The Great Resignation has had a huge impact on teams and organizations. How do you respond as a leader when you lose a really good team member?

 

In this episode, co-hosts Richard Lindner and Jeff Mask talk about what happens when one of a leader’s biggest fears becomes reality: a key player on the team decides to leave. Instead of just speaking in generalities, Richard shares a very personal and recent story, and he and Jeff walk through these important questions:

 

1. How do we process it internally?
2. How do we communicate it?
3. How do we make sure the company is better because they were here instead of worse off because they’re gone?

 

Listen in for some great tips to help you think about—and become better from and through—these experiences. 

 

Richard’s Team Loses a Key Player

 

Richard says their company was blessed not to lay anyone off during Covid, but they still experienced the Great Resignation to some degree this summer. He recently had the scary realization that his team was at the definition of a skeleton crew. Everyone was perfect for their job—right person, right seat, right attitude, right cultural fit. “If anyone here leaves,” he thought to himself, “we’re going to be in a bit of a bind.”

 

And then it happened. Someone who had been with the company for five years (in internet years, that’s forever, Richard says) put in her resignation. In the growth they had seen over five years, this person had been critical in figuring things out and ushering in that change. She was always smiling, had the best attitude, and owned her role. When Richard got the news, his mind went to “not her, not her.” This was going to hurt. 

 

Richard said this is when you start to spiral mentally, no matter how long you’ve been leading. He went immediately to a bad place, because he always processes the worst case scenario first. This person embodied their core values. The company could have written its values by following her around. When she left, we asked, where did we fail in leadership and vision? Where did we fail in growth and opportunity? What are the rest of the team members going to think? Will others leave because she left?

 

If “bad people” (an underperformer, someone who’s not a cultural fit) leave, we get it. But when a good person leaves, the fear is that other people will think, “Wait a second, if she’s leaving, should I leave? What does she know that I don’t know?”

 

How Do We Process It Internally?

 

Important question #1: how do we internally process the impact of this person leaving? How can we work through it in a way so that it’s a growth opportunity instead of something that paralyzes us? If we don’t work through it in our own minds in a healthy way, it has a negative ripple effect on everyone around us. A negative spiral is not helpful. 

 

Every failure is a failure of leadership. However. Good people leaving is not always a failure. It just means that, organizationally, their growth has outpaced your need. When done correctly, sometimes we grow people too good, too much. They outgrow the company. It’s a job well done. You’re called as a leader to grow people. You’re called as a leader to align that growth with the company. When they outpace it, you fulfilled your calling. If the company can’t support their growth, you let them go with your blessing.

 

Jeff summarizes Richard’s process. First, he went to a dark place, thinking “where did I fail? What will people think?” That’s totally normal, human, healthy. Where the unhealthiness comes in is when we stay there. We have to reframe. “Where’s the good in this? Where do we go from here?” It comes down to selflessness as a leader. Seeing the...