Tag: abandonment

Dereliction of Duty

The initial message from my supervisor was direct.

A co-worker had not reported to work in a few days. I was going to need to pick up the consults with his clients.

I quickly agreed to the mission. But it turns out my supervisor had more to share.

I know this isn’t ideal, she stated. I know it’s a new circumstance, and it puts you in a tough spot. But rest assured that I’m going to get to the bottom of this.

I read between the lines instantly.

You see, my colleague had pulled this stunt at the most inopportune time. Our team had gone remote due to a global pandemic. And this made it easy to slack off on the job without detection.

Timecard reporting and vacation requests were on the honor system. There was no foolproof way to see if any of us were at our desks.

My supervisor had only caught on to my colleague’s ruse when clients complained to her. Messages to him went unrequited. A forensic analysis revealed extensive work undone.

It was increasingly clear that my colleague had abandoned his post. He’d deserted his responsibilities. He’d committed dereliction of duty.

And now we were left to clean up the mess.

Dereliction of duty.

It’s a fancy term. But it often carries severe consequences.

We bristle at violations of the Ten Commandments — murder, theft, dishonesty, and so on. But of the offenses not etched in those ancient tablets, dereliction of duty might draw our strongest ire.

You see, despite our boasts of individuality, we rely on others a great deal. There is no i in team, and it takes a village to accomplish anything of note.

The biggest threat to group work is attrition. When team members don’t pull their weight, it forces others to fill the gaps. Balance evaporates, progress slows, and strain proliferates.

This is a significant problem. And when team members walk away from the mission, the problem grows exponentially.

Deserters do more than put pressure on those they left behind. They threaten to use that team’s operational secrets against it. And they cast doubt on the group’s legitimacy.

This is an existential threat. One that leads us to sound the alarm for dereliction of duty.

Indeed, soldiers who’ve walked away from their battlefield posts have been rounded up and executed. Athletes who’ve walked out on their team have been banned from their league. And those who’ve walked off the job have often been sued for breach of contract.

I don’t believe my employer sued my deserting colleague for breach of contract. But I’m sure he was dismissed with cause for what he’d done.

Such a fate would have been deserved.

But plenty of others in differing circumstances have received similar punishments. And those condemned masses likely got a raw deal.

The medical bill caught me off guard.

Eight months after forking over some money to get an MRI, I was being charged for the remainder of the cost.

That remainder was not cheap. And it complicated my attempts to pay off my credit card balance.

As I stared at the bill, I fumed.

Surely, there a statute of limitations for this. A reasonable period in which such residual costs could be collected. And eight months seemed beyond the pale of that statute.

I felt like I was being extorted. I felt used. I felt blatantly disrespected.

And I wanted a pound of flesh from the medical billing employees.

If I was this terrible at my job, I wouldn’t have one, I muttered.

It wasn’t the first time I’d uttered this phrase. But deep down inside, I knew it was all talk.

I wasn’t looking to peel people from their livelihoods on the account of incompetence. I’ve been laid off before, and I know how damaging job loss can be.

I was simply blowing off steam.

That said, many in positions of power have been less merciful. They’ve been quick to hit the Eject button on underperforming employees. And all too often, Dereliction of Duty has been listed as the cause.

If this seems like a misnomer, it’s because it is.

After all, these employees are not abandoning their posts. They’re just degrading the effectiveness of their positions.

The specialist tasked with my MRI statement likely reported to work each day, even as my bill lay in limbo for months. The corporate associate who missed their monthly targets still showed up to give it their best shot.

And yet, if they were to be shown the door, it would come with the stain of abandonment. Of desertion. Of dereliction of duty.

Do the power brokers casting these stones know what dereliction of duty means? Do they care?

They should.

Four times in my career, I’ve joined a new company.

Each time, the fresh start came with plenty of emotions — and lots of paperwork.

Most of the paperwork was standard — federal tax reporting forms, computer usage policies and the like. But twice, I also had to sign a non-compete agreement.

These agreements were defensive maneuvers. The industries I was preparing to work in were highly competitive, and company-hopping employees were a clear threat. By demanding that new hires sign a non-compete, businesses were minimizing the danger of job abandonment.

I’ve long associated these overt agreements with a tacit one. By signing them and abiding by them, I was proected against professional character assassination. If I showed up each day, stayed above board, and maintained a strong effort, I wouldn’t be accused of dereliction of due.

So far, that has come to pass. But that’s more by chance than by decree.

More and more companies assess employee performance by outcome these days, rather than output. Hitting the objectives of a role matters, but only if it leads to positive outcomes for the company. This could be revenue growth, increased market share, or a host of other corporate markers.

If employees deliver the goods and the company prospers, they stay on. If they only manage the first part, they could be dismissed. And on the way out the door, they’ll be slapped with the label of Dereliction of Duty.

This is similar to the mandate for football coaches. A coach can improve the readiness and performance of all the players on the squad. But if that positive momentum doesn’t lead the squad to win football games, that coach will get kicked to the curb.

But lay employees are not football coaches. There are no weekly scrimmages. There’s no central entity keeping score or handing out trophies at the end.

It’s apples and oranges. And it’s high time we start recognizing that.

So, let’s reserve Dereliction of Duty for those who truly deserve the label. Those like my ex-colleague, who pulled a Houdini and vanished into thin air.

And let’s stop smearing those who keep showing up and giving their best, just because the organization fell a bit short.

Team goals are shared responsibilities. Those who pursue them with strong effort and good intentions are derelict of nothing.

Finishing the Job

On July 20, 1969, a nation watched with awe as three astronauts planted an American flag on the surface of the moon.

A month later, residents of the North Side of Chicago probably still felt like they were on the moon.

The temperate Midwest summer was still in full swing. The ivy on the brick outfield walls of Wrigley Field was lush and green. And the team playing in that venerable ballpark was having its best season in decades.

The Chicago Cubs had already won 75 games by mid-August, and the team held a 9-game lead in the division standings. The Cubs hadn’t played in the postseason in 24 years, and the team hadn’t won a World Series championship in 61 seasons. But it sure looked like the days of ineptitude were over.

They weren’t.

As August turned to September, the Chicago Cubs hit the skids. The team was suddenly losing games at an alarming rate, while the second-place New York Mets were stringing together wins.

When the two squads faced off in New York, a stray black cat ominously ran in front of the Chicago dugout. The Cubs would lose both games to the Mets and cede the top spot in the division soon after that.

The Mets would go on to win the division by 8 games, before rolling through the postseason and claiming a World Series championship. The Cubs would become a punchline.

1969 was well before my time. Still, I remain captivated by that season. My mother — a lifelong Mets fan — has said that year is what sparked her love of baseball. And the black cat incident remains an iconic moment in the sport decades later.

Still, I wonder if the 1969 Chicago Cubs deserved better than ridicule. Even with the late-season swoon, Chicago finished with a 92-70 record — by far the franchise’s best in what would ultimately become a 38-year postseason drought.

In subsequent years, 11 teams have gone on to claim World Series championships with fewer regular season wins than the 1969 Cubs. 6 more with identical records to that team have claimed titles.

But ultimately, that matters little. The Cubs failed to finish the job. And that’s how they’ll continue to be remembered.

Mama didn’t raise no quitter.

I’ve told myself this line time and again when I’ve found myself at a crossroads.

It’s not factually accurate. My mother might not have quit rooting for the New York Mets, but she’s stepped away from several ventures in her life. She also encouraged my father to leave a dead-end career for a better opportunity. And she was fully supportive of me during my youth when I stopped playing the violin or walked away from the cross-country team.

Still, the adage has resonated with me in adulthood. I’ve seen how our society treats those who don’t see a job through. And I don’t want to become one of those cautionary footnotes.

So, I’ve rarely quit at anything. And when I have, it’s come with a giant asterisk.

When I considered leaving the news media, I waited until my employment contract expired to do so. Since I was switching careers, I wasn’t beholden to that contract end date. But it provided the cleanest way to make a break.

When I gave up alcohol some years back, I didn’t consider sobriety to be quitting. Instead, I’ve treated abstinence as its own mission — one I must not ever stray from.

And even when I’ve dropped out of marathons due to injuries, it was on doctor’s orders. It took outside intervention to keep me from running through the pain.

Yes, I’ve remained steadfast in my commitment to finish the job. To be the 1969 New York Mets, and not the 1969 Chicago Cubs.

Yet, I’ve failed to consider the cost of this edict I’ve foisted upon myself.

You see, I’ve generally attributed finishing the job to consistency. If I show up day after day and give my all, I will achieve what I set out to achieve.

This is not a novel concept. It’s practically gospel in the worlds of sport and project management.

But this idea is fatally flawed.

Indeed, not much is consistent in the world around us. And the longer the timeline of an initiative, the more likely it is that we’ll face a curveball on our quest. A curveball that can’t simply be swatted away with the tenet of consistency.

This leaves us with a choice. Do we stay true to our approach, despite diminishing returns? Or do we become who we need to be to get the job done?

The answer is not as straightforward as it seems.

The Godfather is an American classic.

Both Mario Puzo’s novel and Francis Ford Coppola’s film adaptation represent storytelling at its finest.

Many consider The Godfather to be a Mafia tale. But I see something else.

In my view, The Godfather is an allegory for the challenges of finishing the job.

Consider the story structure.

Don Vito Corleone prepares his youngest son Michael for a future in the U.S. Congress, as his Mafia outfit seeks to go legitimate. But Michael leaves college to join the military in World War II. And upon his return, he draws a line between the Corleone family and himself.

The family is tough-minded, principled, and often violent. By contrast, Michael shows himself to be sophisticated, calculated, and thoughtful.

But a series of events eventually weaken the Corleone family. And Michael doubles down on Vito’s original vision of making the outfit legitimate.

This requires Michael to become ruthless and domineering while finishing the job. The metamorphosis of his character carries a heavy toll.

Time and again, Michael’s temper comes to the fore. Paranoia over potential mutinies leads Michael to cut himself off from lower-level associates. And his demeanor causes his marriage to crumble.

Yes, Michael Corleone chose both paths of the Finishing the Job Conundrum in succession. First, he walked away from the Corleone outfit so he could serve his country. Then he re-entered the fold and committed himself to finishing the job he’d previously abandoned.

That second path brought Michael Corleone the trappings of success. But he was undoubtedly happier following the first one.

I’ve been thinking about this more often, as I consider finishing the job on complex initiatives. Is following the principle worth the personal price? Perhaps not.

Mama didn’t raise no quitter. But maybe I should take a step back anyway.

When I was in high school, my family took a trip to Spain.

One of our many stops was the Sagrada Familia Basilica in Barcelona.

My parents and sister were awestruck by the ornate structure with its architectural flair. But I was preoccupied with something else.

Namely, the cranes and scaffolding hovering over the site.

The Sagrada Familia, you see, was still under construction. The groundbreaking had taken place more than a century prior, and the completion was nowhere in sight.

I wondered out loud why we were giving a construction site the time of day. My father bristled, explaining that I was looking at the site all wrong.

Sure, the Sagrada Familia was still a work in progress. But the work that had been done — all the finished accents illuminated by the Catalan sunshine — was still worth noting. It earned architect Antoni Gaudi acclaim in his lifetime. And it continued to add to his legend in the many decades since his passing.

Someday, my father explained, the Basilica would be completed. The world would marvel then at the realization of Gaudi’s vision.

But even now, there was much to celebrate. What had been done was far from nothing.

There was a profound lesson in my father’s words. One I could do a better job of heeding. One we all can.

Perhaps we shouldn’t put as much stock into finishing the job. In bringing the initiatives we’re involved in across the finish line at all costs.

For those costs could accelerate throughout the journey. And much like Michael Corleone, we could lose ourselves in a quest for what is ultimately an abstract principle.

Perhaps it’s better to take a step back sometimes and pass the torch.

We might not get feted for our early-stage accomplishments, as Gaudi has been. But we’ll still know the value of our contribution. And we won’t compromise our sense of self.

That means something. But only if we let it.

So, let’s draw a line in the sand. Let’s demonstrate that something matters more than finishing the job.

That something is us.