No One is Coming

That subject line is a bit of a gut-punch, isn’t it?

But it’s true. 

No one is coming to make things better for you — as a manager, as a CEO, as a father, as a daughter. It’s up to you. 

I did not invest in myself, professionally, for the first 20 years of my career. Instead, I did what most of us do: I just worked within the professional development budget that my employer held for me. 

I was letting an organizational budget determine how I would invest in my growth and potential. 

When you get right down to it, I was letting somebody else's budget decide whether I was worth growth and learning. I hadn’t figured out yet that if I wanted to grow and develop, I had to take responsibility for it myself.

Eventually I figured it out. 

I decided that I was worth investing in, that I wanted to learn and grow, that I wanted to learn about myself. I was eager to learn about coaching. I craved learning more about leadership. 

And I didn't want to be limited in my learning and my growth. More precisely, I didn't want other people putting limits on my potential because of their meager budgets! (To be fair, I want to recognize out loud that organizational budgets are usually meager because they must invest in everyone.)

When I left being an employee back in 2011 and created my own company, I invested exponentially in myself. I did what it took to build a business that supported my growth in areas that I was really passionate about.

Over the intervening years, I have literally invested tens of thousands of dollars in my learning about coaching, about entrepreneurship, about leadership, and about me. I’ve invested in myself through coaching, counselling, post-secondary education, through entrepreneurial programs and in non-traditional learning environments. 

A decade later, I am in an entirely different place than I would be if I'd stayed in a paradigm that wasn't willing to invest in me. 

This is my bold call to you to not let your organization's pro-d budget determine your potential.

If you want something — if you want to learn, if you want to be an inspired leader, if you want to be inspired as a human — you will need to invest in yourself with your own resources.

No one is coming to do it for you.

There isn't a single investment I've made in myself that I regret. Each of them has brought different gifts. As an example, I have learned and grown and connected to people along my journey, many of whom have become dear friends and colleagues. 

I invested in my skills, and received not only better skills but also a support network! Talk about increasing returns.

Those investments that I was willing to make in myself, over and over and over again, have created so much abundance for me. 

Looking back, I am so grateful that I broke the paradigm of letting organizational budgets determine my growth, and instead decided to invest in myself.

My hope for you is that you will also break that paradigm. Jump the boundaries of the org budget and trust that the investment in your own leadership will pay off. Join us for the ten-week Inspired Leadership Signature Program, and do for yourself what you wish someone else would do for you.

I’ll be looking for your “I’m worth it” face in our next cohort of the Inspired Leadership Signature Program.

You’ll never go wrong when you bet on YOU