~by Haley Lynn Gray~
I spent the first years of my career believing that if I worked hard and followed the rules, I’d do well and rise through the ranks.
What took me far too long to notice was that most of those rules weren’t rules at all. Nobody had ever told them to me. I’d assembled them myself, from watching, from being a well-behaved girl, and from assuming that how things appeared to work was how they worked.
Here are the ones worth breaking.
1. “Work hard and you’ll be noticed”
You’ll be noticed by the person who notices things. Everyone else is busy.
Excellent work that nobody knows about doesn’t get rewarded — it gets absorbed. Telling people what you’ve done isn’t boasting; it’s making your work manageable.
2. “Wait your turn”
Turns are not administered by anyone. There’s no queue and no list.
Ask for the project, the role, the raise. The worst realistic outcome is a no, which leaves you exactly where you were — and almost everything turns out to be more negotiable than it looks.
3. “Don’t make waves”
Taught early to girls, and expensive later. Raising a problem, disagreeing in a meeting, or saying a plan won’t work is your job, not a breach of etiquette.
The people who advance are frequently the ones willing to be briefly uncomfortable in public.
4. “Be agreeable”
Being pleasant is good. Agreeing with everything is not — it makes your agreement worthless, and it means nobody can tell when you actually object.
Warm and immovable is the combination that works: pleasant tone, unchanged position.
5. “Do it properly or not at all”
The perfectionist’s rule, and the most expensive of the lot. It stops you delegating, publishing, launching or asking, on the grounds that it isn’t ready.
Adequate and done beats excellent and theoretical, in almost every case that isn’t payroll or safety.
6. “Stay in your lane”
Nobody hands you permission to learn something adjacent, take on a new type of client, or have an opinion about a part of the business that isn’t formally yours.
The boundary is usually one you drew.
How to tell a real rule from an invented one
Who told you? If you can’t name them, that’s informative.
What happens if you break it? Genuine consequence, or just discomfort?
Does everyone follow it? Watch the people doing well. Frequently they’re breaking the rule you’ve been obeying — and nothing has happened to them.
And would a man in your position follow it? An uncomfortable question that clarifies things quickly.
Real rules exist — laws, contracts, ethics, the ones with actual consequences. Keep those. The rest you made up, and you’re allowed to un-make them.
