Everybody Makes It

I noticed that I’ve been referencing my time in “college” a lot lately and it just hit me as to what time of year it is right now…

I like to take time every Veteran’s Day to reflect, honor classmates and make sense of where I am and where I’m going.

Which leads me to this post. I had a series of really good conversations with my boss last week. It’s tumultuous times for myriad reasons, yet we all got together to chart out a direction that we would like to move in for the upcoming year. We’re definitely still in the storming phase but that’s to be understood right now, in my opinion.

One of the things Greg and I talked about briefly, was a concept that was drilled into my head at the zoo:

Everybody Makes It

In an era where personal brands reign supreme, I can understand that this is a tough concept for people to get their heads around. I’ve seen people struggle with the concept for nearly a decade. I’ve been part of the struggle myself at times. It’s easy to lose sight of the bigger picture in an attempt to grab a bigger individual slice.

But the term community is such a part of the social space that I think things be different here. Community doesn’t simply mean to gather a group of people, prospects, or customers together for individual gain.

Community means believing that there is enough [fill in the blank] for everybody to go around.

There is a large part of the word community that implies everybody is in it together and everybody makes it together.

Teams think that way.

Individuals don’t.