By Senior Contributor,William Arruda
Copyright forbes
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When you hear the word afterlife, it likely conjures up thoughts of religion or spirituality, a trip to heaven, reincarnation, or something ethereal. But you can look at the afterlife through a different lens, one that will help you make decisions at work that will have a big impact on your living legacy.
You Are Creating A Living Legacy Every day
This article is not about the hereafter, it’s about how you live on in the hearts and minds of the people you’ve touched, the influence you’ve left behind, and the stories others tell about you when you’re not in the room. That’s your living legacy. The truth is that every one of us creates a living legacy, whether we intend to or not. The more people who remember you fondly, the more impact you’ve made, and the longer your living legacy lasts.
Some people extend their legacy through visible symbols (or other people do it for them). These symbols include plaques, a building named in their honor, a statue in a park, or other physical memorials. These markers are meaningful, but they’re not always enduring. Over time, people walk past them without acknowledging the person or their impact. And in some cases, they don’t even take the time to ask, “Who was this person?” If there’s no story attached, the memory fades. The most powerful and meaningful legacy isn’t built in marble or metal. It’s not in having your name blazoned across the top of a skyscraper. It’s built from moments, generosity, and the impact of purposeful work.
Work As Your Living Legacy Launchpad
Work isn’t just what you do to pay the bills or fuel your entertainment. Think of work as the platform through which you create meaning, build relationships, and contribute to the world. Done intentionally, work becomes one of the most powerful ways to shape your living legacy.
Think about it. We spend a third of our lives working. That’s a lot of time and a lot of potential legacy. If we use that time only to check boxes and climb the proverbial corporate ladder, we could end up with professional achievements and a healthy 401(k), but with little impact that lasts longer than we do. But if we approach work as a chance to contribute, support, and elevate others, the ripples we create can last for years or even generations.
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Here are three ways to think about your work as a legacy-building tool.
1. Legacy Action: Did you bring people with you?
Careers are rarely solo activities. Along the way, we meet mentors, colleagues, teammates. We manage people, work with internal or external clients, and collaborate with business partners. The question to ask is: Did you help these people rise, too? Did you make introductions, share advice, advocate for someone who wasn’t in the room, or take the time to teach what you know?
Author and poet Maya Angelou famously reminded us that people remember how you made them feel. If your work helped someone believe in themselves, encouraged them to step into a bigger role, or supported them in overcoming a barrier, they’ll carry that memory and your impact with them forever. Suffragist and Civil Rights Activist Mary Church Terrell distilled this philosophy into this pithy four-word challenge: Lift as you climb.
2. Legacy Impact: Did your work benefit others?
Some work is transactional. It’s necessary, and it gets the job done. But the most meaningful work extends beyond self-interest and crossing things off your To-Do list. Maybe you developed a product that improved people’s lives, started a program that gave others skills and opportunity, or designed a process that saved people time and reduced their stress.
When you focus your energy on creating value for others, your work lives on even after you’ve moved on. Someone benefits from what you started, even if they never know your name.
3. Lasting Legacy: Did you leave something behind that endures?
Work gives us the chance to plant seeds, whether they be the seeds of ideas, systems, or culture, that can keep growing. Perhaps you introduced a new way of leading meetings that made everyone’s voice heard. Maybe you inspired a team to embrace innovation or kindness as a core value (like Jacki Marks is doing in a big way at ALG Vacations). Those shifts, however small, continue to shape how people work long after you’ve left.
What you leave behind doesn’t have to be something monumental, like finally getting nuclear fusion to be a feasible form of fuel, or inventing a flying car. Often, it’s the everyday actions that keep us grounded and build the most meaningful legacy.
The Ripple Effect Of Everyday Actions On Your Legacy
Think about the leader who always took time to ask about your family. Or the colleague who told you that you were going to be great right before you delivered important presentations. Or the mentor who encouraged you to take a big step even when you didn’t think you were ready. Those moments cost them very little, but they meant so much to you.
Now multiply that by the dozens, hundreds, even thousands of interactions we all have at work across a career. Every single one is an opportunity to either reinforce your living legacy or diminish it.
The beauty of this is that you don’t need to be a CEO, a world-famous entrepreneur, or a TikTok influencer with millions of followers to leave a lasting imprint. You just need to be you and to be intentional. Small acts of generosity, curiosity, and courage accumulate over time. They create a ripple effect that outlasts any job title.
What Will Your Work Say About You?
When people reflect on you years from now, what will they say? Will they talk about how many hours you logged? I doubt it. Will they recite your job description? Almost certainly not.
They’ll remember the way you showed up. They’ll tell stories of how you treated people, what you stood for, and how your work made their lives a little brighter, easier, or more meaningful. That’s the essence of your living legacy.
So ask yourself:
Am I deliberately creating value for others, or just for myself?
Am I building people up as I move forward?
Am I leaving behind seeds of impact that will continue to flourish long after I’m gone?
Those are the questions that transform work from a paycheck into a legacy platform.
The Living Legacy You’re Building Today
It’s really hard to control how long we’re remembered. There are just too many variables to consider. What we can do is control what we’re remembered for. And that control rests in all the choices we make every day at work.
Your legacy isn’t waiting for you in the future, it’s being built right now in how you conduct yourself in meetings, how you respond to challenges, and how you invest in the people around you.
Work can be transactional or transformational. It can drain energy, or it can create meaning. It can be a ladder you climb alone, or a way you lift those around you, bringing them with you.
The legacy you leave is up to you. So the real question is: What kind of living legacy are you creating through your work today?
William Arruda is a keynote speaker, author, and personal branding pioneer. He speaks about branding, leadership and career success. Watch the replay of his Maven Lightning Lesson: AI-Powered Personal Branding.
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