Other People’s Eyes

My first job out of college was at a major investment bank in New
York City. I worked at this place for several years. I spent three
months in London and six months in Tokyo. I had over six different
managers in that time. When I decided to move departments a few years
into my job, I had decided that choosing the right manager was
important to my happiness at work. What I realized a few months later
was that my manager wasn’t just important, he was crucial to
the success of my career.

The manager I worked for in London was wonderful. He liked me and
thought highly of me and encouraged me constantly. He had me work
with intelligent people and I learned a lot working for him. He’s the
sole reason I was willing to live apart from Jake for six months to
take a position in Tokyo. The manager I worked with before him in New
York was totally the opposite and always yelled at me, never made
positive remarks about my work and constantly complained. The
situation got so bad that I was dreading going to work each and every
day. I figured the manager in London (and then Tokyo) was as good as
it got.

Until I moved to another department at the bank. When I moved back
from Tokyo, I was ready to be done with the company but at my
manager’s request, decided to look around internally before I quit. I
met with several departments, all of whom were only willing to hire
me for menial jobs since I had decided to work three days a week. One
department, however, seemed to have an interesting project and they
really wanted me on board. The head of the department, let’s call him
Carl, met with me and asked me when I’d be willing to start. The
original offer was to support and fix a specific piece of software
that was honestly built wrong and broken all over the place. After a
few weeks and many meetings, I was suddenly put in charge of
rewriting the software altogether. I spent the following two years or
so, managing a team of six in London, Tokyo and New York and working
only three days a week. What’s amazing about this isn’t that I was a
phenomenal worker. I hadn’t really changed all that much from the
previous year and my skills hadn’t improved that drastically.

But my manager had. Carl believed in me and he told me so daily. Even
though he was a Managing Director, he met with me several times a
week and congratulated me regularly. He brought me along to meetings
with partners and other important people. He asked my opinion in
public and in private. He made sure I got all the credit for all my
work. He gave me all the resources I asked for and was there to
answer all my questions. He truly supported me in every way. More
significantly, he believed in me. Everyone thought working three days
a week would be a career suicide but he put me in charge of a project
and he promoted me to Vice President.



Carl made me believe in myself. He made me feel like I was capable of
doing all that he was asking me to do. And, amazingly, I became
capable. I rose to his expectations. I became the person he saw me as.

A few years ago a friend told me to be careful about statements I
made out loud. She said that if I constantly complain about being
fat, people start thinking I am fat even if they didn’t previously
think so. I believe in the power of saying something to make it
happen. Carl believed in me, he supported it and I rose to his
expectations. If I say something out loud often enough, other people
believe it and start treating me as such and then I become that
thing. Obviously, this happens all the time in abuse cases. Someone
tells you you’re trash often enough, you start believing it. Soon you
forget what your personal thoughts were and you just see yourself
through other people’s eyes. That can cause a lot of damage depending
on the people around you.

It can also help you become a better person. It can help you have
faith in yourself. It can help you become the person you have the
potential to be. The person you already are.

It’s all about whose eyes you get see yourself through.