Elevate the Unassuming

This week's Two-Minute Tip is inspired by my daughter's reaction to her recent birthday gift. Her selflessness and thoughtfulness moved us so much that we decided to take the gift up a notch.

This got me thinking about the unassuming colleagues on our teams—the ones who quietly and selflessly contribute without seeking recognition. Join me as we address our tendency to inadvertently neglect those who may not seek the spotlight and discuss how crucial it is to intentionally elevate them.

• Read the video transcript

  Well, when you receive this, I will hopefully be busy celebrating a huge Philadelphia Eagles win from their Monday night football game in Philadelphia.

  My daughter's 13th birthday fell on the same day as their home Monday Night Football game this year, and so we decided to celebrate this big step into teenage years -- we thought it'd be fun to do a special experience, and so we proposed to her that my husband would take her to this home game for her birthday. She doesn't love surprises, so we gave her the heads up. And she seemed relatively excited when we told her, but it was just before bedtime, so she headed off to bed and about 30 minutes later, she came out of her room all emotional, and we're like, honey, what is the matter? Why are you crying?

  And she said, I mean, of course I'm excited about the game, but I'm just so sad thinking about not having our whole family together on my birthday. And I'm sad thinking about Mom, you and Harper not getting to experience this special thing with us. And we told her we just love her heart and the selflessness and thoughtfulness in that, but sending four of us was quite the investment, so we might need to wait for a future year to do that. And she was just fine with it.

  And so because of that, of course, my husband and I kept talking about it and we decided, ah, let's just make it happen. Let's all four go, and so that's what we did.

  And so the leadership lesson here is that oftentimes those on our team who are great at advocating for themselves and promoting themselves, those get the most attention. Those maybe get the most opportunity for reward and recognition.

  And the individuals who are selflessly serving the team, who are more focused on showing up and just working hard, doing their work, sometimes they don't get quite as much attention just because they are busy kind of hiding in the background, doing their work.

  And so I want you to think today about who is that individual on your team, who truly is selfless, who is diligently doing their work, who is not worried about being in the spotlight or getting the reward or the promotion, the recognition? And think about what can you do to validate them, to show appreciation and recognition, to promote them. What can you do to really recognize them for their diligence and their hard work and do it in a way that's meaningful to them? Maybe they don't want be in the spotlight, but take that proactive step to honor their mindset and their character in their work.