The Value of Supporting Others

Originally published 9 September 2023

In my early twenties, I read Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics. I remember being fascinated by some of the ideas around people, community and our relationship with others. Fascinated enough, apparently, to try bringing Aristotle into a college essay where my professor wasn't entirely convinced he belonged.

The ideas stayed with me.

Much later in my career, I found myself thinking about them again, particularly around the idea of supporting other people.

I have spent a lot of my career in roles where my job is to support others. Sometimes that means bringing my own knowledge or experience into a discussion. Other times it is helping somebody work through a problem or simply being there when they need some help.

I have always found that rewarding, but also quite humbling.

Supporting somebody else sometimes means putting your own ego to one side. You don't always need the recognition, and your name doesn't have to be attached to the outcome.

Sometimes you help somebody work something out, and they take it from there. The team achieves something, and whatever part you played in getting there isn't particularly important.

I think there is a certain amount of ego you have to let go of if you genuinely want to support other people.

There is a different kind of satisfaction in knowing you helped somebody become more confident or capable, even when nobody else knows what part you played.

“I don't know how much of that I took from Aristotle when I first read him in my twenties. Perhaps my college professor was right, and I was just trying too hard to get Aristotle into the essay.

But more than thirty years later, I am still thinking about it.