What is ambition?

Four women in publishing discuss defining ambition, how to nurture it and their advice for people looking to foster ambition in the industry. 

In June 2022, The FLIP curated a panel for The Bookseller’s Marketing & Publicity Conference, aiming to break down what ambition means, and how (and if) it’s working in publishing. Here, The FLIP’s Cassie Rocks (Campaign Manager, HarperCollins) interviews Sabah Khan (Head of Publicity, Simon & Schuster), Ella Horne (Senior Campaigns Manager, Penguin General), Aoife Datta (Publicity and Marketing Manager, Scribe UK) and Harriet Bowers (Sales and Marketing Administrator, HarperCollins). 

What does ambition mean to you? 

Sabah: I think we always think about ambition as being about work and our next steps professionally. Actually, when we're thinking about it more holistically, you can be ambitious in your home life or your non-professional life in that your ambition could be to buy a house or to have a family. It’s very much about achieving any goal you set your mind to. 

Ella: I wonder if sometimes we misapply the word ambition to progression. I think ambition doesn't have to be that next step; it can be a sideways step to learn something new, or it can be to work a four-day week, or to take parental leave and come back from that. Ambition to me is just striving for more for yourself and to make your life better in some way.

Have you picked up on any themes or notions in your team or your peers of how ambition is working in publishing? Have you had any conversations with your colleagues about it? 

Harriet: My first impression of ambition in the industry came when I was interviewing for the role I’m in now and I was asked to complete tasks that I wouldn’t necessarily be taking on immediately. It was really encouraging for me to see that the person who's going to be managing me is interested in what I could be doing in the future. It felt like they really saw a future for me and they didn't want me to sit at this entry level role forever.

Ella: When I first started out in publishing I really wanted to progress. I was on an entry level publishing salary and it felt really kind of critical to my livelihood that I was able to move up. Now, I’m more interested in what excites me and making sure I work with people that I love and I feel safe with. 

So for me personally, I moved to Sheffield a month ago and love it. That’s been an ambition of mine for the last three years, so to fulfil that feels like a huge achievement, more so than promotions and progressions have done at times. It's not just about work; it’s my whole life and happiness.

Sabah: What you want personally should be able to match what you want professionally. You have to think, ‘How can I make sure that work facilitates it?’ It's about constantly stepping back and saying ‘What do I want and how am I going to get there?’ When I talk with my team about their big goals, it’s also about the small goals we can take to help them get there. 

Aoife: Even from my first junior position at an independent publisher we were encouraged to be ambitious about the kind of company we wanted to form. We were asked to have an input and help to steer the direction of the company, which I think is very unique within publishing. I feel very grateful and fortunate that my ambition has been able to play out in a company-wide setting. 

Something we’ve noticed at The FLIP, and something actually we’re a part of, is the notion that you have to be working above and beyond the scope of your official role in order to achieve your ambitions. What are your thoughts on this? Do you define ambition as ‘above and beyond’ or can it simply be just being excellent at what you do?

Sabah: There is so much competition to get into the industry, and to be seen to be different enough you feel you have to go above and beyond. It means everyone you're competing against at that level is doing extraordinary things. I look at people more junior to me and I just think I can barely get myself out of bed and get myself to work to do my day job! I don’t know how you all find the energy. And it's amazing, but it creates a vicious cycle of competition. 

Personally, I don't have a side hustle. I want to reserve that energy. But if your side hustle excites you, you'll make room for it. I think it's about just making sure you aren't overstretching yourself, because that's when it gets quite dangerous. Do you have to do all these things? Or are you choosing to be ambitious in the wrong kind of way?

Aoife: Social media distorts what people are actually doing in the industry. The lion’s share of people are just really excellent at their jobs. They’re not founding organisations or winning awards all the time, but the industry rewards people who do these things in an outward way, so it can be hard to remember that the majority of people are just trying their best at work.

Ella: Well, there's a reason we've handed over The FLIP! It was a great side hustle and I loved doing it. It's helped me hugely in my career to stand out and connect with people who I never would have had the chance to connect with. I found that as I got more senior in my official role, I just didn't have the energy for it anymore. The expectation that everybody has a side hustle behind him is an extra drain on your time, on your energy. There has to be an expectation that it's enough for people to just do their job well, without outperforming your role in order to progress. 

As a manager, I’ve noticed that it’s not just about someone delivering more. It has to be aligned with what the business is looking for and what the business needs. When you’re looking for your next step, it’s good to be cognizant of that. 

Sabah: The person you're reporting into needs to be that person who gives you insight into what is necessary for the business and for you to thrive. They should be able to tell you how to channel all of your energy into what’s going to give you visibility. As your manager, I can have sight of all of that without putting too much pressure on you. I can tell you the one thing you can do that will be better than doing 10 other things because you're just going to be pushing yourself. That's when you start getting really demoralised, which is what we want to stop. We have amazing talent in the industry and we want to keep it. We don't want to push them in the wrong direction.

Harriet: I definitely did feel the need to come armed with more than just my degree and my work experience. I’d worked in different industries, but during the pandemic I had a moment of reflection when I realised I wanted to work in publishing. I did LinkedIn courses about marketing and SEO, and I started a Bookstagram so I could prove my passion for books in interviews. That's the mental paradigm of it all, doubting if I would ever get a role while simultaneously feeling like I had to work hard and do extra to prove myself. 

Ella: Publishing is such a hard industry to get into and you do have to make yourself stand out. Is there an element of that hanging over us once we're in a role? Is that constant drive to overdeliver partly because we feel so lucky to have got the job? 

Harriet: I do find it hard to say no and to set boundaries. If someone says ‘Do you have time to do this?’, my answer will always be yes, whether I do or I don’t - because I’m constantly thinking about the fact that so many candidates applied for this job. I still want to really prove myself and make sure I'm seen as someone who's a valuable team player. It can be a good thing to get to be seen as someone who's proactive and hardworking, but perhaps sometimes I'm willing to just accept whatever I get because I'm grateful to be here. So even over six months in, it still mentally hangs over me. 

Ella: Most people that I know in publishing are already doing the job that they get promoted into. People are always working above what they're actually supposed to do. And we allow that to happen by letting that person do something above their pay grade and not rewarding them for that.

Ella: I've never had a promotion in-role where I haven't felt exhausted by the time I got the promotion. Waiting just to be recognised for the work you're doing can take a long time, and if, during that time, you’re pushing at 110% to prove you’re ready for it, you’re going to be crawling over the finish line. 

Sabah: That's why we need to be careful when we're thinking about what ambition is. If you’re defined by your ambition and your success, it is going to kill you before you get there. Sometimes we need to take a step back and figure out what’s making you unhappy and what you can do in the meantime that will make you feel better. 

Ella: ‘Ambition’ is not a dirty word, but neither is ‘unambitious’. I think it's fine to be unambitious in an area of your life, and that might be work and you might just not want to progress right now – or ever. We have a finite amount of energy and you shouldn’t have to take that from your life to give to your work. 

What do you think are the main barriers to being ambitious in publishing? 

Sabah: To be ambitious and to get to whatever that next step is for you, you really have to know and understand what that is and how you're going to get there. There’s the potential for a big mental barrier there, knowing that this goal could take you, say, five years and you have to be okay with that. And make sure that the people you surround yourself with are all on the same page about what you want, so that you're not getting any unnecessary pressure. You might know what your goal is, but if you’re watching other people achieving theirs quicker, it can feel really scary. So in that sense, I think our biggest barriers can be ourselves. 

Ella: I also think the barriers can be physical, like workload and pay. It can be hard to carve out space for that kind of forward planning and prioritise the bigger picture. It can be quite unclear where your career will go, because there’s not a lot of information out there. You have no idea how much you’re going to be paid in 10 years and how to formulate that into your life plans. If you have the opportunity to give that clarity to people who are junior to you, it’s important to share that information. 

Ella: We’ve lost really talented people – mainly young women, mainly from underrepresented backgrounds – to other industries, because they just can’t stay in publishing anymore. I think that's a real tragedy for the industry. We have a responsibility as people who are still in publishing – and especially if you're able to shape the culture – to make that space easier somehow. 

What advice do you have for people looking to foster ambition in publishing? 

Harriet: Don’t be afraid to share your opinions and ideas. When I started, I'd sit in on meetings and think, ‘What do I have to contribute? Do I have anything that's worth saying?’ And actually, someone who manages me did say once that a new person has so much to offer because they can look at things from a fresh perspective. So if you’re early in your career or just started a new role, just say what you’re thinking, even if other people say ‘Maybe we can’t do that this time’. It’s still worth sharing your ideas, and every time you do, it helps you to understand better what you could do in the future. Just speak up.

Ella: Try not to compare yourself to others. I think sometimes we can use ambition as a stick with which to beat yourself with. It's really personal what you want to achieve, and how long you want it to take. If you are constantly comparing yourself against others, even what you do achieve isn’t going to seem as valuable because it's not as much as the next person. Focus on yourself and what you want to do.

Sabah: Get a mentor – or be a mentor. I think giving back is really, really important. And find any way to network! Getting a fresh perspective from people who don't work in your team or division is really useful because then you can learn from each other and have a support base that allows you to have those conversations that can be difficult to have within your team. 

Ella: Really invest the time in knowing what your ambitions are. I would really recommend a company called Amazing If and they have a podcast called Squiggly Careers on identifying your values, which I found so useful. It’s helped me to identify opportunities that I knew I wanted to take because I understood my values. So with this secondment I’m doing at the moment: I’d been at Transworld for five years and loved it, but had kind of reached a point where I felt that I was learning the same thing over and over again. It was a sidestep, and I think some people were slightly perplexed at that. But a new opportunity doesn't have to look like a step up for it to take you further towards where you want to be.