James Laughlin joined the Canterbury rugby team and felt like an imposter until the team's culture of fist pumps, name recognition, and focused attention made him feel genuinely welcomed. He asks what your team does to make people feel they belong.
I remember my first, first ever time walking in, working with the Canterbury rugby team, and there was a real strong feeling of, whoa, I don't know this team yet. I'm new here. I don't know how I'm going to fit in. It's going to be interesting. You know, we all have imposter syndrome. And certainly when I walked in there, I was like, this is totally outside my comfort zone. And the culture there was phenomenal. I had about 25 fist pumps within 10 minutes of arriving. Many people already knew my name. When I started speaking, there was just full focus. And by the time I left on day one, there was this seed inside of me feeling like, hey, I belong. I felt today like I belonged here. And so I came back the following week with so much more courage and excitement and engagement. So I want you to ask yourself, wherever you are, whatever organization or team you're a part of, what level of belonging do you feel.
