Sachin Jain: One of the untold stories of my life
Sachin Jain, President and CEO of SCAN Group and Health Plan, recently posted on LinkedIn:
“I was fortunate (maybe unfortunate; read on) to be appointed to senior leadership positions early in my career. I was excited about the opportunity these early appointments gave me to grow personally and have an impact on issues and organizations that I cared about.
One of the untold stories of that time in my life was how much-unexpected negativity I experienced from people who I thought were friends (and others who I knew weren’t).
I was reminded of this period when a close colleague who was appointed to a senior role in a healthcare organization reached out to share her own such experiences.
Oh, I could sympathize with her feelings of betrayal.
What form did this negativity take?
- People vocally questioned whether I was qualified for my job or was offered it for some reason other than merit (the underlying, unstated feeling—“why him and why not me”).
- People actively disparaged my work—both the content and the way in which I did that work—without close intimate knowledge of it.
- People silently rooting for my failure to confirm their suspicion that I wasn’t where they thought I belonged at that stage of my career.
- And when I did happen to fail at something—for whatever reason—obvious schadenfreude; poorly hidden glee at bad outcomes.
There are some negative feelings you grow to get over and accept. And there are others that sting as strongly the first time you experience them as they were 10th.
These feelings certainly fit into the latter. Because it is human for us to want people and community in our lives to root for us.
Arising from jealousy, insecurity, skepticism, and fear—our haters make us question ourselves and feed the imposter syndrome that lies within all of us. And how unfortunate that so many people live in a zero-sum world—where there is lots of room for many to succeed. I still wouldn’t have lived my life or career any other way.
We don’t have to apologize to anyone for the opportunities we have. But if I had to do it all over again, I might have more quickly and assertively (and permanently) muted the people around me whose attitudes weren’t helpful to me.
I might have also trained myself to have a shorter memory for the slights whose sting otherwise linger for a long time.”
Source: Sachin Jain/LinkedIn