By: Maurice Gilbert, Managing Partner of Conselium Executive Search
“We cannot live without change. The race for survival in this world is not to the strongest, but to the most adaptive.” — Jong-Yong Yun, Samsung Chairman
You are a leader and you recognize that change is constant. A company must constantly reinvent itself to survive, developing new products/services and/or improving what they have. There is no better example of this than Apple.
So what is your leadership role regarding change? It is to be a consistent champion to your staff of the notion that with change, the positives outweigh the negatives. The significance of the previous statement is based on the fact that most people fear change, responding with negativity and sometimes paralysis. They may not have embraced change as a good and necessary part of the evolution process. I frequently encounter this lack of understanding of change in my role as an executive recruiter. Professionals we are recruiting have frequently said “I don’t want to interview with your client because I know they are laying off staff.” We have to educate them that companies that are adapting are consistently laying off and hiring simultaneously; they’re laying off people whose skill sets no longer apply and hiring for new skill sets required for the adaptation of new business.
Keep your staff motivated and educated by selling change as a necessary part of adaptation and survival.
Maurice Gilbert is Managing Partner of Conselium Executive Search, which specializes in placing Compliance Officers and Legal Counsel for clients in the U.S., Europe, Latin America and Asia Pacific. Maurice is also CEO of Corporate Compliance Insights, a worldwide publication devoted to governance, risk and compliance issues. Maurice can be reached at maurice@conselium.com or maurice@corporatecomplianceinsights.com.
