The Harm of My Good Intentions

How I Misused Privilege by Trying to "Make Room"

My biggest professional mistake came after I had already learned the language of privilege.

I understood it well enough to name it. I could see how my whiteness, my maleness, my position, and my credibility inside an institution had smoothed paths for me that others never received. I had become a public leader in an organization and was entrusted with stewarding one of its most important pieces of identity. I knew that if the institution wanted to grow, if it wanted to live into the values it aspired to, it would need perspective that did not come from another white man in the seat that I occupied.

That awareness felt like progress. It felt like maturity.

So, I did what I thought was the right thing. I helped grow the organization’s capacity to a point where I could step into a different role and hire someone new into that space. We brought in a leader whom I believed deeply in. Someone capable with a proven track record. Someone who could help move us toward a more diverse and equitable future. I remember the feeling of satisfaction I carried. This, I told myself, is what it looks like to make room.

Then I handed them the keys and tried to get out of the way.

I believed my absence would create space for their success. I believed stepping back was the same thing as sharing power. I believed less of me was support. I also believed the institution was more ready than it actually was.

That approach was a disaster.

What I failed to understand is that privilege does not disappear when you exit the room. Power doesn’t evaporate because you want it to. In fact, my absence didn’t remove power dynamics at all. It simply left them alone to face forces I had been protected from my entire career.

They encountered resistance, barriers, and blockades almost immediately. Resistance that never announced itself publicly. Scrutiny that never came with clear explanations. Doubt that hid behind politeness. Meanwhile, I stayed absent, convinced I was doing the enlightened thing. I thought I was honoring their leadership. I thought I was resisting the urge to control.

What I was actually doing was abandoning them.

Their work didn’t need my silence. It needed my presence. It needed me to use every ounce of credibility, access, and authority I had accumulated to stand between them and the resistance they were absorbing. It needed me in closed-door meetings. It needed me interrupting narratives before they hardened. It needed me taking blows that would never land on me the same way.

I had recognized privilege, but I had not recognized power. And privilege always comes with power.

I also believed too much in the organization’s ability to become who it said it wanted to be. My optimism about its desire for change outpaced its actual capacity for change. I confused stated values with practiced ones. I assumed intention equaled readiness.

The result was devastating. The person could not succeed in that environment. They left, hurt and disillusioned. And I was left stunned, trying to understand how something that felt so right had gone so wrong.

There are parts of that story I cannot change. There are ways I failed that still sit heavy in my body. My mistakes had consequences, and someone else paid for them more than I did.

When we brought in the next person, I did everything differently.

This time, I did not disappear. I understood my role was not to be neutral but to be active. I took responsibility for fighting behind closed doors so they could work in freedom out front. Their leadership was still scrutinized, but it no longer happened without resistance. I stood in the way of harmful dynamics. I named things early. I used my power intentionally. It cost me relationally or professionally.

That experience taught me something I wish I had learned sooner: identifying privilege is only a beginning. It might get us ten percent of the way there. The rest requires action.

I’ve heard rhetoric suggesting that the role of white people is to deny our privilege. I don’t believe that’s possible. Privilege isn’t a volume knob we can turn down. I don’t believe it is something we can opt out of. It’s embedded in systems that respond to us whether we want them to or not.

The question is not whether we have privilege. The question is whether we will use the power that comes with it on behalf of something better, fuller, and more just.

I carry deep regret about who I wasn’t in that first season. About the ways my learning outpaced my courage. About the harm that followed my absence. I don’t write this as a story of redemption but as a confession. Growth does not erase impact. Awareness does not undo damage.

What it can do is change how we show up next time.

Privilege acknowledged but unused is not humility. It is negligence. And that negligence has consequences that often we are not the ones who have to bear them.

Coming Face to Face With Authority

Making these mistakes finally helped me see a path forward. One I never wanted to admit I needed to be on

And that’s where the story will pick up next.

Check back in for the next article (8 of 11), where we explore how learning about race and cultureneeded me to finally submit to authority.