Change is not easy, even when you are looking for it.
I work with an organization and team that are in the midst of overwhelming change. Everything around us is under stress due an environment that does not stay still. In the past few months, we have adding hundreds of new staff. Even though I made the core recommendation to hire them, most have no idea who I am. In their communities, they are new. The company they work for is new. Even the clients are new.
When I think of the sleepy environment of last year, I think of a client base that numbered in hundreds. Now it numbers in the thousands, more than 30 times what it was. In the old days, I could name the largest clients. Now I have no idea who makes up the top 10, much less the top 100. It is a very different world.
As I look at my management team, the way that they are performing, working together, and building their teams, it is hard to recall the days when there were just three of us. It is a radical change for me. It is hard to imagine what it is for others. Everything is different from what it was.
The change cascades and builds, creating its own momentum. I am coming to realize that in itself, change is its own constant. I knew that yesterdays were not going be here long. As a coming storm, the sense of new horizons was always present. As I think of the recent milestones, new business acquired, hiring decisions made, and plans put in place, I realize that a new phase had been waiting for my embrace. I feel as if I am a character in an old story; “When an Egyptian ship that had wintered there in the harbor prepared to leave for Italy, we got on board. The ship had a carved Gemini for its figurehead: ‘the Heavenly Twins.’” (Acts 28.11) The story continued then as it does now.
The next chapter will be new. It always is.
