It was just a normal school day in September of 2007 at Central Kings Rural High School in the small community of Cambridge, Nova Scotia. A grade nine student, in his first year at the school, wore a pink shirt to school. A few bullies roughed him up a bit, called him a homosexual for wearing a pink shirt and threatened to beat him up if he ever wore it again. Great first day of school, right? It is a scene that, in one form or another, is a regular part of the school day experience for many students all over the world with 64% of kids in North America saying that bullying is just a normal part of everyday life at school. Every year there are sixteen suicides in the U.S. alone as a direct result of bullying.

The next day, two grade twelve boys, David Shepherd and Travis Price, heard about the incident. That night as David Shepherd said “I figured enough is enough, someone has to do something.” He told his friend Travis that he had an idea. What if they went out and bought as many pink t shirts as they could get and get as many of their friends as possible to wear them the very next day. They would make a statement to the bullies, we have had enough.

On line they began to recruit their friends and classmates in what they dubbed a “sea of pink.” But the next day, even they were overwhelmed with the response. Not only were dozens of students wearing the t shirts they had bought the night before, but hundreds of students showed up in pink outfits of their own, many dressed from head to toe in pink. The bully showed up to a pink tsunami and overturned a garbage can in disgust, but he got the message, the whole school had risen up with one voice and said “Enough!”

The story of the boys stepping up was picked up the media across Canada and eventually far beyond. Today there are hundreds of schools that participate in “pink shirt day” in February of each year in places as far from Canada as New Zealand. What started as two boys simply standing up for something they believed in spawned “pink shirt” days around the world and called on others to step up. This year it will be February 23. http://www.pinkshirtday.ca/

One of the interesting things about stepping up, the act of seeing a need and deciding you are the one who can do something about it, is how viral it is. David and Travis hoped that at least fifty would step up with them and were surprised when hundreds did so. When one person or a few people step up others can’t help but join in. Doubt that for a moment, look at what is happening right now in Egypt where what began with hundreds soon became hundreds of thousands which may change the course of a country’s history. Stepping up is contagious, but it always requires someone or some few to stick their necks out just a little.

Think of how this is true in an organization. It only takes one person to stop the flow of negativity in a conversation and suddenly others shift too. It only takes one person to step up and help a customer when others are holding back, then others start to step up. Sometimes it takes just one person to speak up and point out to senior leaders that they are not walking their talk then others feel bold enough to speak the truth. Often it takes only person to say I can’t meet on the weekend and then others defend their work-life balance as well.

It works in everyday life too. In December I helped coach a girl’s high school basketball team at a tournament in Hawaii. We took the bus to the games each day and they were always crowded. I was amazed how many young people let older or disabled people stand while they sat. So each time I would step up and give a seat. What I noticed is that often when I gave up my seat, some younger person stepped up and gave up theirs.

The amazing thing is that many people still believe that stepping up is risky, but my experience in organizations has been quite the opposite. Those who step up and speak up in a positive way are almost always rewarded. As one CEO told me “people who step up and challenge things are sometime a pain in the neck, like little dogs with a bone, but they always make the organization better.” David and Travis made their school a better place and wound up influencing schools around the world. When asked in an interview what they wanted to tell others they simply said: “If everyone does what they can we probably can’t eliminate bullying but we can make a big enough dent to get rid of most of it.”

Sometime this month you will have a chance to step up. When you have that chance, remember how viral it can be and how the impact of one stepping up can become a wave before you know it. And tell everyone you can about pink day, maybe you will help stop some young person from getting bullied.

Oh and speaking of how stepping up is viral, when a guy in England heard about what they had done he did his own you tube video to spread the story http://tinyurl.com/4ev2zgj

Be well, do good work.

John