I went from high-flying success to nothing — all because of one choice.

After two years of leading a multi-million dollar government project, I had built an amazing team, delivered exceptional results, and even pitched the work to the company’s internal version of Shark Tank in California.

Then our government lead left. Her replacement didn’t have the same enthusiasm or skill, and within months, 80% of our funding disappeared. My team was scattered, and I was left asking my boss, “What’s next?”

The answer? “We’ll find you something… we don’t have a plan.”

To make it sting more, I realized I had passed up an opportunity to switch divisions a year earlier, out of loyalty to the boss who hired me. That division was now investing in the ideas I had pitched. And they told me, even if they needed 10 project leads, they wouldn’t bring me on because I wasn’t in their group.

It would’ve been easy to point fingers at my boss, at the new government lead, at the company. And believe me, I did for a bit. But blaming doesn’t change the situation.

One of my favorite quotes from Dr. Wayne Dyer says:
“The word responsibility means ‘responding with ability’... I have the ability to respond. I can respond with ability.”

I couldn’t control the decisions above me. But I could control how I responded.

And that choice — to take responsibility instead of blaming — set me up for the next leap forward in my career.

Leadership isn’t about avoiding setbacks. It’s about how you respond to them.