Ready to ‘Keep the Change’?

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I remember the voice mail from our CEO, Joe Forehand.  

"I'm happy to announce, today we have separated from Arthur Andersen."

In 2000, my company went through a business model change, from partnership to publicly held.  It fundamentally changed the very fabric of our company.  Gone were the days of renting out DisneyWorld for our Global Seminar.  Partners no longer could 'make the call' to take huge risks with clients.  We retained the title of Partner for YEARS when we were no longer a partnership.  

Many people left.  Disgruntled.  Bemoaning the past.  The Glory Days.

I stayed.  

Why?

After I left my PhD program in Organization Behavior, I considered my career as an ongoing PhD dissertation on how executives make decisions and how organizations face the reality and inevitability of …. CHANGE.

I stayed with voracious intellectual curiosity.  How do we keep the fabric of what made us successful and release what no longer was our identity?  I stayed to do my part to bridge the past to the future and we changed the course of our corporate history.  We went from a $10B company in 2000 to $44B in 2020.  Yes, I'm proud to say, I did my part.

2020.  We are in the midst of a global Pandemic.  

Some experience this Pandemic as Groundhog Day.  For me, it feels like Groundhog Decade.  

It's like our society is going from being privately held to publicly held.  

I'd like to say humanity is at a crossroad.  We're not.  We just stopped.  The Pandemic Pause.  

As you stand in this place, are you looking forward or backward?

The Pandemic Pause is an incredible time to reflect.  If you hope the return of status quo, somehow you got turned around and you're looking backward.  

Turn around!

We are at an amazing time to retain learnings from the past year and blaze a new trail forward!  

A friend and colleague who is President of a Leadership and Organization Development company calls it:  Keep the Change.

I LOVE it.

What change to keep and what to release?  Create a list.  

Let me help you by jumpstarting your list.

• We have an extraordinary scientific breakthrough called, messenger-RNA vaccinations.  KEEP

Studies show we:

• Spend more time outdoors.  KEEP
• Improved our sleep patterns.  KEEP
• Improved our exercise habits.  KEEP
• Improved our diets.  KEEP
• Increased alcohol consumption.  RELEASE
• Report more mental stress.  RELEASE
• Increased pandemic-induced hesitation.  RELEASE
• Honor our frontline health care and emergency workers.  KEEP
• Appreciate our schoolteachers more after homeschooling our children.  KEEP 
• Lowered emissions 17% in the US by mid-2020.  KEEP
• Learned how to use technology to work and learn.  KEEP
• Learned how to use technology to whittle away 4 hours per day watching TV, Netflix, Hulu and Amazon Prime.  RELEASE

And there's a cool new trend:  Pandemic Puppies!  People adopted puppies in droves!  How about a little more exuberant life in your home?  KEEP?

As we move forward, make a list of what you will Keep and what you will Release.

We are at a profound point in human history.  You decide…to look forward or backward.

Let's Keep the Change and Blaze a New Trail Forward!

Trailblazing is what Wisdom 4 Humanity is all about!