Functional Irrelevance: By Fate or By Design?

Let’s just get this out of the way: my friend the former Buddhist monk would say “fate.”  Perhaps.  BUT…I would like to think it is by design.

The problem, though, relates back to quote I heard whilst at the University of Dallas: “Every system operates precisely as designed, not as intended.”  So, by design, not intention, I have become functionally irrelevant.

Allow me to explain.

At work, they are remodeling our floor.  A lot of people work on the floor.  So, they divided the floor in half and sent the first wave of us down to the basement of another building.  It smells like sewage down there.  You would figure that a Fortune 100 company would figure out how to vent a building in such a way as to eliminate the sewage smell in the men’s restroom.  Apparently, this is not the case.  However, I digress.

Down in the basement, I am largely isolated from the rest of the world.  My immediate team is around me, but, as has become painfully apparent to me, they don’t need me for much.  When they do need me, they E-mail me.  Or they call me.  Apart from them…yeah, pretty much not a lot going on in my work life.  It is an interesting situation.  I did not realize how much of my day is spent in walk-up/drive-by engagements, either perpetrating such visits or having such visits perpetrated upon me.  Either way, without the foot traffic, I feel functionally irrelevant.  

There.  I’ve said it.  The situation is exacerbated by the fact that, as the weeks pile up (and the smell persists), fewer and fewer people are showing up downstairs.  A bunch of people have opted to work from home more often.  Others are satisfied with “hoteling” space throughout the campus.  Yet others…I don’t know.  I think some of the missing may account for at least a small portion of the smell.  

This is not an entirely bad situation.  Apart from the injury to my ego, I consider the experience rather successful.  How so?  Well, it has demonstrated to me that I have achieved my primary objective…by design.  Not my primary CORPORATE objective, mind you, but my PERSONAL primary objective as a leader of people.  This is the objective that follows me wherever I go, whatever the assignment.  I could take it with me from company to company, if that were my career intent.  It transcends the person above me in the Grand Organizational Hierarchy, and it transcends the logo on my company-supplied notebook.  It is my very personal objective, and I measure success far outside the confines of a corporate employee performance assessment.

My objective is to be a coach.  It is to be a mentor, if appropriate.  It is to be a sounding board for my direct reports and my peers.  It is to be a person in whom others confide and in whom others seek an objective and reasonable opinion.  My objective is to be a guide for others on their journey through life should they feel compelled to entrust such a sacred gift into my hands.  In return, I ask only that they gently and compassionately guide me.

It is NOT my objective to tell people what to do.  It is NOT to tell them how to do it.  It is NOT to manage the details of their daily grind.  I know, I know: every good business person needs to understand what goes on in their part of any organization.  Understood.  But I also know that the best leaders also know that the sure-fire way to get results is to promote autonomy.  We talk so much about accountability at work, but I suspect we differ in our interpretation of the meaning of the word.  I look to promote autonomy and, with that autonomy, an acceptance of the consequences that come with it.  That is one of the ways I define success as a leader.

So, I am now taking this time to figure out what I do next.  How do I serve my team moving forward?  How do I serve my employer moving forward?  And how to I refine this art of leadership further to the benefit of everyone on my team?  It is time to spread the wealth a little farther, a little more evenly.  I’ve neglected a few, and it’s time to see how I can chip in to help them write the most successful story for themselves that they can.

So, by fate or by design?  I am in the basement by fate, but I am slightly more enlightened by design.