CHARACTER
Originals: How Non-Conformists Move the Worldby Adam Grant

Carmen Medina

Carmen Medina (Originals)

Quick Facts

  • Role: Former CIA analyst who becomes Deputy Director of Intelligence; central case study for Voicing Dissent Effectively
  • First major episode: Early 1990s push for an internet-based, real-time intelligence-sharing platform
  • Key relationships: Boss Mike (a disagreeable but fair-minded ally), analysts Sean Dennehy and Don Burke (creators of Intellipedia), early colleagues who resisted her ideas
  • Core ideas embodied: Status versus power; “tempered radical” strategy; Risk Mitigation and the Myth of the Risk-Taker
  • Signature contribution: Senior sponsor of Intellipedia (2005), the wiki-style platform that realized her long-argued vision

Who They Are

At her core, Carmen Medina is a tempered radical: a visionary who learns to harness patience, credibility, and alliances to move a resistant system. Grant presents her not for physical detail—none is given—but for the evolution of her method. She starts as a brilliant, blunt dissenter whose “me-focused” approach alienates peers, and becomes a “mission-focused” insider who reframes risk, earns status, and makes her radical idea feel safe and necessary. Her arc illustrates how originals succeed not by louder defiance, but by translating dissent into legitimacy.

Personality & Traits

Medina’s defining qualities drive both her early missteps and later triumphs. She pairs long-range vision with high standards and emotional intensity, then learns to channel that intensity into strategic sequencing—building cover, borrowing credibility, and timing her moves.

  • Visionary: Anticipated the need for internet-era, real-time information sharing inside the intelligence community—years before it was palatable—prefiguring Intellipedia.
  • Persistent: After a career-damaging setback, she didn’t abandon the idea; she waited, retooled, and tried again when the conditions and her status improved.
  • Principled candor: Warned that honesty could “ruin your career” (p. 63), she still prioritized truth and mission over comfort, which first hurt her standing but later underpinned her credibility.
  • Passionate to a fault (then refined): Her advocacy escalated into a shouting match and sick leave (p. 63); later, she channels that passion into coalition-building and careful framing.
  • Strategically risk-balanced: She sought “very conservative top cover” by taking an information-security role and managing a “balanced risk portfolio,” tying change to protection rather than disruption (p. 67).
  • Reflective and adaptable: She reframed her messaging from “me-focused” to “mission focused” (p. 85), a shift that let colleagues see shared stakes rather than personal crusade.

Character Journey

Medina begins as a high-performing CIA analyst convinced that the agency must share intelligence in real time. She wields insight without the status to carry it, pushing too directly and triggering organizational antibodies. The backlash isolates her and stalls her career. Rather than exit or escalate, she recasts her plan: she moves into information security—a conservative stronghold—to earn credibility, reduce perceived risk, and work “under the radar.” With this status and cover, she learns to sponsor others, not just her own proposal, and to frame change as advancing the mission, not attacking tradition. By the time Sean Dennehy and Don Burke build Intellipedia, she is senior enough to give it the high-level protection it needs. Ultimately, she ascends to Deputy Director of Intelligence, the very perch from which she can normalize the radical idea she first introduced—and first mishandled—years earlier.

Key Relationships

  • Mike (her boss): A “cynical,” mercurial manager who values truth over harmony, Mike becomes Medina’s unlikely protector. He gives her “enough rope” while preventing self-sabotage, modeling how disagreeable allies can be better guardians of originality than agreeable ones who avoid friction. His support legitimizes her second attempt and buffers her as she gains status.

  • Sean Dennehy and Don Burke: As the creators of Intellipedia, they supply what Medina once lacked: a concrete, workable vehicle for her vision. Medina, now senior, becomes their sponsor—translating her early outsider push into insider protection. The relationship marks her shift from lone dissenter to builder of platforms and people.

  • Early colleagues: Their rejection—and even social isolation—exposes middle-status conservatism and the penalties of “speaking while female.” Their resistance forces Medina to distinguish power from status, recognize how her style triggered threat responses, and reframe her advocacy around shared mission and security.

Defining Moments

Medina’s turning points trace a movement from raw dissent to strategic stewardship.

  • The initial rejection (early 1990s)

    • What happens: Medina’s push for an online intelligence platform meets fierce resistance, culminating in a shouting match and career setback.
    • Why it matters: It clarifies the gap between being right and being effective, and sparks her shift in how to approach Challenging the Status Quo.

  • Taking the information-security job

    • What happens: She pursues a conservative role to gain “top cover” and assemble a balanced risk portfolio.
    • Why it matters: It’s a masterclass in de-risking dissent—earning status, reframing her idea as protective, and building credibility before exerting power.

  • Championing Intellipedia (2005)

    • What happens: As a high-ranking executive, she provides the senior backing Dennehy and Burke need to scale their wiki-based platform.
    • Why it matters: The vision she once pushed and failed to advance becomes institutional reality—because she now has the status, allies, and framing to make it stick.

Essential Quotes

“Be careful what you’re saying in these groups. If you’re too honest, and say what you really think, it will ruin your career.” (p. 63) This warning captures the career costs of blunt dissent in high-conformity cultures. It foreshadows Medina’s initial derailment and frames the central lesson: candor must be paired with timing, status, and audience-sensitive framing to be effective.

“I had this very conservative top cover. It was a balanced risk portfolio.” (p. 67) Medina’s language borrows from finance to describe change-management. By hedging with a conservative role, she reduces perceived threat and builds credibility—demonstrating that originals can succeed by managing, not maximizing, risk.

“People saw that I stood for something, not just against the status quo. I thought that if I proved myself in that position, I would get a chance to start planting the seeds for even bigger change.” (p. 67) This shift—from negation to positive mission—recasts her identity in the organization. Once seen as a challenger, she becomes a steward of shared goals, unlocking allies who support what she builds rather than defending against what she opposes.

“The whole second chapter of this journey was really very different from the first chapter. I was mission focused.” (p. 85) Medina names the pivot that makes her effective. By foregrounding mission, she aligns her idea with institutional identity, translating a radical proposal into a natural extension of what the agency already values.