About twelve years into my career at Upjohn, I was invited to fly home from an event on the company jet. I had recently moved my whole life from South Florida to Kalamazoo, Michigan where Upjohn had its headquarters, and I was a junior executive still finding my way. For someone who started her working life taking hamburger orders at Disney World, a seat on the company jet was a big deal.

Getting home usually meant changing planes in Detroit or Chicago and hoping there was still room in the overhead bin before my carry-on got gate-checked. This time I would fly straight to Kalamazoo with my boss and several executives above him. I thought I had arrived, at least in the transportation department.

There was one small problem. The plane had room for one more passenger but not one more real seat. In the back was a tiny lavatory, and its toilet doubled as a passenger seat, complete with a seat belt. Every regular seat was taken. So yes, I flew home on the airplane toilet.

Our senior vice president noticed. He made a comment about me getting the worst seat on the plane, then added something like, “At least you get a fast ride home.” He wasn’t wrong.

I’m five-foot-two, so maybe someone decided I was the logical fit. More likely, everyone looked around and the most junior person got the least desirable seat. Every leader on that plane was a man, and every one of them outranked me. Nobody was hazing me, and it had nothing to do with my being a woman. That was simply the corporate hierarchy at work. Nobody offered to trade, and I certainly wasn’t going to ask.

On NCIS they would have called me the probie. (I’ve watched more episodes than I care to admit.) I was the new kid on that plane, and I was fine with it.

Here’s the part I didn’t expect. The seat was comfortable. It even gave me a little privacy and a coveted electrical outlet for my computer. So, I opened my computer and worked the whole way home. There was a curtain I could have pulled closed to separate myself from everyone else. I laughed at that. Of course I left it open. The last thing a junior executive should do on the company jet is disappear behind a curtain.

I also said a quiet thank-you that none of the men on that flight needed to use the restroom. I’m still not sure what the protocol would have been.

I didn’t tell anyone at work. I’m a private person, so the only one who heard the story was my husband. His response was classic him: “Who cares about the seat? I’d sit on the floor of a private jet. How cool is that?” He had a point.

Would I take that seat again today? Absolutely. I was grateful to be on that plane, and I’d be grateful now. I had plenty of ambition back then. I just never thought ambition meant I was owed the best seat.

I was never interested in corporate games or racing someone to the next rung of the ladder. I wanted to do my job well and let the results do the talking. I figured that was how you earned other people’s confidence.

Trust me, people notice the difference. Over the years I’ve worked with a few people who arrived expecting a front-row seat before they could find the conference rooms. They spent a lot of energy reminding everyone of their own importance. The people above them noticed that too, just not the way they hoped. Most of them didn’t last long.

It was never really about the seat. Where someone sits won’t make or break a career, but it tells you a lot about how they approach the job. I used to say the same thing about award trips in sales. Nobody’s career was ever made by going on an award trip. But I watched more than one sales rep ruin theirs by doing something stupid or inappropriate on one. Like the guy who decided the golf course was a perfectly good restroom. That’s a story for another time. Or the winner who got into a fight outside a bar and swore he didn’t start it, right up until we saw the video. The list goes on.

That doesn’t mean keeping your head down. Speak up and bring better ideas. There’s a big difference between contributing with confidence and expecting special treatment.

As it turned out, somebody was paying attention. About a year after that flight I was moved into a bigger leadership role. Later, two of the men on that plane championed me for my first vice president position. I have no idea whether that toilet seat ever crossed their minds. I’ve always believed they saw how I showed up, whether I was in a conference room or the back of the plane.

So what if I were one of the senior leaders on that plane today, and the new kid ended up in the back? Would I give up my forward-facing seat? Absolutely not. I’d probably tell them I’d been in that seat before and lived to tell about it. But I’d be watching how they handled it.

That’s what senior leadership did for me. He didn’t trade seats. He noticed, and later he did something about it. On every team, someone is willing to take the worst seat. They quietly do the work and never ask for the spotlight. It’s easy to overlook them, because they never complain. Don’t. Those are often the people with the most to offer, and part of a leader’s job is to see them before they ever have to ask.

So no, I wouldn’t change my seat on that flight. I flew home with people I could learn from, and I didn’t have to change planes in Detroit. Not everybody can say their first ride on a corporate jet came with its own bathroom seat.

Want more on becoming a WOW leader? Check out Tune In to WOW Leadership. And stay tuned. I’ve got something new in the works, and I can’t wait to share it with you!