You aren’t standing still (you’re going backwards)
January 19th, 2005 by Bill
I was reading David’s post Signs of a problem workplace on his Ripples blog and it got me thinking about companies and how they work. (Or, in some cases, don’t work.)
We seem to have an ironic quality built into us as humans. Nothing defines our existence as much as change. We change and the world changes every instant of every day. You would think we would get used to it after a while, but we don’t. While some of us adapt well to change, even welcome it, most of us do not. We often hate change.
How many people have you known who constantly complained about their job then, when something about it changed, started complaining about the change? It’s as if some weird hacker had placed some bad code within us.
The reality of life is change. However, there is good change and there is bad change. One of the problems we face in the workplace is a great deal of the change we see is of the latter, bad kind. Often, these kinds of changes are the result of recognizing a need for change but not understanding what kind of change is needed or, if we understand this, not quite knowing how to implement the necessary change.
Another problem we face is a belief in infinite growth. If a company grows by 50% one year, we expect it to grow by at least that much the next. If a salary increases by 10% one year, it must increase by that the next. And so on down the line.
But if we look at the biological world we see there is no such thing as infinite growth. I think that model holds true for business as well. Nothing grows forever. Something (or someone) is born, grows, declines and then dies. It’s the life cycle.
There is, however, transformation. Whatever dies, in biology, transforms and returns. (Well, actually it never goes away.) A bud becomes a flower. The flower eventually wilts, falls and degrades into the soil. It then becomes the stuff that feeds the next year’s buds.
In the same way, businesses (and jobs) don’t remain static or grow forever. They transform - a company’s business model changes, companies are absorbed into other companies, some go under and get sold off as parts … Whatever happens, they don’t live forever, at least not in the same form.
Nor do jobs.
Part of the job of having a job is recognizing change and making a sound judgement on whether what is happening is good or bad. Now, it may be what is happening is good for the company but not necessarily for you. Even the reverse can sometimes be true.
I’ve probably mentioned this before, but I believe there is no such thing as standing still. This is a world of constant motion. The earth is spinning. If you are standing still, you’re going backwards. You need to go forward just to keep up.
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