The more I think about why organizational changes happen, the more I see that it’s merely an adjustment to the environment. The world is changing all the time. If you don’t adjust and evolve your organization with it, you’re practically falling behind and will eventually go out of business.
You have to keep the momentum in the team and constantly reiterate yourself and your team. You always have to adapt your strategy to macro and micro changes. Sometimes, you even have to be the change that forces others to adapt.
While doing so, not everyone will be on board with your direction. Some will yell at you to tell you that you’re going in the wrong direction. You’ll not listen to these screams and keep pushing in your direction because you’ve made your decision or are stubborn enough to think that “others are wrong.” In time, these screams won’t disappear but will be less annoying because most people will adapt to the new change and lower their voices. You’ll be surprised to see how people change and how flexible they are when you look back. But some…
Some will leave. You’ll want to convince them to stay, follow you and help you on your journey because they are brilliant. They are the smart ones in the “hire smart people and get out of their way” phrase. You’ll offer even more compensation for them to stay because they play a key role in your organization. You’ll take an extra mile and do whatever you can to keep them. And that will be a mistake. And that will be a mistake over another mistake you made earlier.
When you offer them a better deal for them to stay, you think you’re doing best for the team and organization because you’ll struggle when the person is not there and thing will fall apart. Then, you’ll remember a phrase you’ve heard before and ask yourself many questions.
As a leader, your job is not to retain people but to create an environment where they will want to stay.
You’ll pause. Will gain another perspective. Suddenly you’ll realize that offering more was a mistake. Then, you’ll be fine with the person leaving. You’ll realize the person wasn’t fit for the environment and the culture you want to form in your changing organization. Either way, you’ll be better off without them going forward. No hard feelings. Then, you’ll realize the impact of the person in the organization. You’ll see the mistake you’ve made way earlier.
You relied on one person too much. You built a castle with a very weak foundation: the castle was standing on one person’s shoulder. When the person left, the castle started to fall. Now, you have to build it again. But this time, you’re wiser. You’re not going to construct it on someone else’s shoulder. You’ll build standalone. That will be a good correction. You will start but will come across another roadblock.
You need to part ways with some people because they don’t help you build the castle in the way you want or consider best for your organization. Ideally, these people will leave themselves. But ideals don’t always happen. So, you’ll have these difficult conversations. You’ll blame and question yourself on how you couldn’t think about it before, how you couldn’t see it.
You can’t. Don’t worry. Things change around you, and you can’t predict and prepare for all of these scenarios. You’ll try your best to say a nice and grateful goodbye to the people you’re parting your ways with. However, circumstances might not allow you to have everything in the way you want. So, you might say a shitty goodbye. Everyone will blame you for it. Without knowing what you are going through, they will make you the villain. You’ll accept it. You have to. The mistake was yours; you have to own all criticism.
Sometimes, you won’t make it shitty, but the people leaving will do it. They will make everyone suffer unnecessarily while leaving. You’ll never know why they do this because your communication bridges are already shattered. You’ll pray to finish this mess as soon as possible and go back to your regular life.
When you get over this, you will start new. You spent some trust credits on the way. You have to earn more. You’ll start looking for new people who are motivated by your culture. As people always think, they bring a fresh perspective. Yet, they rarely do. They don’t have a historical understanding of what happened. They fit your new culture better. That’s all.
Once you are back to regular life, you’ll realize how quickly people adjust to the new reality. The ones who couldn’t adapt or were unwilling to do so left the organization. The remaining members are your real team.
Now, you have a second chance. You’ll start looking for ways to build a strong new culture.
It will be challenging, but one way or another, you’ll work on changing the culture by keeping in mind the phrase you remembered a while ago:
As a leader, your job is not to retain people but to create an environment where they will want to stay.
You’ll work tirelessly, thinking that you’ll reach that environment. However, that culture will only be half-working until the external environment changes again or until you make your next mistake. Once it happens, you’ll start all over again.
This time, you know the drill, although knowing it won’t make it easier. You’ll take a deep breath and begin.
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