Clear for Takeoff

A call to help clear the runway, not just cheer it

Last week, I attended the MA Conference for Women. The energy and enthusiasm was palpable before I even got through the main doors. Big voices. Big stories. The kind that can lift you up.

But, as I recently shared, the moments that stayed with me weren’t a result of those stories.

It was reading in our WhatsApp chat about women needing to slip out early or, in some cases, having to cancel their trip last minute. Not because they were done, or didn’t want to go. It was because something, or someone, at home needed them more. A child, a parent, a responsibility that couldn’t wait until they got home. A result of life happening in real-time.

A leadership conference designed to inspire women, and some couldn’t stay long enough to absorb all of the inspiration.

That contradiction wasn’t lost on me.

Ambition isn’t the problem. Bandwidth is.

We like to pretend opportunity is equal. Same rooms, same speakers, same desire to grow.

But ambition flows differently when the weight underneath it isn’t shared.

Some walk into the office with an empty slate. Some walk in already carrying everyone else’s.

Both are loaded with talent and ambition. Only one has the space to capitalize on it.

Even the icons on stage didn’t rise on sheer grit alone. They rose on support systems, shared responsibilities, and room to breathe. The scaffolding of their lives mattered as much as the spark.

And yet, we almost never name that scaffolding when we talk about leadership.

What support actually looks like

This is why ERGs like Fire up matter.

It’s why allyship matters. It’s why the smallest choices inside teams matter more than we think.

Support isn’t loud. It isn’t heroic. It usually sits in the margins.

It could be a meeting time that respects invisible labor (school drop-offs).

A partner stepping in without being asked.

A leader who pauses long enough to ask a simple question like, “What do you need to fully show up?”

Sometimes that question is all it takes for someone to stay in the room instead of having to step out.

Allies aren’t just cheerleaders

Here is where allies become accelerators.

Not by speaking over anyone, or trying to fix or understand everything. But by noticing what others stop seeing.

Noticing who always adjusts their schedule. Who rarely gets uninterrupted space. Who carries the load by default instead of by design.

Leadership isn’t only about stepping forward. Sometimes it’s about stepping in so someone else doesn’t have to step out.

If we want women to lead, we clear the runway

We ask women to soar. We celebrate their lift. But lift and force alone don’t allow a plane to take off. They also need room.

Talent and drive isn’t the barrier. Opportunity is sometimes a barrier. But space is always a barrier.

And space is something we can create together. In choices we make, in conversations, in culture. In the human moments where someone decides whether they can stay.

That’s the work. That’s the runway I’m talking about. And that is how we (and I) as allies step up to allow more women to rise.

TL;DR

Women at the conference left early because caregiving pulled them away, reminding me that ambition isn’t the barrier. Space is. If we want more women leading, we need shared responsibilities, real allyship, and daily choices that clear the runway. This is the work we’re doing in Fire up.