Having Stability to Get Through the Chaos

The past couple of years have been really tough for just about everyone in so many different ways. I mean, not only just with the pandemic, but we’ve got geopolitical tensions, we’ve got economic uncertainty. How did your Air Force experience enable you to help others at work to respond to so many rapid changes effectively?

When I transitioned from the Air Force to Goldman, it was 2013 and that’s when the price of gold dropped. And there were people who lost their retirements in that. I remember 200 West was like, on fire, everyone was just running around screaming, “Ah, gold!” And I remember myself and some other vets said, “did anyone die? No one died, right?”

How’s that for perspective?

And Goldman has very strong and engaged affinity networks. And my veteran mentor from the Veteran Network pulled me aside and said, “Trier, in order to be successful, you need to have a paradigm shift. Everything that we did in the military was to take a life or to save a life. Everything here at Goldman is to make $1 or lose $1. The sooner you can have that shift, the easier it will be.”
It took me a while to have that shift, but what remained intact is you have to be stable as a leader. You have to have that stability to get through the chaos. And so I will say though that in 2020, following the murder of George Floyd, as a Black woman that was a Chief People Officer at an organization that had the Air Force, the DOD, and to Space Force were our customers. So, we worked all the way through Covid. To work through that, but then also as a Black woman, being a Black person in this nation, I broke.
And it took me a while for me to see my own humanity in that and just show myself grace that it couldn’t have – that it was inevitable. But typically, I reserve to emote later, once we’ve gotten through the chaos. As a leader, that’s my responsibility. And leaders also have to be mindful that your reaction and your response will signal those beneath you that are looking towards you. Is that a heavy burden and responsibility? Absolutely. But it’s one that I don’t take lightly. And I think it’s one that I built that muscle in the military. I do give myself space to react and have emotions and that’s fine. But I put my people first because it’s people first always.