Bahar Selman, PCC

You look successful on paper.

Senior title. Strong salary.
Respect inside your company.

But your career is more fragile than it looks.
AI is compressing senior roles.
Restructuring doesn’t care about loyalty.
And your 15–25 years of expertise is invisible outside your employer.

If corporate ended tomorrow, most leaders at your level have:
• No external personal brand
• No consulting or advisory options
• No income diversification
• No real Plan B

That’s not a talent problem.
It’s a career longevity problem.

Career longevity isn’t about staying in one job longer.
It’s about staying relevant, visible, and in demand across decades—
regardless of age, AI disruption, or employer dependency.

That’s where career autonomy comes in.

Career autonomy means:
• Your expertise is portable
• Your reputation exists outside one company
• You have options before you need them
• One corporate decision can’t derail your future

I work with senior corporate leaders (Directors, VPs, C-suite) who:
• Have built impressive careers inside multinationals
• Feel the growing risk of invisibility and replaceability
• Want to protect their income, identity, and legacy
• Need a strategic way to build visibility without harming their corporate role

This is not about quitting your job.
And it’s definitely not about becoming an “online influencer.”

It’s about strategic positioning.

I spent over 15 years inside global corporations, building brands, leading teams, and operating at senior levels.

I’ve seen firsthand how quickly:
• Roles disappear
• Experience gets discounted
• High performers become “too expensive”
• Loyal leaders get caught unprepared

Since then, I’ve worked with 500+ senior professionals to help them:
• Turn corporate experience into visible authority
• Build reputation-safe personal brands
• Create consulting, advisory, and portfolio options
• Design exit strategies on their own terms

Through The Career Autonomy Blueprint™, I help experienced leaders:
• Clarify their next chapter
• Position their expertise for the external market
• Build LinkedIn visibility that attracts opportunities
• Create a strategic safety net before they’re forced to use it

The outcome isn’t noise or vanity metrics.

The outcome is power:
• Options
• Confidence
• Leverage
• Control over your future

If you’re still employed but quietly thinking:
“Something needs to change but I don’t know where to start”
You’re exactly who this work is for.

DM me on LinkedIn or email info@baharselman.com when you’re ready to explore your options

Consultant

Bahar Selman

I might lose friends over this, but:

Staying in one company for 15+ years is career suicide in 2026.

Here’s why I’m willing to bet my reputation on it:

Because loyalty doesn’t protect you anymore.

AI eliminates roles. Restructuring is constant. And the longer you stay invisible in one company, the harder it is to pivot when you’re forced to.

I’m not saying quit your job.

I’m saying build Career Autonomy WHILE you’re employed.

So when the time comes—and it will—you have options.


Do you have options? Or are you hoping loyalty will save you?

Bahar Selman,PCC

Career Longevity & Personal Branding Strategist for Senior Corporate Leaders │ Executive Coach │ Corporate Trainer │ Corporate Workshops & Keynotes @ Uphuman │ Ex–Diageo, Danone, Red Bull

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By 2027, “having a good resume” will be obsolete.

The people who win will be those who master personal branding today.

Because AI can write resumes.

But AI can’t build trust, credibility, and relationships.

Are you still relying on your resume to get your next role?

Or are you building a personal brand that makes recruiters come to you?


The choice is yours. But 2027 is closer than you think.

In corporate, it’s easy to spend 40 hours on “looking busy.”

Attending meetings. Responding to emails. Following processes.

But the real career growth happens in the 2 hours you spend on:

	•	Building your personal brand
	•	Optimizing your LinkedIn
	•	Creating strategic relationships outside your company

Because “busy” keeps you employed.

But “high-value” makes you irreplaceable.


Where are you spending your 2 hours?

#careerlongevity

I made the same mistake at the peak of my corporate career.

I thought a strong results, and internal credibility
meant I was safe.

I thought staying quiet was “professional.”
That visibility was risky.
That loyalty would be rewarded.

Then I watched restructurings wipe out people with 20+ years of experience.
AI accelerate faster than job titles.
And brilliant leaders become “redundant” overnight.

Here’s the uncomfortable truth:
Invisibility feels safe until it becomes your biggest risk.

Most leaders hit by restructuring aren’t weak performers.
They’re strong operators with zero external positioning.

Inside the company: respected.
Outside the company: unknown.

And if your value disappears the moment your corporate email does,
that’s not stability.

That’s fragility.

The leaders who will survive what’s coming
aren’t louder, younger, or trendier.

They’re visible before they need to be.

Sit with that.
Then rethink how you’re positioning yourselfwhile you still have the choice.

Most people ignore “feeling invisible at work.”

They think: “It’s fine. I’m still getting my paycheck.”

But in 6 months, that turns into:

	•	Being passed over for promotions
	•	Being “too expensive” during restructuring
	•	Being eliminated because “no one knows what you do”

Are you ignoring it?

Because the cost of staying invisible is higher than the cost of building visibility.


When was the last time someone outside your company asked for your expertise?

5 signs your current career strategy is a ticking time bomb:

	1.	You haven’t updated your LinkedIn in 6+ months
	2.	No one outside your company knows what you do
	3.	You’re waiting for “the right time” to build your personal brand
	4.	You think loyalty will protect you from restructuring
	5.	You have no Plan B if your job ends tomorrow

If you see #3, stop what you’re doing immediately.

Because “the right time” never comes.

The right time is NOW. While you still have leverage.


How many of these apply to you?

Let me guess.
You're reading this because part of you is thinking, "This sounds great, Bahar. But is it too late for me?"

You're in your mid-40s/50s. Everyone else started years ago. Haven't you missed your window?

Here's what I want you to know.

You haven't missed your window. 
You've been building credibility while others have been building followers. Now it's time to combine both.

Your 15-25 years of experience is not a liability. 
It's your unfair advantage.
But only if people know you exist.

That's the difference between professionals who thrive and professionals who survive. 

Between those who have options and those who feel trapped.

The best time to build your brand was 5 years ago. 
The second best time is NOW.

Because every week you wait, your expertise becomes less relevant. 
Not because you're getting older. 
But because the market is moving forward without you.

It’s About Not Putting Your Head in the Sand.
One line in this conversation stopped me cold.

Jamie Dimon doesn’t dramatize AI.
He doesn’t soften it either.
He says it plainly:
“Don’t put your head in the sand.”
That sentence alone is a career warning.

Because when asked whether AI will wipe out jobs, he doesn’t hedge:
“Will it eliminate jobs? Yes.
 Will it change jobs? Yes.
 Will it add some jobs? Probably.”

This isn’t panic.
This is realism.

And then comes the line every professional should sit with:
“You can hope for the world you want, but you’re going to get the world you got.”

Hope is not an employability strategy.
What matters now is how fast change happens, and whether people are ready for it.

Dimon makes a critical distinction most career conversations miss:
The danger isn’t AI itself — it’s speed without preparation.
“If it goes too fast for society… that’s where government and business need to step in together.”

Retraining.
Relocation.
Income support.
Phasing change instead of detonating it.

His example is blunt:
“You can’t lay off two million truckers tomorrow.
 You phase it in. You retrain.”

Now zoom out and make this personal.
This is no longer just a policy issue.
It’s a career design issue.

Because a few minutes later, he’s asked the question everyone avoids:
“In five years’ time, will JP Morgan have fewer employees than it has now?”

His answer:
“My guess is there’ll be fewer employees.”
Not no employees.
Fewer.

Which means employability is shifting from:
role ownership → value ownership
job security → skill mobility
experience alone → adaptable relevance

AI won’t replace professionals.
It will replace professionals who can’t clearly explain why they still matter.

Career longevity now belongs to those who:
Reposition early
Learn continuously
And stop waiting for certainty before acting

Because as Dimon puts it:
“You’re not going to slow it down.”

The question is not if your work changes.
It’s whether you change before the market decides for you.

I’ve led billion-riyal strategies.

Sat across from ministers.
Delivered national plans under midnight deadlines.
Built cultures, guided boards, & transformed high-stakes rooms.

But the work that changed me was never in the "strategy decks".

It was in the silences.

The moments when a high-performing leader looked at me and said,

 “I can’t do this anymore.”

That’s where my real work began.

I didn’t become a coach.
I’ve always been one.

For over 15 years, I led national teams, crisis projects, and board-level strategies.

Center of government. Vision 2030. KPMG.
CSO. Principal. Head of PMO.

Projects worth billions.

Environments where most lasted months. I stayed years.

But what I was really doing  was ‘listening’.


Reading between the lines.
Holding space in rooms where no one else would.

I’ve sat in boardrooms where no one said what they really felt.


Ministry-level meetings.
Global consulting war rooms.
Royal Court strategy sessions.

Where decisions moved billions.
Where timelines were impossible.
Where silence felt safer than honesty.

Where leaders smiled but quietly carried doubt, exhaustion, and fear.

Those moments don’t show up in reports.

But they show up in:

Team tension no one will name
Burnout that gets labeled as “attrition”
Quiet disconnection that kills innovation
Resignations from people you thought were loyal

And that’s where I come in. 

I mentor leaders through what most avoid:

→ The unspoken weight.
→ The quiet disconnection.
→ The emotional core of leadership.
→ The pressure to hold it all together.

Because a disengaged employee costs over $14,000 annually.

And the worst part?

Companies lose $223 billion to toxic culture each year.

Culture misalignment is silent.
Until it’s not.

Studies show that up to 60% of turnover is preventable with emotionally intelligent leadership.

And now, I bring that lens into every room I walk into.

In the past 15 years, I’ve helped:

→ Teams restore trust in under 90 days
→  Companies reduce turnover by up to 60%
→ Executives shift from burnout to clarity—without losing their edge

If you're leading on autopilot
If your team looks fine but feels fractured.
If you’ve ticked every box but still feel disconnected...

You don’t need more productivity hacks.

You need emotional clarity.
You need someone who’s walked this path.

And can walk it with you.

Dm “EQ” to enquire about executive mentoring, team leadership labs, or custom EQ workshops.

Because If your team looks fine on the surface but feels fractured underneath,

That’s a  $1M+ Culture Leak.

And I’m here to help you fix it.

Rawan Althagafy

The hardest part of being a single mother in leadership? 

The division NO ONE can see.

Even while discussing priorities in meetings,
I’ve silently calculated school pickup times.

Part of my attention stayed in the room.

Part of it was somewhere else entirely.

Not distracted.
But divided.

I remember one afternoon at the Royal Court.

We were mapping a national strategy timeline.

Critical decisions. High stakes.

And in the back of my mind, I was calculating:

If this meeting runs late, who picks up my daughter?
If I leave on time, will they think I'm not committed?
If I stay, will she feel like I chose work over her again?

I made the decision in the room.

But I carried the weight of both.

No one at work knew I was a single mother.

So they only saw focus.

They never saw the division.

That mental load of holding two worlds at once was crushing me.

And still, I was pretending it was effortless.

That division is truly exhausting.

Most leaders don’t even talk about this.

Because it’s not really about time management.

It was about presence fragmentation.

I was performing well in both spaces.

But I was never fully present in either.

And that split…
that constant toggling between identities
drains you in places rest doesn't reach.

For years, I thought I just needed to plan better.

But what I really needed was acknowledgment.

Not from the outside world.
But from myself.

It was OK to feel that things were hard.

And not because I was failing, but because I was carrying more than what’s visible.

Leadership load is much more than what’s written on the agenda.

It's the invisible mental math running quietly underneath it.

Ignoring that load doesn't make you stronger.

It just makes you tired in ways people can't see.

Now, when I mentor leaders, especially mothers navigating both worlds,

I don't just help them optimize their time.
I help them honor the division.

Because 𝐚𝐰𝐚𝐫𝐞𝐧𝐞𝐬𝐬 𝐝𝐨𝐞𝐬𝐧'𝐭 𝐫𝐞𝐦𝐨𝐯𝐞 𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐩𝐨𝐧𝐬𝐢𝐛𝐢𝐥𝐢𝐭𝐲.

𝐈𝐭 𝐡𝐞𝐥𝐩𝐬 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐜𝐚𝐫𝐫𝐲 𝐢𝐭 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐮𝐭 𝐟𝐫𝐚𝐠𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠.

Without losing yourself in the split.

Founder @ Elevating Minds | EQ Leadership Expert | Center of Government | Fixing the $223B Culture Problem With EQ-Led Leadership 🎯

“Rawan, you never break.”

People said this like a compliment for years.

And even I thought that was strong leadership.

I stopped myself from cracking in front of anyone.

I wasn't showing visible strain.

And I was proud of myself for that composure.

Then I started noticing the leaks.

Not in my words
but in my tone.

In decisions that felt heavier than they should.

In the fatigue that didn't match my workload.

In the tightness in my chest before meetings that I used to handle easily.

The pressure was finding exits I couldn't control.

I remember one day at the Royal Court.

A colleague asked me a simple question.

And I snapped.

Not loud. Not dramatic.

Just sharp enough that we both felt it.

She looked surprised.

I was too.

That’s when I realized:

When emotion has nowhere to go,
it shows up where you least want it.

I thought I was containing the pressure.

But in reality, I was just redirecting it.

It ruined my health.
It was constantly eating away my patience.

And I was taking it out on relationships that never deserved any of it.

I realized something at that moment.

Real strength isn’t sealing everything shut.

It’s tracing the pressure back to its source
before it spills into places it doesn’t belong.

Awareness never weakens leadership.

In fact, it stabilizes it.

Where do you notice your pressure leaking lately?

My daughter asked me a question that broke me: 

"Mom, why don't you smile at home as you do at work?”

Silence.
I had no answer for her.

That’s because I had learned to regulate my emotions in meetings.

But I didn’t see what that composure was costing me.

I could sit through tense boardroom discussions without reacting.

Present strategies under pressure without cracking.

Navigate politics at the Royal Court without losing my calm.

People respected that.
I respected it too.

Until I started noticing the cost.

I was regulating everything,
but I was never processing all of it.

The emotions I managed all day didn’t disappear.

They were just being collected.

And showed up later as:

Exhaustion I couldn’t explain.
Irritability that surprised me.

I was performing at work and holding it all together.

But I was falling apart quietly at home.

And my daughter was able to spot it.
Even when I was missing out on it.

Emotional intelligence isn’t about constant control.

It’s knowing when to regulate and when to honor your emotions.

That understanding is what saved me over time.

Have you ever felt exhausted from constantly performing at work?

“I can’t do this anymore.” I said this out loud.

Alone. In my office, after everyone left.

I was on the verge of breaking.

Because it was this particular week at the Royal Court.

Four years of high-stakes work.
Four years of managing impossible timelines.
Four years of being one of two women in a room of 25.

And that week?

Everything hit at once.

A national deadline moved up without warning.
A family situation I couldn’t control.

I sat in my office after everyone left.

And I just shouted at the top of my voice.

I just wanted to leave everything.

But I stayed.

Not because I felt strong.

But because walking away from myself,
from the work, from the responsibility, from who I was becoming
would have cost more than staying.

Those quiet moments never show up on performance reviews.

They never get acknowledged in meetings.

But that changed me internally.

And in that space, I learned something most leadership books don't teach:

𝐒𝐭𝐫𝐞𝐧𝐠𝐭𝐡 𝐢𝐬𝐧'𝐭 𝐧𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫 𝐛𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐤𝐢𝐧𝐠.
𝐈𝐭'𝐬 𝐜𝐡𝐨𝐨𝐬𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐭𝐨 𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐲 𝐩𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐧 𝐰𝐡𝐞𝐧 𝐲𝐨𝐮'𝐫𝐞 𝐚𝐥𝐦𝐨𝐬𝐭 𝐛𝐫𝐨𝐤𝐞𝐧.

I think about that week now when I mentor leaders who are quietly exhausted.

They are showing up.
They look composed.

But they tell me in private:

"I don't know how much longer I can do this."

And I tell them what no one told me back then:

You're not at all weak for feeling that.

You're human.

And the fact that you’re still trying is enough to tell you that you’re strong!

Has there been a moment that tested you more than it ever showed?

P.S. What's one thing you're still doing that your past self would've quit on day one?

I call this the most dangerous leadership skill that every leader develops.

Reading rooms.

Reading the pauses.
The silence.

And even the things that people don’t say out loud.

Four years at the Royal Court taught me how to sense tension before it surfaced.

It helped me navigate politics without losing integrity.

I could walk into a boardroom and know within minutes:

Who held the real power.
What needed to be said carefully, and what needed to wait.

But there’s something I’m still learning.

I’m learning to listen to myself
when the room needs something different than what I do.

I remember a meeting where I knew the right strategic call.

But I could feel the resistance building.

I sensed that subtle shift in body language.

So, I immediately adjusted.

I found a middle ground and settled.

The meeting ended smoothly.

But I left feeling unsettled.

Not because I was wrong.

But because I'd overridden my own clarity
for the sake of keeping the room comfortable.

I know leadership requires settlement at times.

Not always.

And there’s a cost when you constantly override your own signals
for the sake of alignment.

You start losing track of what you actually believe.

You blur your own boundary lines.

I know it because I’ve been there.

But I realized over time that I can’t keep doing this.

I need that internal honesty.

Knowing when to adjust for the room,
and when to hold your ground quietly.

Even when it's uncomfortable.

So before you learn to read the room.

Learn to notice yourself first.

Because the most dangerous thing you can do
is become so good at reading everyone else
that you stop hearing yourself.

P.S. When was the last time you noticed yourself before the room?

I was presenting a billion-riyal strategy that would influence national direction when the guilt hit.

Working mothers rarely acknowledge this guilt.

The guilt that quietly shows up when leadership needs presence
and motherhood needs it too.

I've felt it in moments where I was fully delivering at work
while questioning myself internally.

Not because I wasn't doing enough.

But because I cared deeply about both.

In that room at the Royal Court, the stakes were high.

I delivered with clarity.

And the entire time, a small voice in the back of my mind whispered:

"Your daughter's school play is in two hours.
You promised you'd be there early.
You're going to walk in late again."

I actually made it in time.

But I carried the guilt both ways.

Guilt for leaving work before the conversation fully ended.
Guilt for arriving at her play just as the lights dimmed.

No one saw me as anything but committed.

But inside, I felt like I was failing both.

I thought the answer was balance.

And that’s why I was blindly chasing it for years.

Tried to split my energy perfectly down the middle.

50% mother.
50% leader.

But it doesn’t really work that way.

Because some days, leadership asks for everything.

And you give it,
because people are counting on you.

Other days, your child needs you in a way that can't wait.

And you show up,
because they're counting on you too.

Neither meant failure.

But I finally understood that time management wouldn’t help.

It was releasing the idea that presence has to look identical everywhere.

Some days, leadership asks for restraint.
Other days, motherhood asks for resilience.

And on the hardest days?

Both ask for more than you feel you have.

But that's just the reality of holding two loves at once.

I started asking myself a simple question:

“Am I present where it matters most today?”

If it’s a YES, then I’m right.

That shift didn't erase the guilt.
But it softened it.

Actually, that guilt doesn’t mean you’re failing.

It just means that you care deeply about both.

And that’s something to honor.

P.S. Do you feel overwhelmed while handling everything at home & work simultaneously?

The morning I walked into the most important meeting of my career, I was breaking.

From the outside, everything looks steady.

Clarity in my voice.
Organized thoughts.

But that clarity doesn’t mean lightness.

That morning, I remember sitting at the table while everyone discussed priorities, timelines, and outcomes.

And all I could feel was the weight I brought with me.

A conversation with my daughter that morning.

The kind that stays with you, even when you close the door.

The email I'd read at 6 AM shifted something inside.

It was an exhaustion I hadn't named yet.

No one saw it.
But I felt it in every word I chose.

For years, I believed professionalism meant emotional silence.

That strength meant leaving parts of myself outside the door.

That leadership required containment at all costs.

And I was good at it.

I presented to ministers while holding personal storms inside.

I led strategy sessions for Vision 2030 while carrying a weight no one could measure.

I sat in boardrooms at the Royal Court,
being the only woman in a room of 25,
and kept my composure even when everything inside me wanted to break.

People praised my calm.

They didn't know what it cost to stay that composed.

I’ve learned one thing from there…

𝐄𝐦𝐨𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬 𝐝𝐨𝐧'𝐭 𝐰𝐚𝐢𝐭 𝐩𝐨𝐥𝐢𝐭𝐞𝐥𝐲 𝐨𝐮𝐭𝐬𝐢𝐝𝐞 𝐛𝐨𝐚𝐫𝐝𝐫𝐨𝐨𝐦𝐬.

They influence how we listen.
They shape what we rush to do and what we avoid.

Leadership doesn't break because we feel.

It breaks when we pretend we don't
and let unacknowledged weight quietly drive our choices.

The shift came when I stopped treating emotions as distractions
and started treating them as data.

When I learned to pause and ask myself:

"What am I carrying right now?"
"What's influencing this decision?"
"What needs space before I can be fully present?"

That's not a weakness.

That's 𝐞𝐦𝐨𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐚𝐥 𝐢𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐥𝐥𝐢𝐠𝐞𝐧𝐜𝐞.

And it's the difference between leading from presence
and leading from unprocessed pressure.

So if you're reading this before your next meeting,
then take a moment.

Ask yourself:

"What am I carrying into this room?"

And give yourself permission to name it.

Not to anyone else.
Just to yourself.

Because the most powerful leaders I know
aren't the ones who never feel the weight.

They're the ones who acknowledge it and lead anyway.

What weight are you carrying with yourself into rooms that no one ever sees?

This is what working mothers do before 9 a.m.

Stand in the kitchen half-awake,
waiting for the kettle that takes too long.

Check the time.

Calculate how late you can be before it becomes a problem.

Pack lunches you hope come back empty.

Tie shoelaces while answering questions that start with

“Mom, where’s my…”

Break up an argument.

Apologize for rushing while rushing anyway.

Stand in the bathroom for a moment longer than necessary
because it’s the only quiet you’ll get.

Then you switch.

Not gently.
Abruptly.

You straighten your back.
Lower your voice.
Push the worry somewhere deeper.

Laptop open.
Camera on.

“Good morning, everyone”

Mute yourself
while answering a question from another room.

Unmute.
Smile.
Lead.

No one sees what came before.

No one sees that you’ve already made

ten decisions
held three emotions
and swallowed one fear
before the meeting even began.

It’s not the work that’s heavy.

It’s the constant handover between who needs you and who expects you.

Mother.
Professional.
Provider.
Anchor.

With no space to set one down
before picking up the next.

Some days, you don’t feel present anywhere.

Just stretched thin across all of it.

If your mornings leave you exhausted before the day starts, it’s not because you’re failing.

It’s because you’re carrying a life
before you ever open your laptop.

If you’re a mother building a career, a business, or a life that matters to you,
I see you.

Not just the outcomes.

But the effort it takes to keep choosing it
on days when it would be easier to shrink.

And if you’re open to sharing:

What’s one small thing you do every morning that helps you feel steady before the day takes over?

I’d genuinely love to hear.

I said “I’m fine” in a meeting while my vision went blurry.

I wasn’t really OK.

But I’ve learned to stay composed in front of people who depend on my clarity.

I know how to steady my voice.

People see a composed version of me.

But they never see the quiet negotiation happening inside me at the same time.

I keep asking myself…

How much can I hold today?
What can wait, and what can’t?

When people see me as a leader, 
they just see that unbreakable confidence on the outside.

But inside?

It’s calibration.

A constant awareness of my limits.

Not so that I can retreat.

But so that I don’t cross a line I can’t recover from.

I still remember my early leadership days.

I thought I had to stay available.
Stay strong.
And even override myself.

Because that was the definition of good leadership for me.

But now I know that clarity never comes from overextension.

It comes from a place of self-trust.

From knowing when to lean in,
and when to quietly protect your energy without announcing it to anyone.

𝐂𝐨𝐦𝐩𝐨𝐬𝐮𝐫𝐞 𝐢𝐬𝐧'𝐭 𝐩𝐫𝐞𝐭𝐞𝐧𝐝𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐡𝐚𝐯𝐞 𝐧𝐨 𝐥𝐢𝐦𝐢𝐭𝐬.

𝐈𝐭'𝐬 𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐰𝐡𝐢𝐥𝐞 𝐤𝐧𝐨𝐰𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐞𝐱𝐚𝐜𝐭𝐥𝐲 𝐰𝐡𝐞𝐫𝐞 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫𝐬 𝐚𝐫𝐞.

What limits are you constantly pushing right now?

P.S. Do you think overriding yourself is healthy at any position?

Work-life balance is a lie we tell ambitious mothers.

And I saw it turning out to be true.

That’s why I believe in trade-offs.

Quiet & daily ones.

The kind no one applauds.

Leadership. Motherhood. Ambition. Presence.

There’s no way you can balance them perfectly.

And that’s why you choose.

Consciously or unconsciously.

For years, I thought something was wrong with me.

I'd look at other leaders who seemed to have it figured out.

The ones who made it look seamless.

Who showed up everywhere
at every meeting, every event, every school play.

And I'd wonder: "What am I missing?"

That’s when I realized.

They weren't balancing.
They were choosing.

Just like I was.

The only difference was that some of them were honest about it.

And some of them were pretending it was effortless.

I've made trade-offs most people never saw.

I chose the Royal Court role knowing it would cost me evenings at home.

I chose to raise three kids alone, knowing it would mean saying no to opportunities others could say yes to.

I chose to lead national strategies, knowing I'd miss moments I couldn't get back.

And on some days?

I chose my daughter's science project over a networking dinner.

I chose rest over visibility.

I chose presence over performance.

None of those choices felt clean.

Most of them felt like a loss on one side or the other.

But that’s what sustains a leader.

You can’t get it right every time.

It's knowing why you made the choices you did.

And when you’re clear on your trade-off, you see that alignment.

When you’re doing everything at once,
it’s natural to feel like you’re failing at some.

But in reality, you’re just choosing what matters more in that moment.

And that’s sustainable leadership!

What trade-off do you make very often for your work?

P.S. Do you think work-life balance is a myth?

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Rawan Althagafy

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The Battle

Bahar Selman

Rawan Althagafy

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Engagements

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Performance Score.css-goub6s{font-size:var(--chakra-fontSizes-md);font-weight:500;color:var(--chakra-colors-gray-600);display:block;margin-top:var(--chakra-space-1);}Bahar Selman's LinkedIn Performance

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