When the Ride Goes Wrong: Navigating the Glass Cliff in Real Time

Written By Jennifer deCoste

I found myself thinking about trust in the back of a Lyft, watching Colorado blur past through windows that had seen better days. The driver had insisted his car was “one of the best”—complete with grimy faux-fur seat covers punctured by jagged holes—while I clutched my phone showing Lyft safety tools. Five minutes into our highway dance, he asked if I'd pay cash. That's when I knew we were heading back to the airport. "It's very extra in my car," he said, with the confidence of someone who'd perfected this particular hustle. I couldn't help but laugh at the irony later: here I was, literally being taken for a ride, while spending my days studying how brilliant professionals navigate far more sophisticated versions of the same dynamic. The fraudulent driver reminded me of a conversation I'd had just days before with a client—let's call her Sarah—whose experiences illuminate something psychologists call the "glass cliff."

Sarah, an international academic leader, had been sharing her strategies for handling colleagues who question her expertise before she even begins to speak. "I've learned to mention my credentials upfront," she told me, describing how her accent triggers assumptions that require immediate correction. This is the glass cliff in action—that precarious position where underrepresented leaders find themselves after achieving breakthrough success.

Unlike my airport hustler, who deployed obvious deception, the glass cliff operates through subtler mechanisms: the colleague who consistently ignores emails, the administrator who questions decisions that would otherwise go unexamined, and the endless documentation required to prove what should be assumed.

Five core elements of the glass cliff:

  1. The crushing need for community support in environments where you're often the only one who looks like you or sounds like you.

  2. The tendency to take on additional burdens—mentoring every student of color, serving on every diversity committee—that wouldn't be expected of others.

  3. The challenge of identity-based roles, where your very presence becomes a political issue.

  4. Being viewed as taking resources from others, as if leadership were a zero-sum game.

  5. Navigating the insensitivity of well-meaning colleagues who've never had to question whether their XXX (accent, sexuality, race, etc.) affects their credibility.

What struck me most about our conversation was Sarah's sophisticated approach to boundary setting. After an accident forced her to confront her limits, she developed what she calls "strict work-life boundaries"—no working after hours, scheduling appointments with herself to respond to the daily barrage of student emails, and a comprehensive self-care routine involving plant care and date nights with friends.

The parallels between my fraudulent ride and the professional challenges Sarah faces aren't perfect, but they're instructive. Both involve trust betrayed, expectations manipulated, and the exhausting work of constant vigilance.

This is where the concept of racial identity complexity enters the conversation. Sarah and I discussed how perceptions and stereotypes create unexpected tensions—even between people who might seem to share common ground. The assumptions people make about Mexican immigrants versus Mexican Americans, the way accent and appearance trigger different biases, and the delicate navigation required when your very presence challenges others' comfort zones.

I think about faith and spirituality as coping mechanisms, something Sarah emphasized during our discussion. As an immigrant without family nearby, she's had to construct her own support systems—prayer, conversations with her daughter, and the deliberate cultivation of calm in the face of professional storms.

The documentation practices Sarah has developed fascinate me as a coach. She's learned to maintain professionalism even when faced with what she diplomatically calls "fake or inappropriate behavior from colleagues." She limits interactions with problematic individuals to work-related matters only, a boundary that protects her energy while maintaining professional standards. But perhaps what moves me most is Sarah's work coaching students who've been hurt by colleagues who claim to support diversity while causing harm through their actions. This is the glass cliff multiplied—not only navigating these dynamics yourself but helping others learn to recognize and respond to them.

Sitting in that fraudulent Lyft, demanding to return to the airport, I had the luxury of a simple solution to a straightforward problem. Sarah operates in environments where deception is systemic, solutions are complex, and the stakes are infinitely higher.

The glass cliff isn't just about the challenges faced by underrepresented leaders—it's about what institutions lose when they fail to provide adequate support for the people brave enough to break through barriers.

As I finally made it to my destination in a second Lyft, I carried with me a renewed appreciation for the sophisticated navigation skills required by professionals who can't simply demand to go back to the airport. Their ability to reach their destinations despite systemic obstacles isn't just personally admirable—it's institutionally essential. The question isn't whether the glass cliff exists. The question is what we're going to do about it.

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Jennifer deCoste
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