Saying Hi while envisioning Bye

I am surprised how often we tend to apply ideal expectations’ frameworks to interactions whose outcomes we rationally acknowledge that are hard to be controlled. We like for example to apply the “fairness” label to all mechanisms governing our professional relations. If one side offers selfless commitment for a purpose, then it is expected to benefit from a similar treatment as a response from the other side. A “win-win” framework seen from the perspective of positive added value brought to both sides.

Let’s take as an example our own quest for a “perfect job” within a “perfect company”. It is the place we envision ourselves flourishing professionally and enjoying a continuum that brings happily together the personal and professional parts of our lives.

It is the place, that once you identify it rationally, you would like desperately to be part of. Even if at beginning you might not be at level par with it, you will do whatever it takes to get there. And in return to your commitment to become a better professional and proud contributor to a success story you would expect to be supported, guided/taken care and rewarded. It is the positive outcome we would expect from a “win-win” type of situation.

In 2014 January’s issue of the Harvard Business Review, Netflix’s former chief talent officer, Patty McCord shared with the readers the approach Netflix used to build a “culture of excellence” (http://hbr.org/2014/01/how-netflix-reinvented-hr/ar/1). Striking straightforward and open, the article tends to shock at first. It describes as “un-curtained” as possible the vision of building a success story around two main, somehow complementary, actions: 1) hire only “A” players and 2) let go of people whose skills are no longer a fit. This would have sound normal, like in the case of any other company out there, if only would have not been supported by arguments such as:

– It is OK to dispose people when their skills were no longer adequate, despite same people being bright, hardworking or  showing work ethic and sound track record

– Spectacular severance package were offered “out of fairness to such people—and, frankly, to help us overcome our discomfort with discharging them”

– Hire, reward and tolerate (!) only fully formed adults who will put the company’s interests first (“Act in Netflix’s best interests.”)

– Dropping formal reviews as they are driven largely by fear of litigation while in exchange “a great severance package…. will dramatically reduce (if not eliminate) the chance of a lawsuit.”

– “Instead of cheer-leading, people in my (talent management) profession should think of themselves as business people….Too many devote time to morale improvement initiatives, focusing on getting their firm onto lists of “Best Places to Work”….“chief happiness officer”—a concept that makes me slightly sick. During 30 years in business I’ve never seen an HR initiative that improved morale.”

I left aside other comments from the author as I would like not to spoil article’s further reading. One might wonder, what company do we talk about? As a refresher, is one of most successful stories of the last decade’s American business! Should some of us worry then? As expected, the article raised a lot of comments. Some were arguing that instead throwing people away when their skills are no longer needed, the company should have invested in empowering the first to build capabilities and acquire new skills. Others, on the other hand, were happy with this “pure” example of American’s approach on HR (“Right of hiring – right of firing”).

Without getting into the debate I think that the answer Ms. McCord offered worth being quoted: “The culture we created is not for everybody, and we were honest about that. I wanted Netflix to be a great place to be “from,” no matter how long the journey. Great colleagues, hard problems, tangible deliverables —those experiences create great résumés and careers…. Sometimes the timing is just wrong for the company or the person, and the next great job is somewhere else.”

This article shows us once more, how the real life situations can be far, far away from our ideal “win – win” expectations. Sometime, the harsh reality we face in respect of unmet hopes regarding responses we receive in the professional life might be due to people whose intrinsic personal or professional values match “Marianas Trench” lowest level. Other times, nonetheless, it might just be the consequence of a “rational/emotionless” interpretation of a given time reality. Is it then the positive “win-win” expectation still a valid one?

I think that the ideal positive “win-win” career expectation comes handy for most of us as we tend many times to associate and compare our professional interactions with the personal ones. In the end, companies are made by people, right? It’s like getting into a “marriage” kind of pledge with a perfect partner. Devoted commitment that attracts commitment for “better or worse”. A joint ride where we support each other, even when facing “bumps”. A granted “I-believe-in-you” support. But we tend to forget that in real life, divorces happen as well. Perfect partners that become over time “strangers” to each other, realities that don’t match anymore joint evolution “road maps”.

And at divorce is when “win-win” gets new nuances. For the purpose of this article I’m not referring to the “legal earned” winnings as they are merely a bitter compensation of own dissatisfaction. I’ll like to stop at those “win-win”s through which some people tend to define their aftermath changed universe. It’s the rational “win-win” related to offering own kids the chance to benefit further from the love of both parents. It is also the different “win-win” of acknowledging rather than “deleting” the positive impact your partner brought along side for an important part of your life. This reconsideration of the “win-win” evolved in time to a point in which some might easily accept to look at marriage like to a “limited in time” positive cohabitation rather than a “life time” partnership.   If this hold true, can we then look to the “perfect company” we want to be part of in the same way?

First of all, if you still believe that an all-committed Hi will far outcast the Bye, you might consider thinking again. I say that we all should be aware and accept when entering a dream environment that we might be there for only a limited time frame. As a consequence, next to offering the best from us, we should try capping as much knowledge as possible for consolidating own expertise and a “not-a-particular-company-dependent” successful career track.

A decade ago, an HR professor told me that when one finds himself/herself in a position to leave, willingly or not, a “dream-place-to-be-in”, he/she has two choices: 1) to believe that no other place will match the existing one and then will “suicide” professionally or 2) to accept that he/she was “gifted” to be part of such an environment and has the chance to “apostolate” it further.  By sharing the learning one has been exposed to in a “dream-place-to-be-in”, it ultimately becomes a game changer, a person that any organization down the road would like benefiting from, rewarding it accordingly.

This being said however, I still consider for its time Netflix approach on HR was a statistical outlier. In my view, it was cynical enough in its so-called realism and I believe that company had grasp at one point the “fruits” of their organizational farming. Anyone interested at the time in reading about Netflix on Glassdoor.com (a website that let employees anonymously review their companies) could see how often the term “culture of fear” was mentioned. In the end, those writing there were as well “apostles” of the same “great place to be from”.