Joseph Lalonde posted a blog on four reasons to step away from Leadership. In his post here, Lalonde asserts that leadership is draining. Leadership is pouring out into the careers and lives of others. As Lalonde states, “[leaders] pour so much of our lives into helping others become the best versions of themselves and helping the company thrive, while we neglect our mental and physical health.” But leaders aren’t the only ones who are pouring themselves out into the careers and lives of others, nor do they have a monopoly on being at risk of neglecting mental, physical, emotional, and spiritual health. Many different fields push on and pour out even when the jar is empty, and their bodies are “feeling worn out and tired.” Customer Experience is definitely one of those fields.
1. Your home life is suffering
As Lalonde states in his blog, we are all “more than just a cog in the organizational wheel.” We have family and friends who depend on us. Perhaps it is a child who needs help with homework, a spouse who wants to go out for a date, or a family member who needs your time and attention. Work-life balance, as a concept, implies the ability to “balance” the demands between work and home such that no part suffers. I won’t get into a discussion on “balance” vs prioritization, but when working cases, learning new tools, deploying solutions, preparing presentations, or conducting another virtual meeting causes you to neglect or miss out on the important people in your life, it’s time to take a step back.
Action Step: Take time off. Evaluate your schedule. Speak to a manager or HR to discuss whether your company is staffed properly. Look for ways to rotate on-call schedules more evenly, or even take a sabbatical from specific types of calls or cases.
2. You find yourself constantly overwhelmed
Several years ago, a colleague reached out to me with a resume of a talented individual who was looking for a new job. The resume was littered with accomplishments and accolades spanning nearly two decades of customer support. This particular individual had experience in startups and Fortune 500 companies; bootstrapping a group and resurrecting an existing team; managing 24/7 call centers and working in the trenches. Needless to say, I was excited for the opportunity to speak with them about the opportunity to have them join our staff. But the excitement waned when they shared that they were looking for a job outside of the customer experience. James, not his real name, explained that despite improvements in CRM systems, automation, and his company’s products, the work demands and workloads kept him underwater. In fact, James noted, even the prospect of cases was becoming too much.
It may be time to step away when you find yourself feeling overwhelmed, not only by the challenging cases, but also by the simple and routine, as well as the prospect of cases at all. As VP of Customer Experience, our teams have worked through periods (or cycles) when case loads are high, deployments require more time and attention, and the line between the work week and the weekend is blurred. But, in most of my experiences, cases begin to settle, trends revert to norms, urgency and escalations decrease, and the constant influx retreats to manageable items. If, like James, there is no retreat and the anticipation of case work has become worse than the actual reality, it is time to step back.
Action Step: In many industries, periods of work are cyclical. Determine if the exhaustion and feelings of overwhelm are due to a heavy cycle or external factors. Talk with your manager regarding the consistency of the workload or concerns regarding the flow of work.
3. You discover the organization is not going toward its vision
A vision statement defines a company’s long-term, aspirational goals. A vision statement is a declaration that clarifies the meaning, purpose, and desired impact that your company aspires to possess or create. The vision statement, while lofty, serves to galvanize employee engagement and clarify stakeholder expectations. For example, IKEA’s vision statement is “to create a better everyday life for the many people,” and Nike’s is “To bring inspiration and innovation to every athlete in the world.” As Lalonde states, vision is one of the reasons people are drawn to an organization. “We’re given this grand vision of how things will or should be. The picture is painted bright and clear.” But what happens when you realize what was bright and clear was just a way to pander for profits or poach clients? The company is no longer following its North Star or aligning itself with the vision.
Action Step: If you can influence the company’s realignment with the vision, and you are not overwhelmed by the work, consider working to course correct. But if you feel like the task requires a Herculean effort and will garner no support, consider a move to a new organization.
4. You discover the organization is not living up to its values
While a corner office, great benefits, or a chance to contribute to cutting-edge technology and a customer service team are drivers for employment, alignment with core values is also important. While vision provides clarity on where we are going, values provide clarity on who we are and how we intend to conduct ourselves. If you discover that the values of integrity, teamwork, and customer first are just buzzwords on the website or cool word art on the wall, it can be jarring. When values aren’t lived out in the organization, it can make the role of CX harder, less rewarding, and draining. Wrestling with “customer first” slogans while swimming in a profit-first culture can suck the joy out of work. When you discover that the company isn’t living up to its values, it may be time to step back.
Action Step: Review the company’s values. Look for where misunderstanding exists vs misalignment or malpractice. Speak to leadership and provide suggestions for ways to make the values real.
5. You have changed your life goals
As VP of Customer Experience, I was invited to give a talk at a local school. When asked about my career, I was forced to ponder how my plans to be an astronaut or math teacher had morphed into roles in software engineering and then customer experience. While some changes were the result of the “life happens” bucket, others were intentional changes in personal goals. As Lalonde states, “Life goals can change.” Our goals change as we experience new things at work and outside of work. Passions can be ignited or doused through experiences and stages of life.
As VP of Customer Experience, I’ve seen firsthand how volunteer experiences, customer calls, hobbies, and even tradeshows can cause people to discover new things about themselves. Steve, not his real name, worked on a customer call with a new client for two weeks. During that experience, Steve met consultants who were working in various capacities, including several DevOps engineers. As a result, Steve discovered that he didn’t really want a career in Customer Experience, but in DevOps. When your life goals change, it may be time to step away from customer experience and pursue something else.
Action Step: Identify your current life goals and how they have changed. Spend time reflecting on whether you can achieve those goals in your current role and organization or if you need to leave this role or your current organization to pursue something else.
6. Your personal life has changed
No one stays the same, personally or professionally. Our lives ebb and flow, changing with the seasons of life and those of our family. It’s totally normal for your personal life to change, resulting in less time for on-call duties or more responsibilities for weekends that were otherwise dedicated to work. Perhaps greater schedule flexibility is required than allowed in a call center, or the 3rd shift no longer works as you parent a teen with a “boyfriend” skilled in evading cameras, scaling walls like Spiderman, and attempting to enter bedroom windows. Life changes, like the birth of a child, aging parents, illness of yourself or a loved one, can require a change in life. There is nothing wrong with a life change or needing your career to support it. If your personal life has changed, it may be time to step back from customer experience.
Action Step: Assess your current life situation. Taking time to evaluate how things have changed can help you determine if your needs can be accommodated in the role or require something more drastic. Speak with your leadership team about possible schedule accommodations.
7. You are losing empathy
Webster’s Online Dictionary describes empathy as the action of understanding, being aware of, being sensitive to, and vicariously experiencing the feelings, thoughts, and experiences of another. Empathy involves putting yourself in someone else’s shoes, or seeing the world through their eyes, ears, fears, concerns, and related experiences. Empathy is the ability to see someone deeply and make them feel seen, valued, heard, and understood. Author David Brooks, in How to Know a Person, describes empathy as a set of social and emotional skills that include the components of mirroring, mentalizing, and caring. Empathy helps you see more than just a paying customer, but a person in need of genuine help that deserves your compassion. When you find yourself being cold, calculating, or callous with customers, it can be fatigue or just the impact of a long day and lots of customer issues. Or, it can be that you’ve lost your sense of empathy. Instead of seeing the world from their perspective, you feel bothered, angered by their needs, and unable to muster pleasantness or kindness.
Action Step: Talk about your mood and emotions. Are you feeling less inclined to help and more inclined to be harsh? Look for trends and patterns in your mood and responses. Are you struggling with certain times of day, types of cases, kinds of customers, or feeling tired and overwhelmed? Being honest about why can help you determine if the issue is fixable in your role and organization, requires a healthcare professional, or requires stepping away from CX.
8. You are increasingly negative
In addition to losing empathy, it may be time to take a step back if your default is to assume the worst intention behind a customer’s actions or malicious intent in their words. When you’ve lost the ability to empathize with others, it might be a sign of burnout or an indicator of a need for a change. When you expect the worst, assume the worst, or can only find things to criticize, it can be a sign that you need a break, a change in direction, or time to address what’s going on in your heart and mind. When you begin with the worst in mind, your reactions can become extremely detrimental to the overall customer experience. Negativity and complaining can seep out and poison conversations with customers.
Action Step: Start a gratitude journal to refocus your thoughts. Calm also suggests keeping a thought journal and taking other personal approaches for improving your mindset. Looking for positive factors occurring throughout the day can help improve your mood and outlook, and journaling can also help identify patterns of concern. In addition to journaling, try refocusing initial conversations and thoughts from negative to positive. Avoid words that push you towards a more negative frame of mind, words such as “never” and “always”, or self-critical words and phrases that wrongly impact your mindset.
9. You are unwilling to change
Customer Experience is an ever-evolving, constantly changing, and growing field. Not only do the tools and technology that undergird the profession change, but products, partners, customers, and the world itself also do. Perhaps most of your customers were in the US, specifically the southeast. But with mergers and acquisitions or natural sales growth, your customer base is worldwide. Navigating customer experience can be challenging, and it can clash with our goals, personalities, and internal desires. “Sometimes, we don’t want to change,” as Lalonde states. As VP of Customer Experience, I’ve worked with colleagues who have honestly shared that they are unwilling to change due to life goals, life changes, or career stages (near retirement, or short-term contract).
If you find yourself refusing or unwilling to change, you will need to seriously consider whether continuing in a customer experience position is right for you.
Action Step: Change is a constant, but if you’ve become reticent for change due to looming retirement or contract end dates, taking a step back to recharge or refresh could be an alternative. If the desire to step away from CX is caused by some other factors, discuss those with your leadership to see if there are ways to reengage your passion for CX or apply your skills, talents, and desire to another organizational unit.
Lalonde offers four reasons to consider stepping away from Leadership:
- You find yourself so overwhelmed that your home life is suffering
- You discover the organization is not going toward its vision
- You have changed your life goals
- You are unwilling to change
As Lalonde concludes,
“Sometimes, stepping away from leadership will bring you back to a place you want to lead again.”
Likewise, sometimes stepping away from customer experience may bring you back to CX again. But, even if it does not, stepping back to evaluate or stepping away to pursue a different path or passion can be valuable.