Did COVID-19 Kill our Culture?
In the final weeks of GSB B.C. (“Before COVID-19”), I was lucky to take part in Glenn Carroll’s remarkable elective class, “Leading through Culture.’’ One of our first exercises entailed collectively defining the culture of the GSB — both its positives and negatives.
The words that appeared on the whiteboard will surprise no one in my class: vulnerable, authentic, trusting, welcoming, open-minded, empathetic on the left. Flaky, exclusive, elite, individualistic, glib, virtue-signaling on the right. Our class at that time comprised mostly MBA2s (ie Class of ’20) and a few keen first-years, like myself. Yet not a single adjective led to vocal disagreement. Even within our first few months at the GSB, we MBA1s had managed to both soak up the brightest sides to our community, and begin to discern its shadow.
Eight months later, flying 8,000 km away from the choked-up clouds of the Bay Area back to London for my LOA, I wondered what the GSB would feel like for the new students arriving at school in masks, gloves and hazmat suits. I wanted to believe that not all of the magic that had made my first few months here so special would be gone. I hoped, even, that the words on the right side of that whiteboard — the flaws in our microcosm, the rotten boards in our home’s foundations — would perhaps not be exposed at all.
The pandemic had, undoubtedly, rocked my class hard. We had been right here together as the US went from 0 to 1 million cases within 3 months. But now, far more time had passed since we began to understand just how pernicious this new normal would be. Perhaps for the new class, there’d be less whiplash and more kindness.
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The intent of this article is not to lay out and lament all that has been lost. Mainstream media has been doing that for months.
To write this, I sent out a survey to collect the new class’ feelings on the impact of the pandemic on their social and mental wellbeing. Unless otherwise stated, every quotation in this article is pulled verbatim from your responses.
I hope that sharing these will help our whole community to communicate, empathize, and support each other better. Perhaps, in time, to start to heal.
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Inclusion
It’s no surprise that COVID-19 has changed how GSBers socialize. “Hangouts have been kept on the down-low and have become much more exclusive than they would otherwise be. [It has] definitely created a divide amongst our class between the ‘haves’ and ‘have-nots.’”
The first weeks of general abidance by the school and county’s rules were fleeting: “While COVID-19 allowed us to make potentially more intimate connections early on through 1:1 walks or coffees, it does feel like it forced the formation of cliques very early.”
Today, some report a sense that people are exploiting the restrictions to lean into the tribal desire for feeling included by excluding others: “COVID-19 is offering the ideal justification to make events, trips, and parties more exclusive.”
Inclusivity has always been paramount for the GSB administration. Our school goes above-and-beyond to welcome all those who earned their place — regardless of nationality, background, or financial means. Sadly, this was also the value that fell away most quickly during the virus’ early days, as COVID-19 thrived on our innate need to socialize. “Size limits on dinners have made social life more exclusive, and people are more angsty about [that].”
In any newly-formed community, there is an initial, impassioned inclusivity — nowhere (in a normal year) more so than at the GSB. As time goes on, people find friends and settle into their spot in the social network. This is as natural as the social intricacies of an ants’ nest, wolfpack, or meerkat mob. For some, finding ‘their’ people is enough; for others, self-worth becomes intertwined with reputation. With the sum, not quality, of their relationships.
What separates us from animals, and all that we can really control, is our ability to take back that loping locus of identity. To collect every piece of ourselves back in, and arrange it back into our true, human self. To use that to pursue our own goals, rather than the relentlessly moving targets of others’ judgment.
That’s the Stoic mindset, anyway. It’s harder to adopt in the reality of business school, with its relentless focus on building the ‘right’ contacts for our careers. But one thing the last year has taught me was actually shared in the first days of our own time here — last year’s WIM Retreat:
“Remember that your time here is limited, and however popular you are, you’ll leave with just a small handful of friendships that you’ll actually have time to maintain. Many you’ll forget almost entirely.
But the way you made other people feel — not just your friends, but everyone you met — that will stay with them for a long, long time. If you made anyone feel small during your time here, that’s what they’ll remember you by. And trust me, recruiters can discern a genuine recommendation from a polite one.” This came from a prominent alumna at one of the Valley’s most coveted VC funds.
Trust and empathy
If inclusivity died with the CDC guidelines, trust was buried by the compact. “It is hard with the compact to have a sense of trust within your community […] Trust in our class is low as a result of the ‘narc / truant’ dynamic.” Hyperbole, for sure, but you can’t fault those who have never lived with real fear for safety, or real consequences from rule-breaking. Nothing shone a light on the spread of privilege in our class so brightly as taking just a slice of it away.
As for those who are begrudging the rules and “on the lookout for ‘snitches’” — that’s also understandable. You’ve worked for years for this; you’ve earned the level-up that this degree unlocks. These 6 quarters are your final chance to unwind and live selfishly before anchoring down for good. You’re paying hard-earned wages, yet feeling like a school-child again. One student stated bluntly: “The admin absolutely bungled this. There is no ‘A for effort’ in the real world. Customers expect results.”
What makes this situation so complex is that it’s not a business function. In (most) economies, customer’s rights are not so clearly linked to real loss by others in the economy. Another, sadder voice: “As someone who has lost two people close to me and several acquaintances to COVID-19, and knows people laid off and deeply impacted by the pandemic, I’m having a really hard time swallowing people unable to keep socializing to small groups outdoors.”
Whichever side you fall on, being reduced to either ‘scared’ or ‘risk-tolerant’ — or, worse, ‘snitch’ or ‘selfish’ — is a whole new way to feel dehumanized. For the first time in our lifetime, “one of the main segregating factors is every individual’s risk tolerance. Outside of COVID-19, I doubt that any of us would consider this a core part of our identity, nor one of the pieces that we would want our social circles/relationships defined by.”
“Each side holds to its beliefs and refuses to compromise with the other.” It is surreal to hear this statement applied to a community that, last year, felt like family. How many famous stalemates, conflicts, and even wars have been described in similar terms? How much would be gained if from today, we all approached each interaction with the intent to trust, empathize, and compromise?
Authenticity and community
The most heartbreaking comment from an MBA1 was this: “The class is fragmented. People don’t trust each other. To be honest, I think the damage is irreparable, and the opportunity to develop a cohesive cohort has passed. I’ll make friends while I’m here, but will never feel a part of a Class of 2022.”
Being at the GSB in Spring 2020 meant that the authentic selves of those around us emerged suddenly. Our communal culture, once defined and governed by authenticity, trust, and empathy, overnight showed to be paper-thin. Those early weeks of utter chaos felt like a living nightmare: dystopian headlines, classmates packing up and fleeing without notice, businesses shut, flights grounded. Fear becoming just another part of daily life.
There was the hammer: friendships falling apart without dignity, based on the smoke and mirrors of social media, whispered rumors, and a toxic focus on reputation. Then came the dance: uncertainty around what could be shared, who could be trusted, hypocrisy, regressive tribalism. A sudden, glaring light on what really mattered most to each of us, deep down.
The friendships that survived, or rose from this, were built on hardier foundations. The constant need to impress was replaced by an unspoken need to care for one another during self-isolation and mental health nadirs. A willingness to truly assume best intentions, be honest about one’s needs, and compromise without begrudging quietly emerged. For some, that was the silver lining of these strange times — the pandemic’s surgical removal of facades. A second, long, hard look at each other, without the bullshit of performativity.
Hope
Perhaps now, we can add one more value to our collective culture: hope. Not one of you stated feeling wholly unsafe interacting physically with classmates. This reinforces that no one, not even the administration, wants to see us all spend our MBAs on Zoom, fully alone behind closed doors.
The culture of the GSB is not just a set of handsome nouns on the school’s website. It’s between the lines of the kind tone of the admissions office to budding applicants; it’s the fond gleam in the eyes of our alumni as they recall their time here, even decades after graduation. Of course, it is not perfect. Not even Stanford could withhold the immense pressure the pandemic placed on every structure of society.
But do not believe for a second that everything you absorbed about our culture before arriving was a dream. That we are no more than customers, and our classmates no more than fellow truants or foes. I do not agree that the damage is “irreparable” or that “many GSB traditions are going to die with the last class.” It will take far longer than 2 quarters to kill 95 years of heritage.
Our foundations are intact. Already, “people have really stepped up to the plate in planning activities and ways of engaging.” Remember: “There is plenty of time, and we all self-selected into this environment knowing that everyone here is someone worth getting to know.”
For those of you feeling lonely and unseen — hold on. Give it a chance. The friends you’ll make in this new age will be truer than those you’d have latched onto during the B.C. mania of FOAM, flights, and 5am Fall nights.
COVID-19 can’t kill our culture. It’s in our hands — it always was.
