The Fallacy of the Status Quo

Like death and taxes, change in business is at once inevitable and difficult to comprehend. It also happens to be necessary if your aim is to create a sustainable, competitive enterprise. Ignore this imperative at your own peril, as history has taught us over and over again. Once great firms like AT&T, Polaroid, and A&P exist as a shadow of their former selves while others including Bethlehem Steel disappeared altogether, in large part because they couldn’t change.

This is not just a large company phenomenon; when it comes to change, size doesn’t matter. Smaller firms fall victim to this slow demise with great frequency, it’s just that their stories are rarely the stuff of MBA case studies. Whether it’s hubris, a virtual monopoly, or flat out denial of external circumstances and events, the common denominator of these sad endings is a literal death grip on the status quo by otherwise competent leadership.

The concept of status quo is misleading, because in fact nothing ever stays the same. Just like a wad of cash buried in your back yard inevitably loses value over time, so it is with the status quo in business. Your markets, your clients, and your competitors will eventually outgrow and outpace you if you are unable to change and evolve. Although it may feel comfortable, the status quo is not a good thing at all; it is a slow motion business killer.

Whether you are conscious of it or not, odds are that you and your team embrace the status quo in a variety of areas. One client of mine – the president of a mid-sized Insurance agency – retained a problem manager for far longer than he should have – because of a misplaced sense of loyalty to her. Another delayed a much-needed technology upgrade because “things are working fine as is” (including, by the way, a number of labor intensive manual tasks). For over 6 months, a third client postponed a difficult conversation with a high-end producer who had become complacent in outside sales and spent virtually all of his time working his existing book.

During good times, we tend to give ourselves and our people credit for a job well done (think high-fives, healthy bonus checks, and lavish holiday parties). The result? “Let the good times roll, and let’s continue to do what we’ve been doing.”

When performance falters, our impulse is to identify and then blame external circumstances as the cause immediately followed by pushing harder to improve results (think it’s “the economy” and any underperforming employee you’ve recently counseled). The result? “We are underperforming because of the economy overall, so let’s buckle down and get more appointments to win our share.”

Ironically, both extremes reinforce the status quo; that is, you and your people generally continue to do what you’ve been doing. Your rationale is the only thing that actually changes!

What are your areas of status quo and why is it so difficult to move yourself and your organization beyond them? Where are your people stuck in the status quo?

The paradox of the status quo is that it makes us feel so comfortable. Only you can decide whether that’s good enough or if you’d like to plan for change to make your business more competitive over time.

A Leadership Checklist: 7 Questions to Ask Yourself (Part II)

(This is part two of a two-part post on Leadership. Please see last week’s post for part one)

Ask yourself how you’re doing and what you should be doing differently—and be sure to answer truthfully. As simple as this may sound, many people are shocked by their answers to basic management and leadership questions.

Last week’s blog covered the first three checkpoints of leadership questions to ask yourself:
1. Vision and Priorities
2. Managing Time
3. Feedback

This post will cover the last four leadership checkpoints:
4. Succession Planning
5. Evaluation and Alignment
6. Leading Under Pressure
7. Staying True to Yourself

Succession Planning

Have you picked one or more potential successors?

If you aren’t identifying potential successors and developing their leadership abilities, then you are contributing to business and personal stagnation. There won’t be enough leaders to grow the business.

When challenging and testing people, you must frequently delegate more to them. This frees you to focus on critical strategic matters facing the business. When people are not being challenged, they may leave to seek opportunities elsewhere.

Planning for succession means your people will improve their performance, you’ll be more successful through them, and you will pave the way for your own promotion. Failure to actively plan for succession means you do not delegate sufficiently and become a decision-making bottleneck.

Ask yourself:

• Have I, at least in my own mind, picked one or more potential successors?
• Am I coaching them and giving them challenging assignments?
• Am I delegating sufficiently?
• Have I become a decision-making bottleneck?

Evaluation and Alignment

Your business is constantly changing. So are your customers. Depending on your industry, this may be rapid—or extremely rapid. If you don’t change along with the business environment, you may become seriously out of alignment. What got you here today won’t necessarily get you there tomorrow. The people you hire, the way you organize them, the economic incentives you offer them and even the tasks you delegate may no longer create the culture and outcomes that are critical to success.

Have you checked to see if the design of your organization still aligns with key success factors for your business? Effective executives regularly seek advice and fresh perspectives from people who are less emotionally invested in their business. This allows them to determine whether historically relevant aspects of the business remain critical to tomorrow’s success.

Ask yourself:

• Does the design of my company still align with key success factors?
• If I had to design my business from scratch, how would I create it? How would it differ from the current design?
• Should I create a task force to answer these questions and make recommendations?

Leading Under Pressure

A leader’s actions during stressful times have a profound impact on the firm’s culture and employees’ behaviors. Successful leaders must be aware of their personal stress triggers and reactions. Behaviors should be consistent with beliefs and core values, no matter how severe the stress.

Pressure is a normal part of doing business, but it affects people differently. What may evoke anxiety for one individual may not bother someone else. As a leader, you are watched closely. Emotions are contagious—even more so when they come from the leader.

You must be sufficiently self-aware to recognize the situations that create anxiety for you and manage your behavior to avoid sending counterproductive messages to your people.

Ask yourself:

• Which events create pressure for me?
• How do I behave under pressure?
• What signals do I send to subordinates?
• Are these signals helpful, or do they undermine the success of my business?

Staying True to Yourself

Successful executives develop leadership styles that fit their business needs, as well as their personal beliefs and personality. While many leaders ask themselves about the former, few analyze the latter.

Companies require leaders who can express strongly held views, rather than mimic the party line. Do you hold back for political reasons? Do you encourage your people to express their opinions and make waves, if appropriate?

Don’t tiptoe around significant issues or foster an atmosphere that encourages employees to do so.

Ask yourself:

• Is my leadership style comfortable? Does it reflect who I truly am?
• Do I assert myself sufficiently, or have I become tentative?
• Am I too politically correct?

• Does anxiety about my next promotion or bonus cause me to hesitate when I want to express my views?

In the early stages of your career, you may have received plenty of guidance and support from superiors and mentors. As you’ve been promoted, however, you’ve probably encountered fewer sources of honest and useful feedback. By the time mistakes have come to light, it may have been too late to fix them.

Successful leaders continually ask themselves hard questions to stay on track in a world of rapid change. Remember to step back and gain fresh perspectives so you’re prepared with a new game plan when change occurs. If you’re standing too close to the blackboard, you won’t see mistakes until it’s too late.

These questions are designed to ignite serious introspection. They can be even more productive when discussed with a trusted advisor, coach or mentor.

When is the last time you had a leadership checkup?