It has been an amazing week (despite this post being late as I was unexpectedly struck down unwell). Last week, I was fortunate enough to attend the Academy for Healthcare Science Honorary Fellowships and Chair Celebration, which was a joyous way to celebrate the contribution that Healthcare Scientists make to the Academy, but also to acknowledge the impact that Healthcare Scientists make across the healthcare landscape. This week has been Healthcare Science week, and it’s been a delight to see the posts shared, and hear about the great work and impact of Healthcare Scientists.
It’s been especially poignant for me personally, as the AHCS had also been liaising with me to support my book, It Shouldn’t Happen to a PhD Student. They were generous enough to allow me to share copies of the the book as part of the goodie bag for their Fellowship event, as well including an article about why I felt it necessary to write the book within the Spring 2026 edition of the HCS Leadership Journal.
All of which got me thinking…it got me thinking about how it feels to have people step up to support you. It got me thinking about privilege and the importance of knowing where you have it, and where you may lack it. Finally, it got me thinking about the importance of using that privilege recognition to actively engage with others, and decide how to utilise it both for impact and the benefit of others.
Awareness of privilege
We all have privilege, even if it doesn’t always feel like it. If you are reading this blog you have some form of privilege, even if that is just that you aren’t in digital poverty. I have privilege. I am white, middle class, European, and in a heterosexual marriage. I also lack privilege in some ways, being a woman who came from a state education background, and work in a professional structure that is dominated by my medical colleagues. Organisations are the same, they will have spheres of influence, and areas where they are trying to expand that influence.
It is obviously helpful to know where you have influence, and where you may lack it. This is essential to allow informed decision making about where to devote your energies, but more than that, it is important to know where you can expend energy for the benefit of others. There is more danger than we sometimes acknowledge in not understanding, and spending time reflecting on, our privilege. Not doing this can result in making assumptions that can harm ourselves and others.
Awareness of the priviledge gap
What does that privilege awareness look like? I am never going to be able to run an invite only event for 200 people. I have a fair level of of influence, due to you lovely people reading this blog and interacting with me on social media, but I am only one person. I will never have the influence, impact or resources of an organisation or group. Therefore, the privilege I am able to harness for the benefit of others will also be limited. This is why I want to discuss the importance of gestures, such as those made by the AHCS. I am able to reach a certain percentage of Healthcare Scientists that I’m personally connected with across platforms. The Academy in contrast has thousands of members across their registers. They have thousands of followers across social media platforms, and they also have reputation impact, as they are have intrinsic legitimacy due to their role providing professional accreditation.
The AHCS supporting me, by allowing me to share my book and by including an article in their journal, substantially increases my reach, and the chance of something I hope to have impact, getting into the hands of someone who may find it useful. It also lends their validation to that reach as, I hope, they wouldn’t support sharing details of the book if they thought it was rubbish. It gets my book into the hands of people who may never have picked it up otherwise, from students to senior leaders. I’m so grateful to them for using their privilege to support something that means so much to me, and that I hope will support the profession I love. Gestures can be big or small, but the impact of them should never be underestimated.
Support without asking
Now, I’ve talked about the fact that I do have privilege. That said, I don’t have the kind of privilege I’ve seen in some of my academic or medical colleagues. The kind of privilege where doors are just opened, or barriers are just removed. I don’t have a problem with this, I feel like I have proven myself every step of the way. Every promotion I’ve had has been a competitive process. Every committee I’ve sat on I’ve either had to apply for or prove my credentials as part of joining. The support for my book is the first time ever that someone has come to me and asked how they can help. Not just the Academy, but places like Applied Microbiology International. The Academy really followed through, and did not just ask the question, but helped me work out ‘the how’. They don’t know this, but when I got off the call, and recovered from the shock of their kindness, I actually had a little happy cry. There is nothing like people stepping up and showing their faith in your by offering the kind of support you would never have asked for. It is a rare event, and it’s made me determined to do what I can for others in order to make it a little less rare.
Support without conditions
Often when people have offered support for me in the past there has been a certain level of quid pro quo. A level of you scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours. If you’ve followed this blog for any length of time, you’ll know that my leadership style is much more around authentic leadership than transactional leadership. There is nothing wrong per se, with transactional leadership, there is definitely a place and time, but it doesn’t feel the same as someone offering their support with no ties or limitations. There is something special about someone offering unconditional support, support that you don’t feel like you have to pay back or pay off. Now having said that, I’m not saying you shouldn’t try to live up to the generosity being offered you, just that it’s different when that’s a decision you make rather than one that is a condition of the support to begin with.
Support without comeback
The other interesting form of support is that type that comes freely at early stages of your career, but has ramifications later on. I think many of us have probably experienced this one, where you have had mentors or supporters who offered great support, until the point at which you reach a similar level of career progression. At this point the support becomes more transactional, or worse, relationships become less constructive and more distant. Opportunities taken can be greeted with commentary, or judgement. This can be a very confusing scenario if you haven’t encountered it before, or seen it happen to others.
People who offer support irrespective of career stage, or perceived risk to position, are worth their weight in gold. Those individuals and organisations who support others, not for benefit to themselves, nor affected by positionality, are both investing in relationships for the long term and build trust based on consistency. This is one of the best ways to maximise impact over time, both for the person supporting, but also for those offering aid.
Acceptance without doubt
This isn’t just about those offering the support however, no matter how wonderful. It is also about how we receive the support and opportunities that we are offered. It can be easy to question whether to accept unconditional support by wondering what’s the catch? If you have been submerged in a culture where you are surrounded by transactional relationships, or where cultures have become challenging due to resource scarcity, it is both understandable and predictable to question support when offered. It is essential however that we get out of our own way. This can be a challenge if you are in a position where you lack privilege. When working with, and offering support to others who have dealt with a lack of privilege long term, building trust may be a required step prior to acceptance of any support offered.
We can all have a tendency to say ‘why me’ for both good and ill. This can obviously be context dependent, as well as depending on whether we are in a place of pessimism or optimism when the offer is made. It is important to have the self awareness to know when we are drifting to skepticism when we should be embracing opportunity. When we are driven by factors from our past instead of embracing our future.
Acceptance with gratitude
Instead of questioning when we are offered support, it is important to move to a space where we accept with gratitude rather than anxiety. I think it’s key to talk about what I mean by gratitude, I’m talking about gratitude without submission. I have a tendency to over correct on this one. I tend to be so grateful for the support that I can come across as sycophantic, without meaning to. I think the best way you can be grateful however, is to make sure you learn the lessons from being offered the support and ensure that you incorporate it into your practice by role modelling that behaviour yourself. As you are being supported without conditions, you should be thankful and stop looking for some unwritten cost that doesn’t exist. Embrace the opportunity and then make sure you do the same for others.
Delivering on the commitment
The biggest demonstration of gratitude you can give, I believe, is by delivering on the faith that others have placed in you. If someone goes out of their way to show you support, then deliver. Deliver on whatever that may be. It could be by putting in the work to achieve a goal. It could be by working to ensure that the advantage they’ve given you isn’t wasted and allows a next step to be taken. It could just be by embedding the same values in your leadership to benefit others. Actions speak louder than words, and so if given an opportunity act to maximise the outcome.
Paying it forward
I’ve mentioned the importance of making sure that you increase the legacy of any kindness you are shown by role modelling that moving forward, but it’s so important that I wanted to state it again. Not all gestures require large resource or commitment. It can be as simple as stating someone’s name in a room that they are not in, or passing on an opportunity that you may believe would be of benefit. Knowing where our privilege and influence lie, not taking it for granted, and utilising it for the benefit of others in whatever way we can, is such an important part of how we move forward as a profession and lift people up as individuals. Especially at the moment, when resources are limited and times are hard, it can be easy to forget what is in our gift to do, and I think now more than ever it’s crucial to realise that we all still have the capacity to positively impact on others.
A final thank you
So, I wanted to end by saying thank you again to the Academy of Healthcare Science. Not only have they really impacted me by showing such by in with a book that means a lot to me, but they were also kind enough to present me with an extra surprise, the Chair’s Award for Excellence. It’s made a real impact on me, and now all I can hope to do is pay it forward and show the same faith and impact in others.
All opinions in this blog are my own
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