There’s always a grand story connected to every dad that recounts his Saturday, Sunday, and sometimes into next weekend story of putting together the play-set/ swingset for his children in the backyard.
Numerous things go wrong, but it gets accomplished, nevertheless, and dad gets his I did it t-shirt and a bravery banner to waive with his fellow comrades at Home Depot.
But when it comes time to move the play-set a few years down the road the bravery banner and great story don’t mean much. The same goes for our businesses and projects we literally give our blood, sweat, and lives to. Not that they don’t meant something, but that as time changes so does reality and at some point they must be disassembled and moved to that reality.
The market changes, the industry changes, the culture changes, competition arrives and the reflex is to boast in your work and refuse to think that something so great would ever need to be changed, remodeled, or taken apart.
As much as I love that leadership is about building things I’m learning that it is at times equally about disassembly. I confess, this is hard for me – but I’m sensing there’s beauty to unfold here.
So you’ve built something? Now what?
The only way to get the play-set to the next backyard is piece by piece.
Ashton.Gustafson 