Burning Bridges
This is part 1 of a 2 part post on transforming from a strategy of avoiding burned bridges to creating fans.
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Ah the long time adage of never burning bridges. Very simple, yet sometimes very hard to practice. Even more difficult is realizing when this applies.
Most senior SEs recognize that their niche equates to a very small world. True, SEs can move to other business segments and can do so successfully. My anecdotal estimate though, based on research on Linkedin, is that at least 70% of SEs change jobs within a similar technical domain expertise. This means we oftentimes find ourselves working with the same sets of people throughout our careers. Given its importance, we can benefit from an investigation of this topic.
Let’s begin with the tactical implementation. At this point, we are concerned primarily with avoiding common missteps that directly translate into burned bridges. Here are some ways I have personally witnessed folks more or less kill their careers overnight:
- Telling them how you really feel - Sending an email to the entire company pointing out the specific faults of every executive in the company the day you quit. (A subsequent policy was added that prevented anyone from sending email company wide).
- Sacrificing integrity- Going to work for a competitor and then immediately divulging (non-public) critical competitive information about the inner workings of a product.
- HR issues- Committing lewd acts, publicly at a sales event, that ruin your reputation as a moraled and principled person.
This is just a few examples. I’d be lying if I said my colleauges and I never got any cheap laughs at their expense over drinks. On a serious level you can empathize with these scenarios and understand how and why they may have happened. #1 probably felt as though s/he was ignored or opinions didn’t matter. Over time, unvented, this led to a large blow up. #2 was concerned about “proving” him/herself at the new company and caved into social pressure to share the information despite knowing it destroyed trust with others (even those being presented with the data). #3, either feeling pressure to demonstrate alpha male behavior or suffering from a poor relationship at home (plus alcohol), contributed to poor judgment.
With all the potential pitfalls in mind, here are a few strategies I’ve adopted over the years to keep myself from falling into common traps:
- Someone is always watching- No matter how small or innocuous the group you are with, always keep in mind that your activities will eventually be outed to another. Which leads to:
- There is no such thing as a secret- People love to share juicy details. Even if you trust someone, do not trust someone to keep a secret of events that transpire during corporate off sites and customer events.
- Separate your values from social values - This is tough to do unless you’ve thought long and hard about who you want to be and what values you wish to stress. Once accomplished, it is very powerful to rely on your own value system to make decisions versus doing what you think will please others in the short run.
- Never communicate when angry - An old email adage but equally important under stressful times with team members and customers. It’s much better to excuse yourself from a conversation than to say something you’ll regret later on.
- Understand your limits - If you know yourself and understand your limits, you can devise rules that you can follow to keep you out of trouble spots. This includes diet, exercise, rest, stress management, etc.
If I had to boil it down I would focus on two long standing good pieces of advice I’ve heard over the years: “Behave as if all your loved ones we’re watching you” and “Always speak as though the person you’re speaking about were listening“.
This sets the ground rules for avoiding the major trouble spots. In the follow on post we’re going to cover moving from a more tactical strategy to a longer term and effective one involving creating true fans in the workplace.
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Filed under: Growth
