Snow-White is a cultural icon. We recognize the fairy tale immediately by the quote in the title, probably the most famous line from Grimms’ book of fairy tales. The mirror plays a pivotal role in the story: it functions as a status report and thus sets the fairy tale’s whole plot in motion. But in fact, the queen’s question to the mirror is just as important as its answer… maybe you can already guess where this metaphor leads?
The tale’s heroes are Snow-White, her mother the queen, the seven dwarves, and maybe the prince. But it’s the new queen, or the evil stepmother, who drives the plot with her schemes to kill beautiful Snow-White out of jealousy. Her actions determine the course of the story. She is a star among fairy tale figures, the epitome of evil manipulation. Let’s step back from psychoanalytic interpretations and look at her dynamics from a different perspective: that of feedback. We shall see that she offers quite a bit of material relevant to the professional world.
The story begins with Snow White’s mother yearning for a child. Her wish is granted and she dies soon afterwards:
A year later the king took himself another wife. She was a beautiful woman, but she was proud and arrogant, and she could not stand it if anyone might surpass her in beauty. She had a magic mirror. Every morning she stood before it, looked at herself, and said:
Mirror, mirror, on the wall,
Who in this land is fairest of all?
To this the mirror answered: You, my queen, are fairest of all.
Then she was satisfied, for she knew that the mirror spoke the truth.
Beauty as Status Symbol
Let’s take a closer look at the queen. She has married into the royal family; her status comes from her connection to the king. The story tells us nothing about the king’s motives for marrying this woman. However, it would not be surprising or out of line with archetypal logic if he had chosen her for her beauty, which she flaunts proudly.
Beauty, then, is a currency, a symbol and a guarantee for status, both for the king and the queen. Add to that pride and cockiness, and things get dangerous, as we already know:
Snow-White grew up and became ever more beautiful. When she was seven years old she was as beautiful as the light of day, even more beautiful than the queen herself. One day when the queen asked her mirror:
Mirror, mirror, on the wall,
Who in this land is fairest of all?
It answered: You, my queen, are fair; it is true.
But Snow White is a thousand times fairer than you.
The queen took fright and turned yellow and green with envy. From that hour on whenever she looked at Snow-White her heart turned over inside her body, so great was her hatred for the girl.
From here on out, the queen wants Snow-White dead. First, she commands a hunter to take the girl into the woods and shoot her. But the hunter is merciful and lets Snow-White run away, which she does, until she finds the seven dwarves beyond the mountains and makes a new home with them.
But the queen turns to her mirror once more, which tells her the unvarnished truth:
You, my queen, are fair; it is true.
But Snow-White, beyond the mountains
With the seven dwarfs,
Is still a thousand times fairer than you.
This startled the queen, for she knew that the mirror did not lie, and she realized that the huntsman had deceived her, and that Snow-White was still alive. Then she thought, and thought again, how she could kill Snow-White, for as long as she was not the most beautiful woman in the entire land her envy would give her no rest.
Only after her third attempt to kill Snow-White through cunning and treachery, the mirror confirms that You, my queen, are fairest of all.
Now she is number one again, even if only temporarily – as we know to be the case. Rather than focusing on the end of the story (naturally, Snow-White is wed to a handsome prince while the queen is punished), let us look at what we can learn from this fairy tale figure aside from the obvious.
Fear of Losing Status
The queen arrives at the court as an outsider and identifies her beauty as essential to her status. In fairy tales, beauty is always a criterion for uniqueness and for being chosen to inhabit an elevated position; the prince who saves the day is also spellbound by Snow-White’s beauty through the walls of her glass coffin. The fear of losing one’s status due to fading beauty is thus not particularly far-fetched.
In fact, the fairy tale tells us over and over again that the queen is not only jealous but also fearful: every time the mirror tells her that “Snow-White is a thousand times more beautiful,” she is frightened. Her first reaction is fear, which leads to jealousy and envy. And what is she afraid of? Precisely of losing her position and the status that comes with it.
Impeding Growth and Development
Loss of status is a painful experience if you haven’t given up your position willingly. For along with the external status symbols it provides, status also gives us a number of indirect advantages: attention, friendliness, agreeability – to name only a few. And the danger that we will grow accustomed to the comforts of our elevated status and accept them as natural is ever-present. Particularly in leadership positions, it’s all too easy to forget that status symbols and the associated attention are connected to our external roles, and not to our personality.
The fear of losing one’s status brings forth the strangest fruits and often sets the tone of an organization’s politics, especially at the executive level. Those who might contest our status in any way are often deliberately obstructed, stalled, or silenced. This type of behavior can do immense damage to a company. Aside from the harm done on the personal level, the intentional curbing of peoples’ potential leads to frustration, impedes development and can even lead to business losses.
The Search for Validation
The fear of losing status is naturally followed by a need to have one’s status validated regularly in order to feel secure. This is where the mirror comes in, whose job is to provide precisely that validation. It’s less about the queen finding herself beautiful and standing narcissistically before the mirror, and more about needing the mirror’s objective statement as proof – a mirror that she knows doesn’t lie.
The mirror is a powerful metaphor in leadership work. It becomes harder and harder to get honest feedback the higher you climb in an organization’s hierarchy – whether as CEO or founder, as a lateral hire or a home-grown talent.
Asking for Feedback
Finding the right mirror and asking the right questions is essential to the executive level or core of any company. When we take on leadership positions and want to continue growing from there, it’s important to pay attention to the mirrors with which we surround ourselves.
Do we really have a mirror that tells us the unvarnished truth? And are we asking the right questions? Do we have the courage to confront uncomfortable truths without getting caught up in power games and intrigue? Perhaps we need to try out different mirrors to get closer to a form of reality check. For example, a combination of personal feedback, employee surveys and regular reviews of the leadership work being done – all these are ways of realistically mirroring an organization’s inner life.
Working Together with Junior Talent
The problems in the fairy tale begin when Snow-White starts to grow older and more beautiful with each passing day, until she surpasses the queen’s beauty. This is not an unusual situation in the professional world. We become leaders of a team, build it up or help it develop further, and one day realize that a team member is outperforming us or may even be gunning for our position already. Can we manage to redefine our role and create the space that junior talent deserves? Or do we try to assert ourselves by hampering newcomers and not letting them have their turn?
In this situation, too, a mirror can be helpful – but a mirror of a different kind. When we confront the reality of aging, a good mirror might show us new opportunities and perspectives. We might recognize a level of maturity and depth of experience in our reflections that are valuable to a different role or context. To achieve these insights, we must ask new questions and perhaps also exchange our mirrors so that new truths can become visible. Good friends, a coach or well-intentioned colleagues can take on this role.
A Stable Sense of Self Worth and a New Stage
For these reasons, it’s worth shaping our own lives multidimensionally, both personally and professionally. Instead of clinging to our one status marker by any means possible, like the queen, and thereby bringing on our own demise, we can build a stable foundation within our environment. At times we may need to step back and let someone else take the stage that was once ours. But we can do so in the knowledge that new and different opportunities can develop that we haven’t yet glimpsed.
