One of my clients was chatting with me the other day. “Being a CFO (Chief Financial Officer) is THE loneliest place”. It got me thinking.
Being part of The Top Team is lonely?
Leading a crack team of accountants, risk analysts and project managers is lonely?
How can that be?
What makes your place the loneliest place?
It is about how you perceive your role. Specifically, it’s about how you feel while you are performing your role. It’s how you feel about how you do what you do.
And there’s the rub. When you are the leaders of change in organisations, that puts you out there on a limb in some way or another. You are the people who are “doing” change to people. This is true even in the dire economic circumstances of the current time. You’re responsible for altering the fine balance of the status quo – and that means people will have to get used to new ways of doing things AS WELL AS just doing the do, every day. They don’t see the financial implications of what is happening out there in the economy. That means they don’t understand why you have to do the things you do. This means your actions are setting you apart from the rest.
And THAT’s why it’s lonely.
No-one but you is responsible for the outcomes the change will bring about.
No-one can possibly understand what it is like to have to push improvements through your organisation, to make it sustainable.
Everyone expects you to be a miracle-worker with the finances.
How can you change this?
You may be able to change situations and even your entire organisation’s financial systems and approaches. In fact, you’re probably having to do that while you’re also scrolling and came across this blog in your feed!
However, what you can’t change is people’s innate responses to change.
What you CAN do, is show them the benefits and help them to change their way of thinking. Actually, that’s the most important thing you can change – how your people understand your thinking and reasons for doing what you need to do, the way you need to do it.
As a matter of fact, that’s not entirely true.
Not only is it important to help others change their thinking, but it is also important to check in with your own. The most important thing you may need to change is HOW you do what you do. Even if the financial changes are crucial to your organisation’s survival, you can’t be overly directive and curt with your colleagues. You still will need to win them round. There’s lots of persuasion ahead for you on this change path. The key is to be self-aware, open and transparent. Do what you say you will do. Explain patiently to your people why you are doing it. And be ready to explain it again. And again.
Certainly, it’s important to build advocacy for your changes, so that people can change their minds without losing face. Everyone needs a way out from any corner, into which their reservations had boxed them.
How does this stop this being the loneliest place?
- If you have supporters, you’re not alone
- If you have people who really understand your “why?”, you’re not alone.
- And if there’s a group of people sharing your urgency for change, you can’t be alone because there’s pressure building for change from a variety of angles.
These alliances and relationships may not be easy to manage. No-one’s pretending that organisational change is simple! Nevertheless, focusing on your people skills and building alliances and alignments will be crucial to you not feeling too alone in your role. And that’s got to be change you can buy into.
This situation may have rung some bells for you. Is it a familiar landscape? Maybe you’ve given this approach a try and it worked, but you feel there was something missing still? If that’s the case, please get in touch and let’s have a chat. I can probably help with that.
Image credit: Matthew Henry via Unsplash