The Humanity We Hide

What Business Gets Wrong About Personal Lives

You never know what someone else is dealing with.

This simple truth from an unlikely source, a fictional football player/coach named Roy Kent, might be the most important business lesson I've encountered in a long time.

In a powerful scene from the great Apple TV show Ted Lasso, Kent defends a teammate who had just lashed out inappropriately to fans by sharing a story about a time he'd unknowingly made a joke about a teammate who had just lost a child. Something he couldn't have known because workplace culture told that man to keep his grief private.

"None of us knows what is going on in each other's lives," Kent says.

And I haven't been able to stop thinking about it.

If you don't know the scene, here is a link to a YouTube video. Go watch it, it is only a few powerful minutes, I'll be here when you get back. 

The Great Workplace Lie

For decades, business dogma has insisted:

"Keep your personal life at home."

"Don't bring your problems to work."

"Maintain professional boundaries."

This separation seems logical on the surface. Practical. Efficient.

It's also, to use the latin phrase, total bullshit.

Because people don't work this way. We can't compartmentalize our humanity.

The parent who was up all night with a sick child. The daughter navigating a parent's dementia diagnosis. The partner going through a painful separation. The person battling private health issues while showing up with a smile.

These experiences don't disappear when someone walks through your office door.

They're just hidden… At great cost.

The Price of Pretending

When we create cultures where people must pretend their personal lives don't exist, we force them to spend enormous energy maintaining a facade.

Energy that could go toward creativity, problem-solving, or innovation.

We also lose the opportunity to provide the support that might help them navigate their challenges more effectively, support that could make your workplace a sanctuary rather than another source of stress.

But most tragically, we lose the chance to know the actual humans we work alongside every day.

The people we often spend more waking hours with than our own families.

A Safe Harbor in Life's Storms

What if your company became something more than just a place where work gets done?

What if it became a safe harbor during life's inevitable storms? A place where, when everything else feels chaotic or painful, people could find stability, purpose, and genuine connection?

Imagine walking into work after receiving difficult news and not having to pretend everything is fine. Imagine knowing that your colleagues understand you're going through something challenging, and that they'll pick up some slack without judgment. Not forever. Not as a permanent excuse. But as a recognition that we all need support sometimes.

Imagine being part of a team that celebrates your triumphs AND stands with you in your struggles, not by becoming your therapists, but by creating space for your humanity alongside your productivity.

This isn't about turning your workplace into an endless support session. It's about acknowledging that work doesn't happen in a vacuum. Work within the context of full, complicated human lives.

Creating a Culture of Seen Humanity

Here's what this looks like in practice:

1. Create space for real check-ins: Not the perfunctory "How are you?" that expects "Fine" as the answer. But genuine moments where people can share what's actually happening in their lives, if they choose to.

2. Model appropriate vulnerability: Leaders set the tone. When you acknowledge your own humanity, the challenges you're navigating, the support you need, you give others permission to do the same.

3. Offer flexible support: Sometimes what someone needs is a lighter workload for a week. Sometimes it's an option to work different hours. Sometimes it's simply just some acknowledgment and understanding.

4. Respect boundaries: This isn't about forced sharing or manufactured intimacy. It's about creating space for humanity when it needs to be expressed, not demanding it.

The Ripple Effect

When people know they can bring their full selves to work, struggles included, something remarkable happens.

They bring their full selves to work, gifts included.

The person who doesn't have to pretend they're fine when they're not has more energy to contribute their unique talents. The team that knows what each member is navigating can distribute work in ways that leverage everyone's strengths while accommodating temporary limitations.

And the leader who understands what their people are going through can make decisions that consider the humans involved, not just the roles they fill.

This creates a virtuous cycle. People feel seen and supported, so they bring more of themselves to work. They connect more deeply with colleagues. They develop stronger loyalty to the organization. They recover more quickly from personal challenges because they're not expending energy on hiding them.

And ultimately, they build something together that transcends what any collection of compartmentalized professionals could achieve.

An Invitation to Real Leadership

Roy Kent was right. We don't know what's going on in each other's lives.

But what if we created workplaces where it was safe to share? Where vulnerability wasn't seen as weakness but as the foundation for authentic connection and extraordinary performance?

What if your company became known not just for what it achieves, but for how it treats the humans who make those achievements possible?

This isn't just about being nice. It's about being real. About acknowledging that the traditional separation between work and life was always artificial. Always impossible.

The most meaningful businesses aren't just vehicles for profit. They're communities of people on a journey together. People navigating triumphs and tragedies, celebrations and setbacks, all while trying to create something valuable in the world.

When we remember this, when we design our companies around this truth rather than despite it, we unlock a level of commitment, creativity, and resilience that no other approach can match.

Because the truth is, we're not just building businesses. We're building places where humans spend their lives.

And limits on our humanity are a choice we no longer need to make.