Leading After Loss - Chris Stevenson
I’m Chris Stevenson, I’m 44 years old and I am the Managing Director of Stripe Communications, London.
I grew up in Aberdeen but was born in Wolverhampton. My dad moved us up there when he got a job opportunity. It’s a bit of a cultural shock to the system moving from a sleepy village in Yorkshire to Aberdeen in the northeast of Scotland and it wasn’t always easy growing up there. Especially secondary school where I was on the wrong end of some fairly vicious bullying. I thank God there wasn’t social media at that time as I had the sanctuary of escaping it all when school finished, otherwise I don’t like to think of how I would have coped with it all. I went to a pretty rough comprehensive school but had some good mates so we all pulled ourselves along to do OK in the end, exams wise. I then went on to The Robert Gordon University in Aberdeen to do a degree in Corporate Communications which I enjoyed and found University a much happier place than school. Family wise, I have one older brother who lives nearby and lost my mum in 2003 and lost my dad in 2010. I am now married and live in St Albans with my wife and two girls (9 and 7) and I am thankful for the lovely life we have together.
I lost my mum when I was 23 and in my first job at a very junior level. I then lost my dad 7 years later when my career was more established professionally and I was a director of a PR consultancy.
I started in Public Relations when I did a work placement as part of my degree. At that stage I didn’t really know what I wanted to do with my life (like most people at 22) but I loved the work placement I did.
I was at University in Aberdeen and got a placement at a London PR agency and the job was exciting, the variety and talent of the people was a brilliant new experience, and I was OK at the job apparently.
6 weeks after I left my placement, when I had returned home, they called me up and offered me a job and told me I had to start in 2 weeks. I missed my graduation and moved to London with not much notice. Moving from Aberdeen to London felt like I was moving to Mars, but it was too good an opportunity to miss, so I went for it.
I then went on to work in a few different agencies throughout my career and have worked with some brilliant people, made lifelong friends and had the opportunity to work on some really fun and interesting stuff. In 2016, I got the offer to establish the London office of Stripe Communications and I was at a stage in my career where I felt like I needed to test myself more and impose my own ideas and vision for a Public Relations business so I went for it. It’s been a huge learning curve and I’ve done some great things and worked with some brilliant, kind and good people. In the early years I used to say to people I could feel like a genius or a moron on any given day and often on the same day, but that is part and parcel of learning how to run a business. But one of the biggest things I’ve learned is you don’t have to be brilliant at everything, just surround yourself with people who are brilliant at the stuff you’re not so good at and you do the same for them.
How do you think your losses have impacted your career?
It’s hard to say, ‘my life isn’t better for their loss but I am probably a better person for the experience of their loss’. I think that is the same for many people who have suffered a loss at this stage in their life. I think my emotional intelligence and empathy benefited from the experiences and also my outlook on life shifted to being more appreciative for what I have, but also to make the most of and enjoy life. You learn to appreciate that things can change and turn everything upside down so it’s important you don’t let life pass you by. I think I have also built up emotional resilience and have been able to support other people who have been through grief in similar circumstances.
One of the things I found when I lost my parents was that people would be sympathetic but not be able to be empathetic and I think providing empathy during grief is a real lifeline and source of comfort. You can feel like no one understands what you’re going through. But when you meet someone who has been there, who can tell you their story and also give you hope that things get better, it’s a real beacon of light. When I think back to how I coped with the losses, the honest answer is I’m not sure I processed or dealt with it for a long time and lived in denial. It was probably 10 years after my mum died, that I fully made peace with it all. That wasn’t by design, it was almost like a moment in time when my brain told me I understood it all and was OK to move on.
Do you feel your losses have impacted you as a leader?
Yes it has, for the above reasons mentioned.
You wouldn’t wish the grief you experience on anyone, but that experience of grief does change your outlook on life. I do feel it’s changed my outlook on life for the better in the most part. A negative I would observe is that losing both parents has led me to be fiercely independent. I always take responsibility for as much as I can in my life but there are people who are around me who will help and support me, I just need to remind myself to be open to that. It’s easy to fall into a headspace of ‘well it’s all on me now’ and the reality is it’s not the case.
More positively, my loss has also made me more likely to tell someone at work I am proud of them or that they should be proud of themselves as the thing you miss most from the loss of a parent is the unconditional love and support a mother/father would give you especially when it comes to pride. It’s not to say there aren’t people in your life who are proud of your accomplishments but not like your mum or dad. So, there will be times when something happens when you think “My mum would have been proud of that” so when I see those occasions occur for other people, I am more likely to tell them that they or someone should and would be proud of them or that I am really proud of them. Emotional resilience is an undeniable positive. Losing a loved one is absolutely and utterly sh*t and if you can survive it and come out the other side, there are not many things in life that will hurt you in the same way and you will generally see most things in a professional capacity with a new level of objectivity and pragmatism.
What top two pieces of advice would you give to a young adult who’s lost one or both parents?
My first thought is to not expect or demand too much of yourself in terms of overcoming grief. There is not an official way of coming out the other side of loss and grief. You are the only one who can tell you how and what you should be doing to get you through it but don’t feel a pressure to do so. Just know that there will be people around you who love you and will do anything they can to support you and call upon them when you need it.
Don’t feel awkward, ashamed, embarrassed about what you’re going through because everyone will go through it at some stage in their life.
My second piece of advice is, expect your grief to evolve but don’t expect it to disappear. You will always have it, but you will become in control of it and it will become an important part of your life in a more reflective way versus the more debilitating effect it has in the early stages of your loss. You will always miss the person and think of them, you will be reminded you don’t have what others will have (Mother’s Day cards, social media posts, etc) and you will always feel the loss, but you will accept it and it will become part of who you are but it won’t define you and it won’t hold you back. You will find peace with it, but when that comes will be different for everyone, but I think it’s important you do that and I think It’s Time could have probably given me a few years back of processing it all, had the services it provides been available to me.
If you’ve lost a parent recently and just feel like you don’t know what the hell to make of it all, just know that it will get better and that is how every single person in your circumstances has ever and will feel/felt.
I didn’t always believe that when people first said it to me back in 2003, especially those who hadn’t lost their mum or dad, but now with hindsight and two decades under my belt I can say emphatically it will. Go to therapy, or just talk to someone about how you’re feeling and how you’re doing.
Talking helps massively. It’s common to feel a sense of shame, embarrassment, awkwardness and isolation around loss and grief, but charities like It’s Time are here to help give you your life back and help you put things back together on your own terms. I never had those resources available but I know for a fact the stuff it took me a decade to figure out could have been addressed earlier. Finally, everyone grieves differently and there is not a right or wrong way, just your way. So when it comes to helping you through your grief do what feels right for you. That’s all that matters.