🎤 Quotable Quote
“Achievement and fulfillment are completely two different things.”
— Irina Posan
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🎧 This Week's Guest: Irina Posan
Remember when you knew exactly what success was supposed to look like?
The promotion. The title. The salary. The corner office.
You worked hard. You climbed the ladder. You checked the boxes.
And then one day, you looked around and thought...
Is this it?
This week on Leadership Rules, we sat down with Irina Posan, career strategist and author of The Career You Crave: Create Fulfillment in Your Work and Life.
After 15 years in HR, recruitment, talent management, and leadership, Irina found herself in a position many people would envy.
She had achieved what she'd spent years working toward.
There was just one problem.
She wasn't happy.
And she couldn't understand why.
After all, wasn't this what success was supposed to feel like?
Irina eventually discovered something she calls identity lag, and we think it's a concept worth adding to your personal leadership vocabulary.
💥 Leadership Rule of the Week
Don't Let Your Career Outgrow Your Curiosity About Yourself.
Irina describes identity lag as what happens when you've evolved, but your career hasn't caught up.
Think about that for a moment.
We regularly reassess our business plans, our goals, our projects, and our strategies.
But how often do we reassess ourselves?
The person who chose your career at 22 isn't necessarily the person you are at 42.
Your priorities change. Your interests evolve. Your definition of success shifts.
Yet many of us keep pursuing the same goals we set years ago, assuming that the next achievement will finally bring fulfillment.
Irina made an important distinction during our conversation:
Achievement is external. Fulfillment is internal.
One can be measured by a job title or a paycheck.
The other can only be measured by how that achievement actually makes you feel.
And here's the important part.
There's nothing wrong with achievement.
But achievement without reflection can leave us climbing a ladder we no longer want to be on.
So perhaps the question isn't simply, "Am I successful?"
Maybe it's...
"Does my definition of success still fit the person I've become?"
💡 Other Topics We Loved!
The warning signs of identity lag
Irina described how she once practically ran into the office, excited to start her day.
Eventually, she found herself sitting in the parking lot, gripping the steering wheel, trying to convince herself to go inside.
The work hadn't necessarily changed.
She had.
A loss of motivation, diminished enthusiasm, or that persistent feeling that something isn't quite right can be signals worth exploring.
You don't have to burn your life down
This might have been our favorite practical takeaway.
When people realize their careers no longer fit, they often imagine the only solution is a dramatic one.
Quit the job. Change industries. Start over.
But Irina encourages something much more manageable.
Experiment before you leap.
Before leaving her corporate career, she spent eight months building her coaching business while continuing to work.
She gathered evidence. She tested her assumptions. She learned what actually energized her.
And she discovered that her new career wasn't nearly as disconnected from her old one as she'd imagined.
The skills she'd spent 15 years developing came right along with her.
The red thread
Irina uses the idea of a red thread to describe the experiences, skills, and strengths that connect the different chapters of our lives.
We love that.
A career change doesn't erase everything you've learned.
Your experiences travel with you.
Sometimes what looks like starting over is actually building on everything that came before.
Give fear the day off
Irina shared a story about spending her birthday at a spa, alone, with her phone tucked away.
For eight hours, she had space to think.
And she asked herself one question:
"If I could do anything and I knew I could not fail, what would I do?"
Two weeks later, she started her company.
Now, we're not suggesting everyone needs an eight-hour spa day.
Although, frankly, that doesn't sound terrible.
But we do think there's something powerful about creating enough quiet to hear what you've been trying not to think about.
Have the conversation you're avoiding
This one really stuck with us.
Irina explained that her first steps weren't dramatic career moves.
They were conversations.
One with her husband.
One with her boss.
Conversations she'd been avoiding because she was afraid of what might happen.
And those conversations revealed possibilities she hadn't even considered.
Sometimes the thing standing between us and our next chapter isn't a lack of opportunity.
It's a conversation we're afraid to start.
One final thought.
We often talk about the importance of having a plan.
And plans are good.
But so is recognizing when the plan no longer fits.
You are allowed to change your mind about what success looks like.
After all, the most important project you'll ever work on is you.
📺 Learn More
🎧 Listen to our full conversation with Irina Posan on Leadership Rules.
📘 Find The Career You Crave: Create Fulfillment in Your Work and Life on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, or Indigo.
💼 Connect with Irina Posan on LinkedIn.
📸 Follow her on Instagram at @careercoachirina.
More leadership musings
🍪 Biscuits with the Boss:
Here's a question worth spending some time with this week:
What's something you once desperately wanted that no longer matters nearly as much to you?
Maybe it's a job title.
A particular accomplishment.
A lifestyle.
Or even someone else's definition of success.
Now ask yourself:
What matters more to me today than it did five years ago?
You don't have to make a dramatic change.
You don't even have to make a decision.
Just give yourself permission to reconsider.
And if there's a conversation you've been avoiding?
Maybe this is the week to have it.
🌎 This week in Here - There - Every F’ing where
Oh, we were definitely here, there, and everywhere this week! Big thank you to Lisa Davis from CLEARS. We had a packed house as we talked about Leadership as a Coach and how to Lead it Like Lasso.
Also, shout out to Marnie's daughter for snapping a picture of her in her Ted Lasso jersey at a book signing event for Lead It Like Lasso in Denton, Maryland. From California to Maryland, we stretched across the coasts this week.
Believe!
Nick & Marnie
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