An organization can reward collaboration while promoting only the most individually visible results.

LEADERSHIP

WHAT THIS MEANS

Organisations often praise teamwork and promote visibility, and those are not the same behaviour. The person who made the project work by handling the dull coordination is less legible at review time than the person who presented it. Everyone learns this within a year or two, and then quietly optimises for being seen, whatever the posters say. Incentives beat statements every time.

Look at who was actually promoted where you work and reason backwards from that to the real rules. If you lead, name the invisible contributions specifically in the room where decisions are made. And if you are doing the unglamorous work, keep a plain record of it, because nobody else is keeping one for you.

A QUESTION TO SIT WITH

What does your workplace actually reward, whatever it says it values?

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