Cooperation and Courage Honed Through Adversity

A few times to this point, I’ve referenced our 2017 experience in hosting that event an hour away as a “battle.” While it certainly seemed like one at the time, it was really just another adversity we had to work through - and a relatively minor one at that. It was by no means the most significant issue Cindy and I had ever faced, but it was the first of its kind that we encountered in our business. It also came at a time where we were doing all we could to ensure that business was capable of keeping our lights on. We had indeed assumed full responsibility and we were dialed in on the keen sense of justice we had held so dear in many other situations; this was just the first time we held complete financial responsibility for how things shook out.

Looking back, as tough and as frustrating as it was then, I can see just how insignificant it was in the grand scheme of all that’s unfolded since. We had between five and ten thousand dollars in overhead for that event, not counting our own time or travel costs leading up to it. Having now hosted multiple events in the six-figure range, the adversities back then seem so small. But without experiencing it exactly when we did, just as we were stepping out on our own for the very first time, I’m not sure we would have developed the same kind of courage, learned to develop the same level of definiteness in our decisions, or seen the same type of genuine cooperation we saw over the course of those few months - with one another and through the partnerships we developed in that process.

What felt like a battle (but was really just a kind of adversity we hadn’t experienced to that point) reinforced that true leadership isn’t tied to institutional approval or contracts but to courageous, values-aligned advocacy. Quiet reliability and principled stands amid conflict strengthened partnerships (with Cindy, clients, and networks), earned respect outside formal systems, and proved influence compounds when we model integrity without positional power. This particular institutional adversity helped us forge the exact traits we would need to provide values-driven leadership to each organization we would interact with moving forward - and we’ve benefited from that ever since.

Influence Beyond the Institution

Time provides us with distance from adversities, adversities that often seem monumental in the moment. Those same adversities, when viewed through a lens of time, end up being relatively insignificant in our bigger picture. That’s absolutely the case when I look back on that 2017 event. Our entire cost structure for hosting it - the venue, the licensing, the materials, the food, etc. - was barely 50% of just our food costs for a few of the events we’ve hosted over the last few years, and the food was just one line item.

I’ve already commented on how our relationship with Dr. Rob Walker and his team administering the Jobs for Veterans State Grant across Virginia deepened in spite of the hurdles we faced in the fall of 2017 so I won’t take you back down that path. If that were the only seed of equal or greater benefit, the juice would have been more than worth the squeeze; it most certainly was not the only seed, though.

Like so many of the adversities Cindy and I worked through leading up to it, this particular experience offered us the amazing opportunity of locking arms together against when felt like an insurmountable foe. And at the time, it was indeed the biggest we had faced. In this case, though, we were facing this foe through a business bearing our name. Standing on the values we held most dear, values we hadn’t even listed or defined at that point, not only gave us the courage we’d need to press forward, it also pulled us together around a vision we were still forming for what our business could someday look like.

While I frequently allude to it in passing, I don’t often explain something in detail. There’s still more than a little bit of unbridled redneck left in me. I’ve learned to squelch it over the years, largely with Cindy’s support and watchful eye, but some scenarios bring it out more than others. The non-compete listed in the fine print on the final page of that contract and how things unfolded in the weeks that followed proved to test my restraint as much as anything. I would have enjoyed few things more than calling the folks involved out publicly. Cindy advised me against that, and she was absolutely correct. I could have made a gigantic stink about it, and I wouldn’t have been wrong, but that would have pulled us away from the goal we were working to achieve. And while doing that wouldn’t have gone against any of our stated values - then or now - there’s a kind of influence that’s earned through quiet strength that just doesn’t come through making a stink, even when that stink is accurate and well placed.

Pivoting through institutional battles builds authentic relational power; consistency in conflict earns trust no system can grant. The real question lies in whether we’re able to routinely identify the seeds from each adversity we face and nurture them into the equal or greater benefit they contain. If we learn to use those adversities to develop systems for finding those seeds, built in alignment with our values, we stand a much better chance for seeing those seeds grow. We’ll look at that next. First, though, take the time to share a small piece of your own advocacy story with someone you trust, and be sure to detail the ripples you’ve seen since.

Over the years, Cindy and I have seen - time and again - that our best results show up with the clients we have strong relationships with. That may be a bit of a chicken-and-egg thing; I won’t make a case whether the relationship is built on the results or the results come from having the relationship. What I can say without question is that the two nearly always go hand-in-hand. The inverse has been just as true. Friction reveals misalignment. All too often, especially in the early stages of starting a business or when there’s a pressing need to make the cash register ring, we brush that friction aside to make something work. That’s exactly the pressure we felt as we read through the contract and were forced to make the decision on how we’d respond to the non-compete clause buried in the fine print.

Cindy and I had developed more and more courage through each of the personal and professional adversities we had faced leading up to that point. That said, this was indeed the first real adversity we encountered since launching Dove Development & Consulting. Without each of those along the way, I don’t believe we would have had the courage to stand on our values the way we did - and certainly not against an established institution. Make no mistake, though, courageous stands plant seeds. And consistent responsibility nurtures them. As much as I wanted results and to win in that scenario (and really any scenario I’m ever in), assuming full responsibility in that situation wasn’t about simply winning. Making the best of institutional battles isn’t about victory over systems—it’s intentional preparation that transforms conflict into chains of values-driven readiness. In our case then, our values were just inside us. But pushing through the way we did allowed us to further clarify what we valued most as well as what we’d need to look for to ensure value-alignment in business relationships moving forward.

Mining Institutional Battles for Justice Seeds

Think back to each piece of what I’ve shared here: the strain when reading the non-compete language buried in a lengthy contract, the institutional conflict that followed and our refusal to compromise our values, leading to the courage, cooperation, influence, and systems we’ve built from the seeds hidden within that conflict. Now, think long and hard about the similar scenarios you’ve faced. Yours didn’t look the same, but I’m sure they exist. The question I have for you is: Did you find your seeds to equal or greater benefit and have you nurtured them to take full advantage of each of your adversities?

Without doing everything in our power to extract every possible seed from those adversities, and then pouring our heart and soul into nurturing each seed, talking about the hand we were dealt is little more than a sob story. What I’ve shared with you here is anything but that - and I hope the same holds true for you.

To be sure you’re able to take full advantage of the greater benefit from every institutional adversity you’ve gone to bat against, dedicate the time to work through these five questions in detail:

1. What institutional battle or systems misalignment still carries weight?
2. What blind spot or habit did it reveal, and what seed (e.g., justice or responsibility) was hidden?
3. How could a principled stand strengthen your courage or cooperation?
4. In what ways might nurturing this seed improve your influence without title—at home, work, or community?
5. What three small, immediate actions can you take this week to plant and nurture it?

All too often, working through honest, thought out responses to questions like these require more time than we care to invest. And the emotional toll can be even heavier. That said, targeted reflection is exactly what we need if we ever hope to turn institutional adversities into leadership lessons that forge values-alignment. My challenge for you here and now is to answer each of these TODAY and share one action step with someone you trust to hold you accountable to living it out. If you do, I believe you’ll be more prepared than ever to adapt to the unforeseeable situations that follow - and they absolutely will follow - so that’s what we’ll work through next.