The Right Thing
Some things are yours to keep. Your job is rarely one of them.
On my first day in the BPO industry, I walked into my boss’s office and noticed how bare his bookshelf was. “Are you just moving in?”
He smiled, “No. I never bring more than I can pack into a single box.”
It was my first job in that world. I quickly realized that everyone is replaceable and this would be more cutthroat than my prior roles. I remember telling myself I’d stay until I was asked to compromise my integrity.
Eighteen months later, that day arrived. By that time, my original boss had moved on and I reported directly to the COO.
We’d received notification that one of our accounts would not be renewed in six months. The COO told me to make contingency plans and keep it quiet. When I responded that it didn’t seem right, he didn’t hesitate. “It’s not the right thing to do, but it’s what we’re going to do.”
We knew how to onboard, how to offboard, how to transition teams. We did exactly that for twenty other clients in the open. So the idea that we’d do this same work but in the dark to our own team, that wasn’t an option.
“It’s not what I’m going to do,” my response was more of a reflex than a reaction.
I knew he could fire me for it. He was a state away, so he couldn’t stop me in the moment, and that is the only thing the distance changed. It didn’t lower the risk, it just meant the one person who might have talked me out of it wasn’t in the room. If he’d been down the hall, I’m not sure how it would have ended.
That day, I pulled my team together and I told them.
We promised to keep as many as we could, based on performance and new-account hiring. We worked with outplacement. We offered short-term training. As the date got closer, we moved people onto other accounts. At the end of the six months, fewer than ten people had left.
Of course, he found out what I had done. And he could have fired me for it at any point.
But that was always his to decide, and I spent those six months knowing it.
By then my original boss’s office was mine. The shelf was still bare. His shelf represented his belief that everyone is replaceable, mine represented that I wouldn’t commit to an organization that operates that way. That part was mine to keep.
If it is not right do not do it; if it is not true do not say it. – Marcus Aurelius