Years ago during an offsite, a white male colleague remarked that he didn’t have time to manage his employees to the extent they needed managing.

“You must realize that has a spillover effect on the rest of us,” I said. “Your team ends up seeking other leaders to help them navigate this place—and to better understand you.”

So-called invisible work—a term coined by sociologist Arlene Kaplan Daniels to describe work that goes unpaid, unacknowledged, and thus, unregulated—abounds in the workplace, especially when we look back on our careers in hindsight. Once you know, you cannot stop seeing such labor everywhere. It’s especially egregious for women and people of color, who pick up the slack for organizations that come to rest greatly on our efforts.

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