The Courage to "Show Up..."

As the academic year starts to wind down, my attention goes towards requests made to come and speak with a variety of organizations in Silicon Valley about the urgency/ problem/ necessity/ fad (delete as appropriate) of courage at work. This is a time of year that always generates dissonance in me. On one had, I welcome the chance to speak to a population about the construct of courage - not in a manner which promotes the behavior but one which asks people to give it the appropriate degree of space and caution it deserves. It is in invigorating, energizing and a little self-aggrandizing (and yes, I mean that in a completely egotistical manner) to speak with employees and managers alike who are eager to understand why “courage” has become the catchphrase at venture capital mixers up and down the peninsula (…and believe me it has). However, any semblance of positivity is quickly dampened by my old familiar friend, skepticism, rationality and moral sobriety. The truth is, talking about courage at work is a bit demoralizing for this reason: Courage is held as far too sacred.

Courage is perceived as a universal good by so many that it has something akin to protected status. Any slight, challenge or scrutiny generates a degree of noticeable discontent among the supporters of courage. This is compounded by the fact that my message (not that I have just the one) is that courage may not be such a good idea for organizations - specifically as they try to promote its display within and among their employees. Sadly, the cost of this potential moral positive is usually borne by the individual and often at great cost to their psychological and moral well-being. As such, it becomes hard to champion courage as something you should do because the truth is, many are better off for not being courageous. However that is a hard message to deliver at the best of times let alone to an enthusiastic crowd that are eager to change the world order by way of a definitive moral expression.

What makes this all the more relevant is the recent and incredibly popular Netflix offering from Brene Brown, The Call to Courage. Brown has been a TED Talk favorite for a while now and most recently has begun to offer practical aspects of how to incorporate courage into your work life. The offering is engaging and oozing with requisite positivity but it also falls foul of two issues I have with the promotion of courage as a workplace behavior;

(1) It frames courage as being about doing something which you’d rather not do and (2) it encourages you to do this because doing things that challenge or make us uncomfortable allows us to grow and thrive as individuals.

Now the issue I have with these assumptions is that they assume that by doing something you don’t want to do - you are by inference - courageous. It ignores, or at least relegates, the idea that whatever it is you are doing is of inherent moral worth beyond your own gain. That is the problem with work - a great deal of work is for your own gain - be it material gain, career advancement or status acquisition - it is hard to look at the work that we do (for which we are also paid ) as being an arena in which we can make attributions of courage.

Next, just because you do something difficult, challenging or frightening does not mean you “grow” from said experience. In fact, there is more of an argument to suggest otherwise. Of course, challenging oneself is a “good thing“ to do but at what cost? Should we really be asking employees to expose themselves to risk for the sake of organizational gain? I remain unconvinced (but open to a discussion).

Finally and most troubling is the idea that you yourself are consistently and aware of your own capacity for courage and as such, you become the best person to push yourself in that direction. A key component of the courageous act is of course, humility. Indeed so much of courage is only labelled as such retrospectively and even then, usually by other people (I’m starting to think that people who say “I’m courageous” are usually the same people that tell you they have a great sense of humor). Because of this I find it hard to conceptualize that the workplace consists of people trying to be courageous at every avenue and opportunity.

As you can see, it becomes hard to take about courage in a critical tone without it coming across as curmudgeonly and that is not my intention. If I could ask anything of the advocates of organizational courage it would be that they embrace some degree of moral sobriety when deciding that courage should be displayed as an required or expected part of their employees work behavior without giving sufficient thought as to the cost and consequence of doing so. It may well be that work is not the great arena for courageous displays that we want it to be but if we repeat it enough with sufficient vigor, we as organizational leaders and members get something akin to moral contagion; courageous by association if you will.