Jean Tien

Transcript

it was the summer of 2006 my first day at my dream job i was so nervous as i approached 85 broad street that i could barely open the doors to enter the building my whole body was shaking and i felt as if i was going to explode from first day jitters what if scenarios ran through my brain as i made my way to my desk what if i didn't like my job what if they didn't like me what if i can't find my desk and i'm late for my first day of work luckily i found my manager let's call him bob pretty quickly and he

turned out to be pretty nice he took me around the floor introduced me to folks and he even took me out to lunch i left the building that day thinking i'm gonna be okay i'm going to fit in here about a week into the job bob calls me into his office and he began to tear apart a report that i had prepared for him nothing about this report was right and as he got into how wrong it was the angrier he became the angrier he became the more nervous and scared that i became and the more questions that i had for him about how to

fix it when i was done with my questions he looked at me cold straight in the eyes and said what is the problem gene i felt as if i got sucker punched i knew what he really meant to ask was what is my problem and i had nothing to say to him all i could do was to excuse myself pick up my stuff and run out of that office as quickly as possible hoping that he wouldn't see me cry and on my way home that night i just kept replaying the conversation over and over again in my head what did i say that was so

wrong what did i do to make him so mad and what could i have done to make him happy it didn't take too long for me to realize that the best way to work with bob was to pretty much stay out of his way and that's what i did until i left the firm before starting my new job i stood there praying and praying that bob was just a fluke but it wasn't over the next six years i constantly beat myself up more so than bob could have ever beat me up because i just wasn't cutting it in finance or in life while everyone else

around me looked so happy i felt so miserable on the inside constantly doubting everything about me worrying if i said the right thing or if i did the right thing or if i would have pissed off the next bob it got so bad that i became a self-inflicted insomniac finally two jobs and three bobs later i realized i was never going to make bob happy no one can and it was with this epiphany that i stood there in the middle of my office at home alone and i declared to the universe bob will never control my success or failures because if i fail i will

fail on my terms not on bob's that was the moment that i picked myself off the floor of bob's office at 85 broad street when i stopped asking bob for permission to succeed i finally found the success that i was looking for since that summer when i allowed myself to be seen i actually became the go-to subject matter expert at my firm of over 200 000 employees and the success keeps growing because here's the thing there are bobs everywhere but he is merely a reflection of our own insecurities he has no power over any of us unless you choose to hand it to him life

is hard it'll knock you down but that doesn't mean that you're weak it's what you do afterwards that will truly define you and you have a choice each and every day will you allow bob to be your ending or will you make him the beginning of your comeback story thank you you

Transcript generated from the recording and lightly cleaned. Some names and wording may differ from the spoken speech.