Being remembered for the wrong reasons

When I started working at Texas Instruments, I was assigned a trainer for my first few months. My trainer was called Amanda, an older woman with a huge personality.

She’d been with the company for over 30 years. She was extremely hardworking and proud of her job but also expressed being constantly stressed and often emotionally drained.

As part of my training I had to shadow her in her office the whole day every single day.

One afternoon, one of our co-workers sent out an email around a delicate project that wasn’t worded well.

Amanda always kept a lookout for things like this so she could step in and do damage control if needed. She spotted the email and decided to call our co-worker, let’s call him Joey, to point out the issue.

She proceeds to dial his office number, puts it on speaker and waits for him to answer.

When Joey picks up, he immediately lets out a heavy sigh and says:

“What is it now? You only call to tell me I did something wrong.”

Amanda froze. So much so she decided to end the call without even mentioning the email. Then she asked me to step out so she could collect herself.

That moment stuck with me.

I knew she genuinely cared about the team and that she meant well. But in Joey’s eyes she was simply the bearer of bad news.

This was a reminder for me that the saying “people always remember how you make them feel” is 100% true, for better or worse.

I do my best to carry that lesson into every interaction, whether that’s with strangers, family members or friends.

Because when people think of you, what usually comes to mind is not your words or your work. It’s the feelings you leave behind.