I’ve recently been fortunate to accept a fantastic offer to join an organisation looking to drastically improve the way they manage Safety, Environment and Wellbeing. Unfortunately for my past employer that meant the often difficult process of having to identify and onboard individuals to take over my role. Sorry team!
I’ve had two transitions in the past 5 years and each time set out a meticulous document which outlined with as much detail as possible how I managed and led the teams I was associated with. This took at least 50 hours each at best guess. Unfortunately prior to writing these detailed documents I failed to ask the person whom I was handing over to what was the best method for THEM to get across the context of the role. Subsequently, both individuals rarely relied upon the document and preferred to rely on the verbal and coached handover elements of the transition, followed up with differing degrees of follow up via phone call.
At first, I was a bit bitter that they won’t used more since I had put so much detail in them. Every time I got a phone call I felt like saying sarcastically ‘Did you read the handover, it’s on page XX?’ Yet, to be honest, I was frustrated at myself misreading the situation, and each phone call confirms it, rubbing salt into the wound.
With my past transition, it was very much more face time, bringing individuals into meetings and relationships earlier and providing a warm handover a full week prior to me leaving (Can’t take credit for that, was a good thought from the WHS Director). Yet also I have brought individuals and the team a longer much faster than previous roles which made the transition so much smoother (it’s fantastic when you have growth orientated individuals in your team who are always looking to serve more people). Carving off part of my role to my likely successor even before I left gave them a chance to know the role and characters well prior to officially taking the role. This changed the nature of our handover to stretch & vision vs nuts & bolts.
I know there will be hiccups along the way after the transition, yet feel confident that once the waterfall is breached post the initial few weeks it will be smooth sailing for the team knowing their capabilities.
And that is key to a big part of my why, enabling people to develop and provide opportunities to grow and serve more, whether that means others or I leaving to enable that to occur if we can’t internally find opportunities. Unfortunately sometimes rocket ships come out of nowhere, and if you get asked to get on a rocket ship, it’s damn hard to say no.
Reframe my Safety Brain 