Dear Stanley,
I work in a big financial institution. My company was taken over recently by another big bank, and now we have all new bosses. A lot of people were fired, most of my friends. Our department is smaller and everything is different. Everybody from my old company is now sort of a second-class citizen, and all the people from the company who took us over are really obnoxious and act like they’re better than we are. My new boss doesn’t really talk to any of us and has no idea how things are done around here. Obviously, I’m lucky to still have a job, but I’m having trouble adjusting. Do you have any ideas?
Lost in Space
Dear Space Cadet,
Yeah, things are bad all over. No, seriously. They are. We pretty much all have a choice. We can remember the way things were before everything came crashing down and allow ourselves to be swept up in bitterness and nostalgia, or we can do what business warriors do: Assess the situation, develop a strategy, and execute against it. Or we can do a bit of both. The times we are living in are very scary. We may be at the bottom, or we may not. If we’re not, it’s hard to imagine what might be around the corner. The trick, obviously, is to avoid looking around the corner. That’s okay. We have plenty on our plate right here, don’t we?
The key to living in times of change in business is to take it a day at a time, a challenge at a time. You are in a pretty classic situation, even though the situation is more dire: You’ve been taken over. Being the acquired guys has never been easy, but there is an established approach that has worked for many over the years. First, if you live through the initial purges, you maintain. Do your job. Begin to make friends with the conquering Martians. Listen very hard to your new management, and attempt to figure out what the frig they want from you. Second, as you do so, you observe very carefully the way the conquering mutants dress, what time they like to feed, what drinks they favor, where they like to hunker down and socialize. And you emulate them. If they like to wear funny hats on the way to work, you get yourself one. If they part their hair on the wrong side, do you so as well. If they arrive for work at 7 a.m., as bright and frisky as coked-up beavers, that’s your ticket, too. Monkey see, monkey do. After a while, you will become all-but indistinguishable from the invaders, and like magic they will begin to see you as a “good guy,” i.e. one of them.
When my company was taken over by the former entity known as Westinghouse, we all suddenly had to go out and buy a bunch of pinstripe — men and women alike — and big, R. Crumb-like shoes with tiny pinholes in them. In the evenings, we all had to learn how to drink Sambuca Romano. They ate lunch at 11:30 in the morning. They carpeted themselves with memos and conducted constant meetings to establish consensus, like ants. Their leaders were old and very, very square. All this was a new deal for the majority of us, and some couldn’t change. Those who couldn’t lost their early lunch. So observe. Be flexible. Listen, and then listen harder. And become that which you fear and loathe. You’ll be all right. In any event, you’ll stand a better chance than those who are married to the old ways of life.
Your greatest enemy in this regard is your heart, the feelings you have for the old bosses, the old colleagues, the old offices, the old letterhead, the old way of life. Have you noticed that the people without too much emotional baggage do best in business? The ones who, like sharks, move forward, cold-blooded and hungry, eating as they go? Be one of them. You’ll do better.
One final thing to consider: What’s different about takeovers these days is that, unlike the glorious days of yesteryear, your acquiring party is almost as messed up as you were before your company collapsed into the arms of the other. Previously, conquering entities were strong, superior in some way, and in a good position to take the helm and steer the newly merged ship. These days the guys taking you over might very well be the next ones to take the hose. This means your new bosses are probably as stressed out, crazed, terrified and woozy as you are. This is both a liability and an opportunity. Yes, they’re nuts already. But they also need more help than the average Roman. Provide that assistance, and you just might have a chance. Good luck.
