You’re taking on water. The waves are crashing over the bow, and it looks like you are going down. Can you save the ship? It probably depends on the nature of the storm. Is it a temporary summer squall or a full-blown hurricane? How can you tell? No matter if you missed some signs along the way, you need to get back on course quickly or all could be lost.The reasons why businesses sink are numerous. Bad planning, lack of skilled people, poor leadership, or plain, bum luck. Misguided or dreadful leadership; or, in the worst case, nonexistent leadership will spell doom nearly 100% of the time. However, strong and capable leadership has the ability to turn things around more swiftly than drunk guys throwing money away at a strip club.
A couple months ago a friend called me to bemoan his plight at work. He works in operations for a fairly successful mid-size company that builds sound systems. The CEO had completely lost his mind. The guy had built the company from the ground up with a strong work ethic and a keen eye on an inclusive culture. In the last five years the company has grown from six people to almost two hundred. People loved it, and they had an overflowing application system of more people who wanted to work there. No longer. For some inexplicable reason, the CEO turned 180 degrees. He disappears for weeks at a time and when he is in the office, the calm and warm demeanor of before is now that of a tyrant who goes so hot and cold that employees are burned either way – from the heat or extreme cold. Think a toddler in full meltdown mode with the ability to fire you. Nobody knows the reason for the changes in the CEO (psychological problems, issues at home, financial strain or run-of-the-mill stress gone too far), but it doesn’t really matter. It’s having consequences.
Because of this change in the guy, the business is in decline. No promotion of strategy, no nurturing of people and contacts. Attrition is high and that is making it harder for the people who remain. Is there a way to salvage this situation and right the ship? It’s a private company so there are fewer options. An intervention sounds to be in order, but those are always tricky. It could end up making things far worse. It would be easy to have trusted advisors sit down with the guy, and figure it all out, but that is based on the assumption that he would be reasonable enough to want the sit down in the first place. It would have to happen when he was, “having a good day.”
I’ve given this situation a lot of thought, and don’t really have the panacea. If this storm will be weathered, it most likely come from heavy doses of active leadership. Leadership will help the return to normalcy. In the face of a lack of leadership at the top, those in other senior positions will need to pick up the slack to keep productivity and engagement going until the CEO finally flames out or recovers. That’s a tall order to ask of anyone, and the chance of success may be very low.
I checked back in with my friend last week, and the situation isn’t much improved. There are signs the boss may be getting with it, but a lot of damage is already done. My friend plans on leaving. This then led me to think about the storm itself. At what point do you abandon ship to take your chances in the water? When you don’t know if rescue or drowning will be your fate, how do you decide? What happens if the storm subsides and you have enough of a ship left to limp back to shore? Hard questions. For me, I guess it would depend on the remaining level and ability of leadership, within myself and others. Only the situation and level of my own resiliency could dictate. Pilot the ship or become one with the water – what would you do?
HR Rebellion 