Florence Nightingale
Travelling as Miss Smith
Once famous, do not let the fame do your work; turn it into something that lasts
Florence Nightingale's life, 1856-1860; Notes on Nursing (1859)
Something made you famous and everyone is praising you. What did Nightingale do with her fame when she came home?
What actually happened?
The Crimean War made Nightingale a national heroine, the Lady with the Lamp. Coming home in the summer of 1856, she travelled as 'Miss Smith', avoided every welcome, and walked home from the station. For decades after she was often ill and rarely went out, yet through letters, reports and commissions she pushed army health reform; the Nightingale Fund raised by the public opened a nursing school at St Thomas' Hospital, London, in 1860.
Skip the welcome, go back to the work
The whole country waited to greet her, and she came home under another name. Receptions, parades and speeches would have made her an image; what she wanted was for the unsolved problems of the war hospitals to be dealt with.
The launch earned company-wide praise. Go to the party, and the next day put the leftover bugs on the plan.
Push from outside the room
Back home she was often ill and seldom went out, and spent most of her life writing letters and reports and summoning people to talk. She did not rely on appearing in person, but on getting data and proposals into the hands of those who decide.
Too unwell to go in often? Write each week's priorities on one page and send it to whoever decides.
Turn fame into an institution
She did not keep the Nightingale Fund the public gave her. She used it to open a nursing school at St Thomas' Hospital to train nurses properly. People age and fall ill; a school keeps teaching, year after year.
You are known in your field. Rather than touring with talks, train three people who can stand on their own.
How do I use it today?
Where you are: something made you famous, everyone praises you, and invitations keep coming.
Ask first: what lasting thing can this fame buy: a rule, a school, a few people who can carry on? Which occasions only turn me into an image?
Where it goes wrong: treating avoiding fame as a virtue in itself. She stayed out of sight, and spent the trust behind her name on reform.
Lines to keep
I use the word nursing for want of a better.
Every woman is a nurse.
Same situation, other people are asking
I won, and now I don't know when to stop.It's going well and I can't shake the feeling it won't last.Three in a row and everyone wants me to press harder.They're scattered. Do I finish them off or let them turn on each other?After the win · all 11 questions →If this one named what you are going through,
send it to someone who needs it, or keep it somewhere you will find it again.