Life isn't fair, especially in the workplace. In Edge:
Turning Adversity into Advantage, Laura Huang offers a new strategy for
uncovering and showcasing your unique value in the face of obstacles.
We’re told that the secret to success is hard work. But
the truth is, hard work alone doesn’t always pay off.
After all, career advancement isn’t always neatly tied
to your skills, effort, or even the quality of your work. Some people gain
easier access than others to the critical ingredients of money, time, and
connections that part the workplace waters—even when they don’t have the best
ideas or the most talent.
“It’s a myth that hard work is enough. We’ve all had
experiences where we worked hard and still ended up losing out on a new job or
a key promotion,” says Harvard Business School Associate Professor Laura Huang,
who studies early entrepreneurship, where failure is common. “You can take two
people who work equally hard, and one person will naturally have an advantage
and achieve success, while the other can’t climb the corporate ladder.”
What often gets in the way: stereotypes about gender and
race or perceptions about age and class. Indeed, vast research shows that
certain groups, such as women and African Americans, have a tougher time
getting ahead.
Yet Huang argues that we can’t let other people’s
stereotypes or their views of our faults or limitations, right or wrong, hold
us back. Instead, we have to focus on finding our “edge”—the unique qualities
that set us apart—and take strategic steps to make other people see our value
and open the doors that will take us where we want to go.
