STYLISA FoundHers Notes: Why Are We So Uncomfortable Talking About Ambition?

FoundHers Notes is where I step back from the interviews to explore the ideas, questions and observations that continue to shape my thinking. This time, I’m reflecting on something we don’t always talk about openly enough: ambition, and whether we’ve become too uncomfortable having honest conversations about what we really want.

I’ve always been ambitious. That’s never been the interesting part. What’s become more interesting to me is why certain ambitions seem easier to talk about than others. Over the past couple of years, I’ve spent a lot of time speaking to women through STYLISA FoundHers. Founders, investors, CEOs, campaigners, creatives and leaders from a wide range of industries. Every interview has been different, but together they’ve encouraged me to think more deeply about leadership, opportunity and what it really takes to create meaningful change. They’ve also made me reflect on my own ambitions.

Reflecting on ambition, influence and what it really means to create lasting impact. Wambam Photography

There are certain words that seem to sit comfortably in conversation. Purpose. Impact. Service. Collaboration. They are all important, and rightly so. I care deeply about each of them.

Then there are other words that can change the mood of the conversation almost instantly.

• Visibility

• Access

• Influence

• Power

• Capital

I want all of those things. Not because I believe they define success, and not because I see them as something to collect. I want them because they create possibilities. The more I’ve reflected on those five words, the more I’ve realised that they aren’t really the destination. They’re the things that enable other things to happen.

Visibility means your work has the chance to reach beyond the people who already know you. It means your ideas can travel. It means opportunities can find you, rather than you spending your entire career trying to find them.

Access changes what becomes possible. Access to information. Access to decision-makers. Access to mentors. Access to people who think differently to you. Some of the biggest opportunities in life don’t come from what you know. They come from who you’re able to learn from, collaborate with and build alongside.

Influence is another word that I’ve been thinking about a lot. It’s often misunderstood as persuading people to agree with you. I don’t see it that way. Influence is about helping to shape conversations, introducing different perspectives and asking questions that encourage people to think differently. Sometimes influence is loud. More often, it’s quiet.

Power may be the most uncomfortable word of all. Perhaps because we’ve become so used to associating it with control or status that we’ve forgotten it can also mean responsibility. The power to make decisions. The power to allocate resources. The power to create opportunities. The power to open a door for someone else that might otherwise have remained closed.

Then there’s capital. For some reason, conversations about money can still feel awkward, particularly when they’re connected to purpose. As though wanting to build wealth somehow weakens the reason you’re building in the first place. I’ve never believed those things are mutually exclusive. Capital creates choices. It allows people to invest in ideas, employ talented people, support organisations, fund innovation and build something that lasts beyond themselves. When I think about capital, that’s what I think about.

The more women I’ve interviewed through STYLISA FoundHers, the more convinced I’ve become that talent, hard work and good intentions are only part of the story. I’ve met extraordinary women with brilliant ideas, deep expertise and an unwavering commitment to creating positive change. But I’ve also seen that ideas need somewhere to go. They need people willing to champion them, fund them, challenge them and bring them to life.

That’s why I don’t think we should be uncomfortable talking about visibility, access, influence, power or capital. Not because everyone should want the same things. But because these are often the things that determine whose ideas are heard, whose organisations grow, whose research gets funded, whose businesses receive investment and whose voices shape the conversations that influence the rest of us. Perhaps we’ve spent too much time asking whether ambition is acceptable and not enough time asking what ambition is for. Those feel like two very different conversations.

For me, ambition has never been about recognition for its own sake. It’s never been about accumulating titles or collecting achievements. It’s about building something that matters. It’s about creating work that opens doors, not just for me, but for other people too. It’s about having the resources to invest in ideas I believe in, the influence to contribute to conversations that matter and the access to spend time in rooms where decisions are made and futures are shaped.

That’s the kind of ambition I’m interested in.

So perhaps the question isn’t whether we should want visibility, access, influence, power or capital. Perhaps the better question is this. If you had more of any one of those things, what would you choose to do with it?

Discover STYLISA FoundHers

Connect with me on LinkedIn