mikelally.net

On Nov. 12, I posted about an article from the HBR by Marshall Goldsmith. Goldsmith provided 4 helpful tips on what to do now that we are apparently in the End Times.

Hannah, my long time friend and mentor, made a comment wondering why it takes a crisis of such magnitude to do the things we SHOULD BE DOING ALL ALONG.

It’s a great question. A friend and co-worker was having a bad day yesterday. Myself and another friend took him to lunch. (OK, so, YES, we are all in the same World of Warcraft guild.) Bad day friend is struggling with his new boss. Who is not like the old boss. Who is also not like many bosses in our company. Bad day friend was all over the place with his issues. And then he lets out the WHOPPER.

“I told him that he has 6 people working for him and that none of them like him.”

I almost killed us all because I was GLARING at him and the car was drifting into oncoming traffic.

This is the equivalent of suicide. You HAVE to be more self-aware than this. You cannot sit in your veal fattening pen, punch in and out every day and think that you are OWED something.

My friend is lost. He has a new boss. That boss is trying to impress HIS boss. He is going to do that by going after low hanging fruit and get some wins. He is doing this. That’s all anyone needs to know. You have NO ISSUES. If you have anything it is solutions. Well thought out, creative even, solutions.

Instead of trying to understand what his new boss is trying to do, my friend bunkers down into his cube and WORSE has made himself the trouble-maker by being the guy that goes around person to person and kibbitz’s about what a jerk the new boss is being.

So now – when Goldsmith might be wrong – and the Sun might actually GET unplugged – when the company starts to struggle – and decides it needs to cut costs – guess what? My friend has made it EASY for his name to be at the top of the list.

EASY.

Why…because he is complacent. He cannot see the crisis that is coming. He cannot see the crisis that he is CREATING. He is complacent because he fears change. People hate change as a rule. I get it. But if, like in this case, you are practically creating the change on your own – wouldn’t you rather it be POSITIVE change than be the dope standing there with your pink slip in your hand wondering what just happened?

Well…its happening RIGHT NOW.