Nishita Roy-Pope | Courage Builder CEO
Across my professional journey spanning Fortune 500 companies, startups, nonprofits and higher education, I’ve observed a consistent pattern. We often obsess over financial performance and operational efficiencies. While these metrics are critical to any bottom line, I believe an area that often gets overlooked is how we are intentionally investing in a culture of courage.
So, what does this mean in practice?
It means ensuring that people leaders possess the skills and confidence to encourage smart risk-taking. It requires us to embrace the incredible value of failure – which I believe is just “earning” knowledge, anyway. The most transformative innovations emerge only when individuals know they have the psychological safety to propose bold ideas.
A culture of courage also requires us to create space for many voices to be heard. This can be as simple as a senior leader allowing junior team members to speak first in meetings to avoid anchoring the conversation.
Through leading training programs for a broad range of audiences – from early-career talent to midcareer professionals to senior executives – I’ve witnessed the power of making space for vulnerability, pitching ideas, open collaboration and reflecting on shared challenges.
And we must have the courage to expand who we empower to make strategic decisions – our boardrooms, venture capital funds, government leadership and C-suites should reflect our multifaceted society and customers.
Building a culture of courage takes immense intention. It isn’t a one-time event or the responsibility of a single department.
When we build systems designed to activate and support courage, we all win. We create better customer experiences, more engaged employees and more-impactful organizations.