Breaking Up Is Hard To Do

There's a reason that 99% of pop songs are about breaking up. Everyone, sooner or later, experiences a break up. All good things must come to an end and, when they do, they can bring drama and heartbreak and all kinds of lyrical inspiration. 

It's no different at work. Sooner or later the love affair ends. One or both parties is left feeling bruised, hurt, angry and wants to show the other just what a big mistake they've made (see Beyonce or John Terry for details). 

Neil Morrison wrote a post recently guiding employees through the break up process. It's here. It was funny, pithy and not a little caustic. If it were a pop song, it would be F*** You by Cee Lo Green.

As if on cue, less than 24 hours after reading Neil's post, I received a forwarded email from a friend. One of her distant colleagues had gone Michael Douglas Falling-Down style bonkers and emailed a detailed diatribe to the whole Head Office explaining exactly why he was leaving (I like to think he was channelling Adele - it was a self-indulgent, self-pitying little ditty in which he was the injured party and they were heartless b*******).

Does it have to be that way? 

I left a business recently. We'd grown apart but the break-up was amicable. I have fond memories and part of me Will Always Love Them (Dolly, not Whitney). It was, to all intents and purposes, a grown-up break up. 

But it takes two to make a grown-up break up. The onus isn't just on the employee who leaves to act professionally.

It's easy for a business (and by that I mean the people in the business) to create a pantomime villain out of a leaver. We've all seen it - they've gone, left us, done us wrong.  We knew they were no good. If they've done a critical exit interview this is picked apart, justified or analysed as if it were a Dear John letter. They're dead to us now - we're Kelis, and we hate them so much. 

What if everyone who leaves the business isn't a villain? What if, rather than a cardboard box and a "don't let the door hit your arse on the way out", we thought of them as Alumni? Knowledge centres? Friends? (Not you, John Terry, you're still a numpty).

After all, aren't they walking out with a head full of our IP, customer database and process maps, not to mention their honest, no-holds-barred insight into our business? The stuff that other employees may not want to share because they're too scared or too astute to? The stuff that if we listened, might prove priceless? Or might save us a hefty consultant's fee some stage down the line. They may be angry, they may be upset, they may not even like us very much but that's no reason to write them off as a twonk and assume they have nothing to teach us. We might survive, but will we have learned anything?

And what about this? Ex-employees are to your EVP what your customers are to your brand. Are yours advocates? What would they say about you? Would they back up the blurb in the glossy recruitment brochure? 

A wise ex colleague of mine once told me that our job is to help everyone who leaves the business feel as warmly about us as they did when they joined. Ambitious? Maybe. But given the current climate and the increasing view that HR is becoming a "Downsizing Envoy" hadn't we better help the business learn a new tune and a little diplomacy when it comes to leavers? Hadn't we better get good at this grown-up break up stuff?

You Kept Cheering So I Kept Running

"You kept cheering, so I kept running" - As spoken by Mo Farah. Long distance runner extraordinaire, double Gold medallist, Olympic God. 

He was talking about his performance on that glorious 'Super Saturday' when it felt like British athletes just couldn't put a foot wrong. When he put in a super human effort to storm to his second gold of his home Olympics. He was talking about where that super human effort came from and he isn't the only Olympian or Paralympian to praise the power of the supporters and the contribution they made to their success. It's an incredible thing - the sheer vocal will of enough people roaring for you to succeed. Beautiful really. 

And quite rare in the grand scheme of things.

How often do we just cheer people on? I went to high school in the US for a while so I'm probably more comfortable than most Brits with the concept of cheering. But in the UK, 'You Go, Girl!' is one of a genre of phrases treated with cynicism and derision more often than not. It's a shame, because the act of cheering is elating for both cheerer and cheeree. And look at the results it achieves, the difference it can make. 

When I left my job last week I made a point of sending an all staff email telling the people I'd worked with why I thought they were brilliant, and willing them on to even bigger things. My last cheer. One of our Account Directors told me afterwards that it had given her chills. 

Yet we seem to do it so little. It isn't the same as expressing gratitude - which we Brits are pretty good at. It's not the same as giving feedback - which we HR types are evangelical about. Cheering, showing support, whether shouting "Go On!!!!" at the top of our lungs, or sending someone a card that says "You Rule" one quiet Tuesday afternoon, is subtly different but equally important. 

Showing support is less about telling someone about the impact that they have had on you, more about doing what you can to have a positive impact on them. At its purest, it's selfless (although, as with all these things, there are those that would argue that the warm fuzzy feeling you get from cheering means that it isn't entirely a magnanimous act). 

Can you imagine 80,000 people shouting their 'feedback' at Mo Farah on Super Saturday? "I'm a bit worried that you're not leading by now, Mo", "Are you sure you should be leading that soon, Mo?" (that's the beauty of feedback - everyone has an opinion). Or expressing gratitude? "Thanks for running, Mo, I'm having a brilliant time!". Mo ran how he ran because of 80,000 people yelling, until they were hoarse, "Go On Mo!!!!!!". 

Because it's selfless, showing support means you take your lead from the person you want to cheer on. That's why 80,000 people fell silent when Jonnie Peacock put his fingers to his lips at the start of the T44 100m final last night. It's why they fell silent when the visually impaired relay runners or long jumpers were competing. Showing support means understanding what that person needs and giving it to them. 

Nancy Kline tells us that, in order for people to have an environment in which they can perform, they need five times the amount of appreciation to challenge. Five times. For most of us that feels like overkill. But it's just what is needed. And the results it brings are phenomenal.

On Saturday, after the Paralympics are over, wouldn't it be nice to think that we had just been warming up our cheering muscles, and could now start putting them to work in other ways? Who could you cheer on? What do they need from you to know that you support them?