’s younger sister Charlotte was about 8 years old, she had a sleepover with three friends. It was an exciting night and to celebrate the occasion one of the kids brought half a dozen beautifully iced and decorated cupcakes from a local bakery. While we were unpacking sleeping bags and getting the girls organized, I heard Charlotte yelling from downstairs. Jill had eaten the top of all the cupcakes. A badass move indeed. However, Jill did not have ill intent, she saw delicious brightly coloured icing that was very accessible and decided to go for it. In some ways you cannot fault a girl for that, but man Charlotte was mad and in normal circumstances perhaps the situation would end with discipline, anger and frustration. The reality is that would not have changed anything. We still laugh about that, and I've included a picture in this article for you to see the scene of the crime. Cupcakes get stolen, people do frustrating things or let us down... separating harmless intent and a lack of understanding from a frustrating outcome serves us all well in our family. On the work side, our team was working together on a very time sensitive proposal and someone newer to our team was adding their content and clearly, they were new to PowerPoint and unintentionally causing disruption. I now call these ‘icing moments’ – help someone out if they are struggling, they might not know and are too shy to ask. A sidebar and 30 minute PowerPoint 101 session did the trick. The secondary lesson is, be mindful how you store unsupervised baked goods in our house!

Lesson #5: Remember what really matters.

I will not get into details, but we have had our fair share of medical close calls and frightening moments. Not all our days are easy, or good. Jill has taught me to appreciate the small wins, the moments of joy, the goodness in this world. On her 8th birthday she randomly shouted out ‘CAKE!’ (do we notice a theme??) That was the last time I remember a word from her… until 2 months ago, while we were home alone together, she turned to me and clear as day when I was getting her PJs on and said, “Thank You”. I will never forget that. We have hard moments, we experience defeat, we get stuck on things…many of those we forget a day or a week later. Being grounded in what truly is important in our life is always a wonderful reminder on how seriously we take things.

Thank you for listening to my story and Jill's story. I hope that you have learned something from her, as I have. I hope that you can apply these lessons to your own challenges and opportunities, and to your own career and life. I hope that you can live fearlessly and authentically, with endless optimism and gratitude, in pursuit of making life better for yourself and those around you.

Thank you Jill, for being my teacher.