Relief: The Workplace Emotion We Pretend Not To Notice
Organisations talk a lot about excitement. They celebrate innovation, transformation and success. They rarely talk about relief.
Yet relief may be one of the most common emotions in organisational life.
The big day arrived. After two years of meetings, negotiations, deadlines and pressure there was no party, no celebration and no sense of triumph. There was simply relief.
Few people talk about relief as an organisational emotion. Organisations prefer more positive language. Success. Innovation. Excitement. Momentum. Yet ask middle managers what they often feel when a major project finally ends, a reorganisation is completed or a senior leader departs, and the answer is frequently the same.
One of the biggest projects I managed involved several agencies working together to meet a nationally imposed legislative deadline. We had two years to agree processes, procedures, responsibilities, priorities, funding arrangements and timescales. Chief Executives and Boards had to sign up to a document setting out not just who would do what, but who would pay for it and when it would be delivered.
It was hard work. Every organisation involved had different priorities and different pressures.
The project succeeded. We delivered on time.
There was no party.
No celebration.
The overwhelming emotion was relief.
People often assume success creates excitement. Sometimes success simply means the pressure stops.
I saw the same emotion on a much larger scale when I inherited a reorganisation that should have been finished long before I arrived.
What should have taken six months had dragged on for two years. Vacancies had been frozen. Large numbers of managers were in acting-up positions. Staff faced redeployment, voluntary redundancy, revised job descriptions and uncertainty about their future. During that time budget cuts changed the organisation's priorities. A restructuring that had originally been about improving services gradually became an exercise in saving money.
The longer it continued, the less important the original purpose became.
The longer it continued, the less people cared about the outcome and the more they cared about it ending.
People can cope with difficult decisions. What wears them down is uncertainty.
I realised the task was not to complete the reorganisation exactly as originally designed. Circumstances had changed too much for that. The real leadership task was not finishing the change but bringing the uncertainty to an end.
We drew a line under it.
The sense of relief across the organisation was enormous.
Not because everyone got what they wanted.
Far from it.
But because people finally knew where they stood.
Relief can also tell us something about leadership.
Chief Executives come and go with increasing frequency. Some leave behind affection and admiration. Others leave behind a different emotion.
I worked in one large organisation where a newly appointed Chief Executive was determined to shake things up. We were constantly reminded that we were standing on a burning platform. Decisions were presented as urgent. Discussion was often seen as resistance. Experienced and respected senior managers were encouraged to move on if they were not fully aligned with the agenda.
After eighteen months the Chief Executive left.
There was no leaving party.
No emotional farewell.
The organisation seemed to exhale.
His departure generated more positive emotion than any of his initiatives.
This challenges one of management's favourite myths.
We are told that change creates excitement.
Often it creates anxiety, uncertainty and fatigue.
What creates relief is when the change finally stops.
Few organisations measure relief. Fewer still see it as feedback.
Yet relief tells us something important. It tells us when uncertainty has lasted too long, when pressure has become exhausting and when people have finally stopped holding their breath.
Sometimes organisations mistake relief for success.
They are not the same thing.
Success creates energy for what comes next.
Relief simply means people are grateful the last thing is over.
Relief.
blairmcpherson.co.uk
