5 Career Lessons from Belinda in White Lotus
If you watched Mike White’s HBO show White Lotus, you were probably drawn in by the gorgeous wallpaper, the tropical setting, and the intriguing murder mystery.
For myself, as a career coach specializing in feminine betrayal, I was particularly drawn to the Belinda/Tanya storyline. If you haven’t seen the show, Tanya is a wealthy guest who disingenuously offers to fund hotel employee Belinda’s dream business venture: owning her own spa in order to get Belinda to be her trip companion.
Now, if you’ve been around the block in the corporate world like I have, you were probably also waving your hands saying “Don’t fall for it!” when Tanya made this offer, because you knew without a doubt that Tanya was manipulative and phony and wasn’t ever going to follow through with the offer. Of course, Belinda ends up devastated by this revelation, and undoubtedly wishes she never met Tanya in the first place.
What can we learn from Belinda’s journey? What could Belinda do differently next time to make sure she doesn’t get taken advantage of in the future? How can you make sure you don’t get Belinda’d?
How to avoid getting betrayed at work
Stand by your small no’s. Belinda doesn’t realize it, but from the very moment she initially caves and agrees to go to dinner with Tanya after all (after initially saying no) she is starting down the inevitable road of being taken advantage of. People like Tanya know how to find their targets. They are looking for people who will give in and overlook their own self-care and boundaries to please others. It’s easy to think “Oh well, it’s just a dinner.” It is not just a dinner. It is the principle of the matter. A person who steamrolls a small boundary will always steamroll a big one. To avoid falling into Belinda’s fate, pay very close attention who tries to steamroll over your smallest no. If someone offers you a dessert, and you say, “No, thank you” and they say “Oh, come on! Live a little! One won’t kill you,” this is not harmless. It is a serious red flag. No means no. It doesn’t matter how big or how small. If Belinda had held firm and said “No, I’m not available for dinner tonight,” Tanya may have realized Belinda wasn’t a useful target and moved on to someone else, saving Belinda a ton of pain and heartache.
Get out of a volatile situation early so you don’t become desperate. Belinda’s situation is very familiar to many corporate women. She is overqualified, way too classy for the environment, and working for an unqualified, off-the-rails hotel manager who she is about one hundred times more professional than. Of course she’s miserable. Of course she wants out. But the thing is, when you remain in a desperate situation like that, working in a dead-end career with no advancement opportunities, reporting to a man child, of course you are going to be more susceptible to anything that looks like a golden ticket out. Now, I do realize employment was clearly limited on the island. But Belinda could have made some big decisions. She could have stopped covering for her buffoon boss. She could have put herself up for his job. You have to do whatever it takes to not languish in a desperate position: that is exactly where a predator will come to find and prey on you. You are a sitting duck. If you are in a fabulous role where you are loved and appreciated, and someone like Tanya tries to pull some shenanigans, you will have zero tolerance. People put up with this crap because they believe it is their only ticket out.
Don’t pin all your hopes on one person. If you have a dream, don’t be afraid to shop it around! You want to get the best deal for yourself as a businesswoman. I don’t know about you, but I was praying for an end to the episode that would have Nicole fishing Belinda’s business plan out of the trash and offering to fund the spa herself. It is the bitterest irony that Belinda was so caught up in Tanya’s lavish promises that she didn’t even realize there was a real mover and shaker in the midst, someone who might actually have put their money where their mouth is. Nicole wasn’t perfect, but she was a successful CEO and a straight-shooter. Or what about Shane’s mom, a scene-stealing Molly Shannon? We all know she loved to flaunt her wealth. Maybe she would have invested. Or maybe Shane’s wealthy wife Rachel, who was looking for a vocation and a sense of purpose? If you have a dream, never assume there is only one shot. Always believe you are so good, there should be a line around the block for what you’ve got to offer.
Check your own character. I know this won’t be a popular opinion, but Belinda isn’t one hundred percent innocent here. The Law of Attraction is heavily in play. Tanya is wanting to use and manipulate Belinda, but Belinda is also not being genuine and trying to use Tanya. She does not actually care about Tanya or want to be her friend. She is pantomiming sympathy in order to get her business funded. This is not high-integrity behavior. You should not pretend to care about someone and be their friend to get them to pay for your business, anymore than you should dangle the idea of paying for a business in order to get someone to be your friend. It always takes two to tango.
Observe if your career trajectory is getting worse or better. Nothing markedly improves from Tanya’s involvement in Belinda’s life. Yes, maybe someone won’t hand you funding overnight, but there should be at least some improvement right away. For example, if some new boss comes into your life and promises you a promotion, maybe they can’t promote you the very next week. But things should start trending more positively and building toward that. Maybe your boss immediately hires a contractor so you can offload some of your admin duties and take on more strategic projects. On the other hand, if they promise you a promotion, but then start exlcuding you from executive meetings and put you on junior work you haven’t done since your first internship, then things are going down a negative trajectory. Look at the trajectory, not the promises. Belinda’s career never improves tangibly from Tanya’s involvement, and if anything it gets worse because she has to take on a separate unpaid labor job as Tanya’s therapist. Yikes.
Do you have a Tanya in your life? Have you been betrayed like Belinda and are struggling to move beyond it? Sign up to learn more about my course “Moving Beyond Professional Betrayal.”