Over 73% Of People Were Vulnerable At Work And Had It Backfire. Here's What Happened To One CEO And What He Learned

At some point in your career vulnerability WILL BE used against you. Does this mean you should never be vulnerable again? What should you do if this happens to you?

Have you ever been vulnerable at work and had it backfire? For context, vulnerability is about doing or saying something at work that can potentially be used against you. It’s essentially exposing a gap that you have.

Perhaps you admitted to a mistake, shared a personal struggle, or confessed to not knowing how to do something - just to have that vulnerability used against you in some way. It turns out this happens quite a lot and I believe during the course of a typical career it WILL happen at least once.

A few months ago I did an informal poll on LinkedIn with over 1,000 people. 85% of respondents said they had vulnerability used against them at some point in their careers.

In my latest book, Leading With Vulnerability, I surveyed nearly 14,000 employees in partnership with DDI. In that survey, 73% of participants said they were vulnerable at work and had it backfire.

Today I’m going to share the story of one of the CEOs I interviewed and what this CEO learned. In an upcoming post I’m going to give you a structured framework that will walk you through what you should do if you’re vulnerable at work and it backfires.

That post will only be available for subscribers as well so make sure you sign up to get that post here.

One CEO of a large telecommunications company shared a story with me about how her vulnerability was used in an attempt to destroy her career. This CEO asked to remain anonymous so let’s call him Bob.

Here’s Bob’s story…