How would you do your job differently if you had nothing to lose? Would you take more chances? Would you be bolder? You’d definitely feel freer. The question is, what would you do with that freedom?

For me, this isn’t a hypothetical question. I was in that situation. It was a while ago, and I haven’t written about it much until now. This experience shaped me, and I’d like to share it with you today.

The setup

I was leading an engineering team at a company that was a subsidiary of a very large company. Rumor had it, that the parent company wanted to absorb our subsidiary IT function into the whole. Upon this news, my boss and long-time mentor left the company for a better opportunity.

For a while, my boss’s boss, the CIO, left that position unfilled. I was one of two internal candidates. Eventually, for similar reasons, my peer left the company too. It was down to me.

I remember the brief conversation with the CIO. He told me that given the looming conditions, he’d be unlikely to attract anyone established from the outside to lead our department. So, he promoted me and gave me the whole infrastructure & operations department to lead. Overnight, I went from leading an engineering team of 15 to leading a department of 75. I was 33 years old at the time.

The job that could disappear at any moment

I was eager and hopeful. I wanted to prove myself. I wanted a big opportunity, and this was it. This will probably seem silly, but my first thought was this: “I hope it lasts long enough to count.” I believed that if I led a big department for 90 days and then lost it, then it wouldn’t count for anything. I hoped I could make it a year. I ended up making it three years and left on my own terms.

The right to exist

I was attending graduate school for organizational leadership at the time. This opportunity gave me fertile ground to apply what I was learning in the classroom at night, the very next day at the office. I practiced all of the normal leadership activities like strategy, motivation, team building, customer focus, and innovation.

Simultaneously, I was playing defense. The parent company had a well-funded and well-organized machine to analyze and justify the takeover of subsidiary tech shops. I threw myself headlong into it. I did that for two reasons: #1 I was uniquely positioned to affect the outcome. #2 I wanted to keep distractions away from my team, so they could stay focused on serving our customers.

I won’t back down

In this season of my career, I often played the song, “I won’t back down” by Tom Petty on my way home from work. It was my theme song for this season.

I embraced the process. Yes, I was in a weak position. Yes, the other team made the rules and kept score. However, I had nothing to lose. And that made me formidable.

The reverse gap

To earn the right to exist, we needed to be good. Very good. We needed to be better, faster, cheaper, and more secure. I remember a key turning point in the exercise. An analyst had finished assessing part of our organization and prepared their “gap analysis” between our operation and the corporate standard. The analyst said, “it’s a reverse gap. This group would be taking a step backward to adopt our standard. That’s never happened before.”

That didn’t end the project but it sure lost steam after that. I never got the satisfaction of an official verdict. They just put the project on hold and put their energy into easier targets.

Risking your job is doing your job

Between Tom Petty songs, I read an interesting book, “Deep Change: Discovering the Leader Within” by Robert E. Quinn. To say this influenced my approach would be an understatement. I had this fierceness within me, but this book gave me the confidence to just go with it. I’ll give you a few powerful quotes:

“Excellence is a form of deviance. If you perform beyond the norms, you disrupt all the existing control systems. Those systems will then alter and begin to work to routinize your efforts. That is, the systems will adjust and try to make you normal. The way to achieve and maintain excellence is to deviate from the norm. You become excellent because you are doing things normal people do not want to do. You become excellent by choosing a path that is risky and painful, a path that is not appealing to others.”

“Every couple of years, you need to bet your job, or else you are not doing your job.”

“Most of us seek quantum leaps in our performance levels by following a strategy of incremental investment. This strategy simply does not work. The land of excellence is safely guarded from unworthy intruders. At the gates stand two fearsome sentries – risk and learning. The keys to entrance are faith and courage.”

For those of you who know me, now you know where I get my spunk.

End game

Three years of this internal combat took its toll. I began to burn out. I figured there are probably environments out there where I can do great work and not get beat up all day. That search eventually led me to CHS, where I’ve happily grown ever since.

This environment is really quite different. I no longer have a position where “there’s nothing to lose.” I’m quite happy to do what’s necessary to remain gainfully employed. I’m also able to take risks in a psychologically safe environment.

With all that said, this story changed me forever. “Excellence is a form of deviance” still defines me. I’m glad I don’t need to risk my job to do my job, but everyone should know that I’m willing to if push comes to shove. How about you?

Well, I won’t back down

No, I won’t back down

You can stand me up at the gates of hell

But I won’t back down

No, I’ll stand my ground

Won’t be turned around

And I’ll keep this world from draggin’ me down

Gonna stand my ground

And I won’t back down

-Tom Petty

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