Think about a moment in your life or work when you truly felt like you mattered to someone. What happened? How did you feel?
Chances are your moment of mattering emotionally moved you, affected how you saw yourself, or altered your behavior. Quite possibly, it shaped your career or life trajectory, as it has for many of the people I’ve interviewed.
When I ask people what mattering feels like, here’s how they describe it:
• “Feeling like I matter makes me feel like I’m something, I’m somebody. I have peace and calmness.”
• “When I feel like I matter, I’m the best version of myself. I show up fully. I do my best work.”
• “Mattering to other people keeps me going in life and work.”
• “Feeling like I matter is my reason to get up in the morning.”
• “Feeling like I matter makes me feel alive.”
Because mattering to others is a basic survival instinct and a fundamental need, our brains and bodies reward us for experiencing it. When we feel significant, we have intense positive emotions and newfound energy. Mattering transforms how we see ourselves, predicts healthy relationships, and is a robust source of meaning. These effects drive motivation, resilience, and well-being, leading to sustained individual and organizational performance.
How Mattering Works
Psychologists find we experience mattering through two primary experiences: When we’re valued by others and we can see how we add value to their lives.
Both sides of mattering—feeling valued and adding value—have a reinforcing relationship. When we’re valued, we develop a positive view of ourselves (“I’m something, I’m somebody”) and are more secure in our relationships (“I have peace and calmness”).
The need to be valued is rooted in our need to be seen and safe, called secure attachment. When children feel important to an adult, they have a safety net so they can venture out and explore. This secure base allows them to experiment, take risks, and learn, knowing someone will be there when they return. Secure attachment drives our core need to matter and predicts lifelong resilience, flexibility, and healthy stress responses.
The need for secure relationships does not go away at work. As adults, we construct our secure base through interactions with leaders and peers. When people feel valued by a leader, they can contribute, create, and innovate because they know someone sees them, hears them, and has their back. Secure relationships also reinforce our worth and ability, forging our confidence to contribute.
In other words, when people feel like they matter, they act like they matter. A mistake many leaders subconsciously make is to assume people should be valued once they add value, but it’s the other way around: people need to feel valued to add value. And as more and more people report feeling unseen, unheard, and unvalued in work, the skill of showing people they matter is more vital than ever.
Reprinted by permission of Harvard Business Review Press. Excerpted from The Power of Mattering: How Leaders Can Create a Culture of Significance by Zach Mercurio. Copyright 2025 Zach Mercurio. All rights reserved.