What I learned running #IamRemarkable workshops
“It’s not bragging if it’s based on facts”
I discovered #IamRemarkable at the end of 2018. An article online made me immediately curious about this initiative. I read how it had originated internally at Google with a mission to foster self-promotion skills in women. As it gained traction, underrepresented minorities felt that the principles behind it resonated with them, and the movement extended its target audience. The idea eventually opened up to people outside Google as they realized the importance of the message couldn’t be contained.
The #IamRemarkable workshop has been the mechanism to spread the initiative and connect people to it. I am hoping not to spoil it for you in this post. Let’s just say that the workshop explains the rationale, breaks down the research, and encourages individuals to get better at celebrating their achievements and self-promoting.
Anyone with interest can sign up and become a facilitator. This openness has been crucial to expanding the network. Other than waiting for an opening, becoming a facilitator is quite painless; it just requires a bit of time for a training and the will to run the workshops.
I recommend checking online to understand more about the movement itself. In this story, I just want to reflect on a few personal learnings from facilitating the workshops and also share why it’s been rewarding for me to be part of this experience.
Dealing with cultural heritage
While being primarily targeted towards women and minority groups, the workshop is open to everyone. There is an understanding that exposing people that wouldn’t consider themselves a minority to the research makes them aware of the struggles, allowing them to develop more empathy and potentially make them advocates for the initiative.
I have facilitated groups in which all the participants were female and also mixed groups. Except for a few minor remarks during the introduction, the workshop is nearly identical.
I currently live in Stockholm. A curious side-effect of doing this workshop in Sweden is that general cultural norms make the workshop extra relevant to almost anyone. The country has a collectivist culture, with a strong sense of consensus, and underlying modesty norms. There is a societal concept known as Jantelagen [1] or The Law of Jante, that discourages individual success and sets average as the goal. It states that “You are not to think you’re anyone special.”
The research used in the program touches on this, citing that culture can sometimes play a stronger role than gender. I often share the HBR article referenced in the material “Self Promotion for Professionals from Countries where Bragging is Bad” [2] where the authors recommend to:
- Reframe the act of self-promotion — maybe you are promoting your company or your team instead, making sure that your self-promotion creates some additional value to other people besides you.
- Stay honest — stick to the facts and remain authentic. It is not bragging if it’s based on facts.
- Strike a compromise — make small changes to your approach to get closer to the benefits you want. In many cases, this thinking unlocks people to try small experiments. If your goals are clear, what would be that something that feels safe, and gets you closer to them?
Collective effort vs. individual achievement
I recently had a participant who expressed concern about the fact they were proud believers in teamwork and collective effort at their company (“no divas”) and felt like self-promotion could be counter to those values. It was a very valid point. From an organizational development standpoint, I agree with building strong teams. We talked and saw this as the opportunity for compromise I just mentioned. While we know exceptional work results wouldn’t be possible without an environment of true collaboration, it is important to develop the ability to articulate individual contributions and to create an environment where people, regardless of gender and group status, feel they have a voice.
As I was writing this, I happened to watch the recording of a session [3] by Gil Broza, in which he discusses how fairness is one of the elements needed to unlock real collaboration. He makes the point that with a purpose to create a friendly environment, companies tend to credit entire teams. Still, when the contribution is not equal, members might perceive it as unfair, and it can eventually become a blocker for precisely what we want.
The “we” is important, but let’s keep in mind that it’s equally necessary for people to be able to tell what their contribution was. We need to build a culture where everyone feel they can do it in their authentic self. It’s not about having women lowering their tone of voice or behaving like men.
Knowing it’s ok doesn’t make self-promotion any easier
It is very hard to self-promote when your whole existence you have been conditioned to not do it.
Many people admit that just the thought of self-promoting makes them sick. They wouldn’t want feeling judged by other people. And some confess finding themselves thinking less of people who self-promote. It is good to find examples of people out there that are doing this well, or at least in a way we actually feel it’s right. What can we learn from them? Are they doing something we can replicate to begin with?
In a couple of workshops, I have invited people to brainstorm ways to justify self-promotion and start seeing it in a positive light. An approach that I’ve borrowed from Neha Batra [4] is to ask participants to text five people, right there, and ask them what they think their top three qualities are. It only takes a couple of minutes, and after the initial shock and nervous laughs, most of the group go for it. They can tell their friends that some crazy facilitator is forcing them to do it, which makes it fun as well. Then, without waiting for the answers, I ask them to think about what three qualities they would like to be known for. If there is a gap between perceived reality and aspiration, they now have an excuse to close that gap.
Managing expectations
I found that quite a few people imagine the workshop is a crash-course in self-promotion, or that at least it will teach them some tricks. And then it becomes disappointing. There is not that much teaching in the workshop. The core of the experience is about raising awareness and encouragement. But it doesn’t go any deep into practical skills, relying instead on the group to develop their own way, hopefully sharing and supporting each other during and after the session.
These days I make sure to note clearly that the workshop is not going to make anyone an expert at self-promotion.
I have incorporated a few elements into the discussion to make it less frustrating for those who expect to dig a bit deeper into this, like, for example, giving the individuals a few minutes to come up with ideas for self-promotion that they can contribute to the group makes a difference. At the end of the discussion, I share additional ideas that other groups came up with.
It works nicely combined with The Responsibility Process
For most people in the workshop, the experience exposes a gap between the reality that we are in and the one we would like to be in. Many participants get to understand the importance of self-promoting and now face the fact that they are not doing any of it. And after the workshop, some feel pressure to self-promote even if they don’t want to, which is not a good feeling.
This situation made me think of The Responsibility Process [5]. It describes the mental stages all of us go through when exposed to some conflict; that gap I mentioned. We tend to get stuck in one of the stages at some point, and I believe the stage where we land will define us as people.
It takes literally 10 minutes to explain it, and I feel it gives an extra dimension to the workshop. When time is not a problem (e.g., meeting as an after-work activity), I talk with participants about responsibility.
This infographic presents the different stages:
In the context of #IamRemarkable, I explain Responsibility quickly, and we then come up with examples of what it can feel to become stuck at one of the stages, like:
- Blame: it’s someone else’s fault — “People in my life didn’t raise me in a way that made it ok for me to articulate my achievements. It’s their fault.”
- Justify: we blame some environmental factor — “this is what it’s always been in here,” “it’s a cultural thing.”
- Shame: we blame ourselves — “I’m not good enough to self-promote,” “I don’t have anything to share.”
- Obligation: we do something because we have to, not because we want to — “ok, I will post something on LinkedIn, but I really don’t want to, I wish I didn’t have to.”
- Responsibility: we can respond to this situation in a way that we fully own — “I don’t need to self-promote, it’s a choice I make. There may be other ways to achieve my goals. If I choose to do it, I am going to make the most of it and find a way to make this work for me.”
I know this brand of responsibility can take a while to land. Culture and society condition us to accept shame and obligation as socially acceptable ways to take responsibility; but we need to recognize shame and obligation don’t come from a position of total freedom.
There are entire workshops dedicated to learning more about The Responsibility Process. In this context, it’s just a means to gain awareness, invite ourselves to be curious about it, and prevent leaving participants in a state of shame or obligation.
Being Humble vs. Being Modest
On a personal level, I am grateful for #IamRemarkable; it encouraged me to start working on having more of a presence within my industry and to articulate achievements and share in ways I hadn’t been able to do properly before. For example, writing more.
The initiative highlights the need to break modesty rules that prevent individuals from celebrating their own accomplishments. I realized that in my quest to be a supportive leader, I had become excessively modest. I have problems accepting praise, discussing my professional achievements openly, and I even downplay them sometimes.
But even if I made a personal goal to be less modest, I reinforced my need to stay humble. Being humble, in my opinion, is demonstrated by not assuming I have all the answers, recognizing that there is always something you can learn from others regardless of who they are, and asking for help.
Wrapping up
Just to conclude, the experience has been very positive so far. I can see participants reacting in many different ways to it. Takeaways for attendants tend to be diverse. Some people share my “stay humble, be less modest,” while others look at it in entirely different ways.
The fact the initiative comes with the Google stamp on it has been divisive. Employer brand recognition and all the trust capital created by them over the years creates attraction and a perception of quality. But privacy concerns (there is a survey at the end of the workshop that some find a bit too nosy; I don’t make it mandatory), and some recent employee drama at the company cast some shadows in what I believe it’s a good thing.
I hope you feel at least curious about the initiative and join a workshop if you haven’t already. As for me, I plan to continue facilitating them for as long as I keep finding people who tell me they get good value out of them.
References
[1] Jantelagen’s Wikipedia Entry
[2] Self Promotion For Professionals from Countries where Bragging is Bad (HBR, 2014)
[3] Gil Broza’s “How To Make Real Collaboration Possible” — I am linking to the section where he discusses fairness, but the entire thing is great. Recommended watching.
[4] I stole this from Neha Batra’s OSCON 2017 presentation “Personal Branding Is More Than Self-Promotion”. Read her article here if you don’t have access to the video.
[5] The Responsibility Process pretty much changed the way I look at challenges. Read the book and learn more from the man himself, Christopher Avery (website).
