Why Do We Need A Bridge Plan Right Now?
All of us know that we are experiencing a storm right now, referencing the previously mentioned Collins and Hansen metaphor. We also know that one or more storms are coming. With this understanding, we have a choice on how to respond to the current instability, and feelings of chaos. We also have a choice on how to prepare for the next couple of storms. It may not be easy to do this, but as leaders, we all understand that this comes with the position and the responsibilities of being a leader.
First, this current storm is the result of an accelerated convergence of multiple factors. While many leaders point to the pandemic in March of 2020 as a turning point, I often have to remind them that the 2016 - 2019 time period before the global pandemic happened was also a time period of market turbulence and uncertainty. Many adaptive problems surfaced during this four year period, and many leaders entered January of 2020 feeling worn and frustrated.
And then the pandemic arrived and caused massive operational issues. The initial goal during the first 90 days was survival. As we gathered more information about COVID-19, we then transitioned out of crisis operations and into a difficult and extended period of operational adaption. And, as result of this on-going turbulence, many leaders went from being tired and worn to chronic exhaustion.
As the pandemic began to wane, we witnessed three factors coming into play in the workforce. The first was post pandemic-grief, i.e. people on teams started experiencing and expressing a wide range of feelings including helplessness, depression, fear, fatalism, and resignation. The outcome was that people were more focused on their losses than on their gains. There were few, if any, short term wins to celebrate. Survival came at a high cost, including loss of family, friends, and jobs.
Second, we saw the rise of post pandemic-anxiety. This included an escalating feeling of loosing control, and people engaging in endless worst-case-scenario thinking. There also was a general struggle with the on-going uncertainty and not knowing what to do about it all. This resulted in disjointed incrementalism “on steroids,” i.e. knowing where you wanted to go but not knowing how to get there.
Third, as post pandemic grief and anxiety surfaced, we also saw various degrees of Zoom fatigue. While video conferencing platforms worked to one degree or another, they also were tremendously draining on so many levels. In short, the aforementioned three factors moved people from chronic exhaustion and into chronic burnout. Some have even called this Post Pandemic Stress Disorder, similar in some many ways to PTSD.
For me as an executive coach, there was one factor that few people saw, but many experienced. As the pandemic started and moved through the initial years, I witnessed numerous individuals and teams tending to get lost in the darkness of the pandemic, and the darkness of the recovery time period. In particular, they lost touch with the awe, joy and light-ness of working as a team. They lost perspective and were not grateful for just being alive while so many other people, families, and teams lost dear friends and family. While I do not believe we need to hide from the pandemic darkness, I also believe we should we get lost in it. We all need to learn new ways to deal with our post pandemic grief, anxiety, exhaustion, and burn out.
At the same time, during the pandemic and afterwards, some teams functioned very well, and this reflected all the work they did before the storm arrived, referencing the earlier Collins and Hansen quote. However, many teams did not. They just imploded from the never-ending adaptive, operational problems surfacing and the never-ending adaptive decision-making. The outcome of this extended experience was that some teams lost the cellular memory of what it felt like to work as a good team.
Furthermore, during the pandemic and then during the two years of recovery post the pandemic, many leaders talked about good teams and teamwork. However, from my vantage point, all they were doing was advocating for and describing a single leader work group. This can be effective in an emergency situation, but single leader work groups can also cause their own problems over time.
One of the biggest problems that accelerated and converged with the aforementioned problems was the arrival of The Great Resignation and subsequently The Great Renegotiation. After working from home and handling crisis after crisis, adaptive problem after adaptive problem, many employees just quit. They left their jobs, their teams, their supervisor and the company. They no longer wanted to work and experience the ongoing chronic burnout that came with the work. Those who were left behind, then stepped up and ask to renegotiate their employment contract.
As a result, many senior executives and numerous companies freaked out. That is not an “official” consulting term, but it is an accurate description if you were sitting in one those meetings like I was. During the pre-pandemic years, many senior executives assumed that they could hire their way out of their people and performance problems. During the post pandemic time period,, they realized that this was an incorrect assumption. A healthy company culture, which encouraged recruitment and retention of key people, moved to the top of many meeting agendas. It was an extremely important operational and strategic choice during the initial post pandemic recovery.
In the spring of 2021, while the vast number of senior executives were focused on recruitment and particularly on retention, I shared that there was an underlying problem that few were noticing within The Great Resignation. While some leaders focused on the loss of talent and knowledge within the company, and this was a huge loss and had a significant impact, I tried to explain that it was the loss of the social networks within the company that was going to have a greater impact over time.
As I have observed, every successful company has a healthy social network that helps people manage current internal operational responsibilities, and the numerous, and normal technical and adaptive problems that surface each day. This operational, social network gives the company, and the people within it a connective advantage, i.e. the ability to marshal information, support and other resources from other people in the network to define and solve a problem. These interdependencies within the operational social network gives the company the capacity to balance maintaining the core, i.e. the mission, vision and core values, and creating progress at the strategic level.
In particular, within The Great Resignation, we lost many good people, but more importantly we lost their internal social networks, which helped the company to get information, support and resources to the right people at the right time in order that all involved could solve problems in a timely and accurate manner. As a result, I strongly advocated in 2021 that those who were retained and those who were newly recruited to proactively engage in building more and healthier social networks. Standing here in 2024, it is very clear to me that those who did this have a competitive advantage for the upcoming storms. Given current events, we need more people connected to more people rather than to a singular individual who may or may not leave.
While The Great Resignation and The Great Renegotiation were taking place, another factor showed up that converged with all of the above, namely quiet quitting. This was a mid 2022 term that went viral from a TikTok video. It was a choice not to abruptly leave a job, but instead to do exactly what the job required, no more no less. Quiet quitting resulted in people limiting their work to their contract hours.
As this was taking place, Gallup’s State of the Global Workplace report in June 2022 showed job dissatisfaction at an all-time high with 60% reporting emotional detachment from work. I was not surprised by this data. It reflected the accelerated convergence of many factors. It confirmed that worker burnout was real and chronic, and that employees were not connecting with their work or their manager.
Nevertheless, smart and healthy companies, referencing the definition and work of Patrick Lencioni in his numerous books, were not surprised by this dissatisfaction. They understood, and still understand, that we have been through four grueling years. The pandemic changed us, and it is still changing us.
These same smart and healthy companies also know that the next four years are not going to get easier. Challenges abound. For example, compassion fatigue has transformed into general indifference for others, or a general dislike of anyone who does not agree with us on all issues. Polarization is the new normal. This indifference also impacts how we deal with problems and come up with solutions for such problems as what to do with everyone who is unhoused, numerous mass shootings, war, poverty, and climate change. The list is endless and growing.
Thus, for many leaders, the choice to create a bridge plan is seen as a wise and viable solution. Until certain elements and problems within society, and the world at large, are known knowns rather than unknown unknowns, a bridge plan creates maximum, adaptive flexibility and the capacity for organizational resilience within continual turbulence.
To be continued on Wednesday.
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