Does your workplace change you?
This was written (full disclosure by another consultant) a while ago but I feel is still relevant now, what do you think?
I was watching the movie Fury, a very good yet very disturbing film set at the end of the Second World War. The main character, Norman, is a reluctant young soldier trained as a typist but forced to become the assistant driver/gunner in the tank "Fury" after the death of the previous gunner. Initially, he refuses to shoot the enemy, but he is forced by his Sergeant, "Wardaddy" (played by Brad Pitt), to shoot a Nazi in the back as he kneels begging for his life. As the movie progresses, he realises he has to kill in order to stay alive and save the lives of his crew, and begins to relish killing Nazis.
I was fascinated by the transformation from Norman to "Machine," his nickname from the crew. He had to change, and change fast, in order to survive. The typist who refused to fire his weapon became a ruthless, efficient killing machine. What disturbed me more was the thought that this transformation could happen to any of us in the same horrific situation. Many of those who fought would have been considered ordinary men, not trained killers, before they joined the army.
To survive in war, soldiers must be prepared to kill the enemy, and to do that, you have to dehumanise them, view them as lesser people. An interesting counterpoint comes at the end of the movie, when Norman is hiding under the tank and is found by an SS soldier (the worst of the Nazis, according to Wardaddy). Instead of dragging him out and shooting him, or worse, torturing him, as he'd been told would happen, the soldier leaves him alone. The movie ends with Norman being rescued and labelled a hero.
It's easy to see how war could change someone dramatically, but how much do other changes in our environment change us? We all know people in relationships who have changed, for better or worse, when they started a relationship with someone new. Sometimes change is necessary to make a relationship work, compromise is essential, you have to think of someone else, not just yourself. Other times, one or both people are forced to change, and not for the better. One test of a good relationship: do you make each other better people?
It's a bit of a stretch to compare work to war, but there's no doubt in my mind that your workplace can change you. At the extreme end, some people become depressed, overwhelmed, or burnt out by their work, whereas others grow, thrive and become better people. Sometimes it's just called the culture of the organisation, you either fit, or you don't. Those who don't "make it" weren't cut out for the environment, or didn't have the right attributes to succeed.
If you don't think your workplace changes people, take a look at the senior people in your organisation, especially those who've been there a long time. Are there similarities in values, working style, management approach, communication? Is that self-selection, recruiting people who are all similar or is the organisation moulding people to fit, or some combination of all three?
Do you find yourself wrestling with your conscience, bursting with the need to disagree, challenge or object, but suppressing it because you know you'd be swimming against the tide? Are you justifying decisions to yourself that you'd previously have called just wrong? Do you feel the need to comply with the company line? It might not be an ethical dilemma, it could simply be that you feel you need to suppress who you really are to fit in. You might manage that for a while, but eventually, it becomes suffocating.
If you find yourself in this situation, you have three options:
- Adapt, change and compromise - just like Norman did in Fury.
- Stay and swim against the stream, becoming an internal agent of change. (In my experience, unless leadership is also swimming against the current with you and genuinely trying to change the culture, this is futile.)
- Get out and find a place where you can be yourself, thrive and excel.
There are plenty of workplaces that don't make better people, some even do real damage in the pursuit of winning. But there are others that make people better, not worse. If you need help getting out of an environment that's changing you, and not for the better, get in touch, let's talk about your options.
