Monday, February 10, 2014

Necessary Endings

Endings: if you see them as normal, expected, and even a good thing, you will embrace them and take action to executive them.  You will see them as a painful gift.  ~Henry Cloud

In 2010, Dr. Henry Cloud wrote the book, Necessary Endings.  Henry is the author of more than 20 books and Necessary Endings is my favorite; The New York Times called it the most important book you'll read all year.  I'm not trying to promote Henry, but I do, very much, believe in the concept and practice of necessary endings. 

One of the chapter titles in this book is: "Normalizing Necessary Endings: Welcome the Seasons of Life into Your Worldview."  Henry says, "Even the most gifted people and leaders are subject to feeling conflicted about ending things, so they resist that moment of truth.  And not only do they resist, they sometimes cannot even see.  Thus they find themselves crosswise with the very nature of life itself."  He says that we need to "Make the endings a normal occurrence and a normal part of business and life, instead of seeing it as a problem."

I'm not sure I can explain why, but for me, I tend to view endings more as a failure instead of a natural occurrence.  And I don't think I’m alone.  Henry says that we have to accept life cycles and seasons, and accept that life produces too much life!  We need to accept that life produces:
  • More relationships than we can nurture
  • More activities than we can keep up with at any significant level
  • More clients than we can service all in the same way
  • More mentors who once "fit" but whose time has past
  • More partners whose time has past
  • More product lines than we can focus on
  • More strategies than we can execute
  • More stuff than we have room for and can store

We have to be in the letting-go phase all through life.  "One of the most important types of decision making is deciding what you are not going to do, what you need to eliminate in order to make room for strategic investments." (McKinsey Quarterly, March 2010).

Necessary endings are, well, necessary.  Whether it's purging unused stuff from your closet, laying off employees that you simply can no longer support, or cutting a product or program that is well beyond its prime.  Leaders could take a lesson from master gardeners.  It's only through careful and ongoing pruning that many plants are able to really thrive.  It's not only necessary; it's a normal and natural occurrence.  

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