Who do you talk to before you know what you're going to do?
An open inquiry from The Journal by Concentric
There is a particular kind of professional conversation I keep thinking about.
Not the conversation after you've made the decision.
The one before it.
Before you've decided whether to leave. Before you know if you want the promotion. Before the idea has become a plan. Before you're ready to tell your boss, your team, your board, or even some of the people closest to you.
When you're still trying to work out what you think.
Our first Concentric research involved 67 professionally established women in the US. One of the things it made me wonder was whether we sometimes confuse having a strong network with having the right people for this kind of conversation.
Because by the time someone is established in her career, she may know a lot of people.
Former colleagues. Mentors. Sponsors. Clients. Friends in the same industry. People she could call tomorrow.
But who among them do you call to say:
I know everyone thinks I should want this, but I'm not sure I do.
I think I've outgrown my role, but I don't know what comes next.
I can't tell whether I'm being brave or making a terrible decision.
What if the next thing I want looks nothing like the career I've spent years building?
That feels like a different test of a relationship.
And it is the part I want to understand.
The obvious explanation would be that some people simply need better networks.
I'm not sure that's it.
Perhaps becoming more senior changes what we are willing to admit professionally. Perhaps reputation starts to matter in a different way. Perhaps colleagues, mentors, sponsors, friends and partners are all useful, but useful for different things.
Or perhaps the whole premise is wrong.
Maybe this isn't a relationship problem at all.
I don't know yet.
So I've started asking people who might.
Over the next few weeks, I'm speaking with researchers, organizational psychologists, people who study belonging and professional relationships, experienced practitioners, and women who have lived this themselves.
I want to understand what the existing research tells us. I want to know where established professionals actually turn when something important is unresolved. I want to know whether this changes with seniority, whether there is anything particularly gendered about it, and what makes one relationship capable of holding uncertainty when another isn't.
I'm also interested in whether the kind of environment people need for these conversations can be deliberately created, or whether trust of that kind can only develop organically over time.
And I want people to tell me where the question itself is flawed.
That part matters.
Concentric is building around a hypothesis of its own, so the least useful thing we could do is go looking only for people who agree with it.
The early responses are already making the question more interesting.
One person described the difference between a network you can contact and an environment that is actively expanding what feels possible.
Another challenged the idea that careful matching creates trust at all.
That is exactly what I hoped would happen.
So I'd like to open the question a little wider.
Who I'd like to hear from
If you research professional networks, organizational psychology, social capital, belonging, career transitions, workplace relationships or peer support, I'd like to hear what the evidence says.
If your work has given you a substantive view on these questions, I'd like to hear that too.
And if you're a professionally established woman who immediately recognized the kind of conversation I'm describing — or read this and thought I've misunderstood it completely — I'd like to hear from you.
You do not need to have the answer.
Neither do I.
If you know something I should know, I'd like to hear from you.
Get in touch →The Journal by Concentric is currently gathering research, expert perspectives and lived experience for this inquiry. Selected contributors may be invited to speak with us or contribute to the resulting Journal work.