In 2018, I came across the following quote:
Always remind yourself that you are too smart to be complacent about a steadily deteriorating situation.
I took this to heart because, at the time, I realized I had been inadvertently complacent in a particular engagement, and I vowed not to fail a 2nd time.
Yet, upon rereading this quote with additional life experience, I’ve realized that while I see patterns of deteriorating situations, I can still fail to act quickly. What could be causing this delay, and what’s the best course of action? And am I really being complacent?
Let’s investigate this.
In stable environments, it can be easy to diagnose a problematic situation. For example, a failing project may have clear ownership gaps, missed deadlines, and harbour poor team morale. In contrast, fluid environments may exhibit weaker signals. For example, leadership may shift focus, previously assigned team members may be reallocated to other initiatives, and projects can end prematurely.
Because these signals are inconsistent, it can be difficult to determine whether real deterioration is occurring or whether this is simply operational noise. Furthermore, it is not always clear whether taking action is the best approach.
Since you’ll never have certainty in these types of situations, the next best thing you can do is ask yourself 3 key questions:
- What exactly am I seeing?
- Is this systemic?
- What should I do about it?
Let’s say that I am working in an environment where there is a consistent lack of follow-through - e.g., emails sent to colleagues frequently result in no response, colleagues do not deliver as promised, and initiatives come and go. If I see these patterns across multiple contexts without any correction, I can safely say these issues are systemic.
Now, what should I do about it? While I can always introduce small, system-level interventions to address these challenges over the long term, my immediate priority is to do one of three things:
- Option A: Limit my exposure and scale my contributions accordingly. I call this “operational containment.”
- Option B: Reposition myself to align with better-defined business objectives and/or revenue sources.
- Option C: Exit cleanly and intentionally.
The third option may surprise some. After all, it’s easy to think that one is complacent if they aren’t fixing the core issue(s). However, intentionality is key, and there are certain situations where exiting is indeed the best course of action.
Remember, your job isn’t to fix the system. Instead, your job is to maintain control over your time and energy in a way that always keeps you in the driver’s seat. This requires active decision-making. Otherwise, you’ll be at risk of over-indexing in areas that don’t require your immediate attention and expertise, which can result in misperception, blame, or even lower your perceived value to the company.