Sarah,

I'm glad you liked the piece. The advice in here is meant to be taken playfully -- I wouldn't suggest going into a workplace and lying through your teeth if you genuinely felt you were doing something dishonest and harmful to the people around you.

It's better, instead, to think of it as owning the fact that you are different from everyone else, and owning the fact that you will not fit--and then playing with it and having fun, instead of worrying over it endlessly.

When I wrote this I had graduate students in mind, since I was just recently one myself. The corporate angle sort of worked its way in there as an afterthought, since I have some experience with the corporate world (especially at the entry level) and never much cared for the conformity.

In a perfect world, somewhere out there, there is a graduate student who feels like they don't fit in their program--maybe they are concerned that they're not focused enough, or driven enough, or they feel like they struggle more than others. And they feel like they can't keep up, and like they're a social outcast who doesn't quite fit--and then they read this piece and think to themselves "So what if I don't fit? Maybe I'm here to use this graduate program to benefit my life, instead of trying to break my life so I can fit in with this graduate program."

If a single person out there reads this article and leaves thinking something like that, then this article will have accomplished what I hope for.

And, while people in the corporate world have a different set of concerns (being able to keep up with the workload, as Scott noted, is very important), I have seen similar pressures to conform to corporate values. So if a person in the business world leaves this thinking "You know what? I'm happy doing my part to support the team but also I think I'm just going to stop being terrified about pleasing everyone and just be myself for a while" then I think I'll feel good about this, even if I get a bit of push-back from some people.

Best wishes to you,

J