Recognizing a Rumble: A Guest Post
I’m out of town this week so please enjoy this Leadership Message from our Director of Sales and Marketing, Colbért Callen.
Four years ago, Anthony led our Executive Leadership Team in a “book club” reading of Brené Brown’s “Dare To Lead.” It was a memorable year, deep diving month-by-month into her vulnerable concepts with a close group (10/10 recommend!) We still reference Brené Brown-isms often, and at a recent event, her concept of “rumbling” came into focus for me.
We were proud to cater a fabulous space-themed plated fundraiser for one of our esteemed venues and 500 VIP guests. Three weeks in advance, a Large Event Logistics Meeting was held, where a representative from each of our departments come together to discuss logistics to ensure seamless execution. Stakes were high the day of the event, and many additional managers were on-site, asking questions and sharing their insight to what could help make the evening perfect.
I checked in with a teammate and asked how they thought the evening was going. They replied, “everything is going fine, just lots of drama.” Drama? I had been there for three hours and had seen plenty of conversations, problem solving, tweaked logistics, layers of communication, but I had not experienced any drama. As I roamed through cocktail hour and pondered this, and it struck me that what our team was doing was “rumbling.”
Brené Brown describes a rumble as “a discussion, conversation, or meeting defined by a commitment to lean into vulnerability, to stay curious and generous, to stick with the messy middle of problem identification and solving. The word rumble has become more than just a weird West Side Story way to say, ‘Let’s have a real conversation, even if it’s tough.’ It’s become a serious intention-setter and a behavioral cue or reminder.”
Personally, I love to rumble. For my enneagram friends, I am a bold 8, The Challenger. I often play devil’s advocate in conversations (even against myself). I leave tough conversations with a sense of accomplishment and a full heart.
But hearing our team’s rumbles referred to as “drama” reminded me that not everyone enjoys the “messy middle” like I do. In the moment, these tough conversations can feel like personal attacks and trigger defensiveness. Our team was deep in the trenches of “messy middle of problem solving” at this event. It felt hard, and these problem solving interactions were perceived as “creating unnecessary stress about unimportant things” (as the Urban Dictionary defines drama).
When we can redefine and recognize moments of contention as rumbles, we can show up with open hearts and open minds. We value our teammates’ willingness to be vulnerable in sharing their ideas, and appreciate how much they care. The drama disappears, and our shared passion thrives.
When we find ourselves in rumbles, Brené Brown reminds us that we need to “be fearless in owning our parts, and, as psychologist Harriet Lerner teaches, to listen with the same passion with which we want to be heard. More than anything else, when someone says, ‘Let’s rumble,’ it cues me to show up with an open heart and mind so we can serve the work and each other, not our egos. Open hearts and open minds are critical if we want to be brave.
At the heart of daring is a deeply human truth that is rarely acknowledged: Courage and fear are not mutually exclusive. Most of us feel brave and afraid at the exact same time. We feel vulnerable. Sometimes all day long. During those moments, when we’re pulled between our fear and our call to courage, we need shared language, skills, tools, and daily practices that can support us through the rumble.”