Lessons Learned from Airport Sprints
by Abby Ford
If you have ever flown through the Atlanta airport, chances are you have seen people sprinting to catch their connecting flight, or maybe you’ve been that person sprinting. This past August, a newfound hobby of mine was being “that girl” sprinting through the airport, on numerous occasions, and being the person that everyone people watched as they sat around waiting for their connections. Summertime in the Southeast means thunderstorms at any given moment, which in turn created moments where I experienced delays getting to Atlanta, which made close connections feel even more impossible to make. Each time I made my way off my flight and sprinted through the airport from terminal to terminal, I couldn’t help but laugh as people would so kindly cheer me on as I ran as fast as I possibly could to get to my next flight.
When I think about the chaos that I experienced traveling to a new city every day, I think about all of the small choices I made along the way. There were so many times that I would be running through the airport, and my body would just be aching from exhaustion, which made running that much more difficult. But, I made the choice to keep going. There were so many times I would land and think “there is no way I’ll make this connection”, but I made the choice to always try. Throughout it all, I always thought about how my choices would impact the women that I would be working with the next day. No matter the curve balls travel threw at me, I knew how important it was for me to give it my all, because the women I would be working with deserved my absolute best efforts.
Thinking about sprinting through airports can be related to our efforts during recruitment, and how we need to try to give it our all even when things get tough. I often think about how many of us get frustrated with recruitment, but it’s always important to think about how the women that came before us put time and effort into recruiting us into the organization, and we owe it to the potential new members to give it our all when seeking to get to know them during recruitment. To put it simply, we all are the reason that someone joins our organization, and also why someone chooses to stay.
We have a collection of choices that are presented to us during recruitment, and some are easier decisions than others. Sometimes when we want to shy away from a conversation, but that is when we need to lean in even more. And even when the going gets tough and we feel like we are sprinting through recruitment (or an airport), our sisters will be there to cheer us on and remind us that we are recruiting the legacy of our organization. We are recruiting the women who will make us better, and who we will inspire to be the best versions of themselves.