When very successful executives find their position eliminated it naturally triggers introspection. What could I have done differently? Did I let my people down? Why me? Was it me, or the circumstances?
More and more it has nothing to do with the skills, style, or even accomplishments of the executive. Sometimes the trigger is a merger or acquisition. External market conditions can force compression of roles. Boards today have greater impatience and accountability to make sure the right person is in the key slot for today’s challenges. But sometimes the trigger for elimination of their role is corporate exfoliation!
Exfoliation is an odd word here — originally it refers to the natural process we are about to experience this fall, as trees lose their leaves to make way for the new cycle of growth. Corporate exfoliation, though, is forced change that happens in any season giving the appearance that “we have a plan” to buy time. It has an added strategy of removing potential successors. If you become a natural part of a corporate growth cycle, or are simply a pawn in your company’s attempt to appear to be on top of a problem by making changes, you will wish you had a plan ready to execute to turn the personal impact and problem into an opportunity of your own.
I experienced a major episode of corporate exfoliation while at IBM. John Akers was the CEO, share prices were dropping because profits were shrinking in the hardware business, analysts did not see as bright a future, and John was becoming desperate. When that happens, buying time by reorganizing people and roles is a common strategy. In this situation it was deemed that no product division should have more than seven people at headquarters. A new headquarters had just been completed to foster teamwork and integrate product planning — and now all but seven people from each division were relocated to plants and labs. The “solution” did not address the core problem — but did create a lot of movement and chaos when crisp thinking and urgent actions were desperately needed.
The latest example of corporate exfoliation appears to have occurred at Bank of America where, in corporate-speak, they are “de-layering.” According to the Economist, de-layering describes the reduction from the top-heavy organizational charts of the 1950s to more streamlined management teams. It’s questionable whether such a term can be applied, writes The Economist, to what Moynihan is doing at Bank of America. Heidi Moore tells the story in this lively “tell it like it is” article where she coins the exfoliation term:
My point is that, in working with hundreds of executives going through job change, I have seen very talented and accomplished leaders go through the agony of questioning how they failed and what they could have done differently to keep their positions. In some situations the answer is truly nothing. In most situations the executive may have been 25% of the trigger — but circumstances were 75%. It is crucial to accept that other circumstances were the trigger. “Hard on the problem, but easy on the person” is a productive approach to accepting fate and moving forward under these circumstances. That approach, and having a career plan that excites you, are key to moving quickly into a productive and focused chapter two.
— Jim Deupree
Travel tips from our global journeys — making the most of your more relaxed next Chapter 