For the past 12 weeks, I have been completing the capstone project for my MBA—a professional-level consultancy project created by nine students who had never met before. As it was an international MBA program, we came from different cultures, professional backgrounds, and time zones. Each of us was balancing full-time work, family responsibilities, and the final stretch of earning this master’s degree.
On paper, it sounded like a recipe for stress, conflict, and competing ideas. Instead, it became one of the most unexpectedly meaningful parts of my MBA experience.
From our very first meeting, there was a collective intention that we wanted to do more than simply divide up the work and complete the assignment. We wanted each person to feel that they mattered to the project. We took real care in creating meaningful roles, making sure everyone had ownership and an opportunity to contribute their strengths.
We were a group of fairly Type A personalities. Nine people pursuing MBAs while working full time do not typically arrive without opinions, ambition, or a desire to lead. Yet, somehow, we made room for one another. We listened. We adjusted. We stepped forward when leadership was needed and stepped back when someone else’s experience was better suited to the moment.
That was an important lesson for me personally. My instinct is often to lead—to organize, move things forward, and take responsibility for what needs to happen. This project gave me the opportunity to think more deeply about my own contributions to a group and to practice followership: trusting someone else’s direction, supporting their leadership, and resisting the urge to step in simply because I could. What emerged organically was not one leader, but a team in which each person led when their strengths were needed and became quieter when it was time to make room for someone else. There was something both humbling and powerful about experiencing leadership as something shared rather than held.
Over the course of 12 weeks, we met several times a week to build, question, revise, problem-solve, and co-create. We showed up tired, busy, and sometimes stretched thin, but we continued to show up for one another.
When a challenge arose because one person’s assigned role did not fully align with their background, the team did not ignore it, criticize them, or allow the discomfort to grow. We paused. We acknowledged what was happening, adjusted the work together, and made sure that person knew they were supported. That lesson will stay with me.
We often talk about resilience as something an individual possesses—the ability to keep going, recover, or push through difficulty. But this experience highlighted in real time that group resilience lives between people. It can look like noticing when someone is struggling, having an honest conversation, changing course, and refusing to leave anyone behind.
Of course, I am proud of the project we created. But what I will remember most is the humanity behind it: nine people from different corners of the world choosing, again and again, to listen, contribute, support one another, lead when needed, and make space when it was someone else’s turn.
In a world that can often feel divided, there was something deeply hopeful about that.
With resilience,
Kristie and the Dovetail Team