You and the environment
The world is a collection of heterogeneous, dynamic environments. These environments are physically and socially constructed.
It is easy to get sucked in to being obsessed with yourself, your thoughts and your actions. But the counterpart to all this is the environment. You exist in the environment, and your thoughts and actions exhibit themselves in the environment.
When things aren’t going quite right, it might be easier to think about how you can change, adapt, or work harder to succeed in whatever goal you set out to achieve. But it is equally important to think about how you can change your environment to your advantage.
When you find yourself in a situation where things are difficult for you, do not forget to consider if the environment is working against you.
Implications for work - the individual level
Different roles suit different people. These roles are a direct product of the environment in which the work takes place. It’s difficult to truly know if you fit into a role unless (a) you start the role and see for yourself, or (b) you have previously held a similar position. Many fall in the former camp.
Often, the result of blind experiment (a) is that you are not fit for the role. Despite all the self-reflection and self-development that you might undertake, your skillset and qualities may not be the best fit; you will not find the role fulfilling. It may not be complementary to other aspects of your life.
In these situations, even if the work environment is positive and the organisational systems are functional, you need to leave. Vote with your feet. Find an environment and a role that complements your qualities. Find your niche. Better yet, create it yourself, so that you have no doubt.
Implications for work - the organisational level (a focus on large organisations)
An organisation like a startup or large corporation can be thought to have constructed its own system for common work. Sometimes these systems produce environments which are supportive for those who work in it, but sometimes the environments are unhealthy.
When an organisation’s environment or systems are dysfunctional, the friction of working there can be miserably unfulfilling. Working in a broken system is the same thing as working against a broken system. There are large organisations that, due to positive public image, or holding access to privileged roles (that is, the privilege to have that role comes with a significant barrier to entry, such as needing a license to be a registered nurse), can get away with poorer environments and compensation. They are buoyed by the goodwill of their employees, or the desire for the individual to continue to hold a privileged role (as defined above) despite the shortcomings of the system.
Many might say that it falls to these employees to instigate change to improve the system. But the larger and more dysfunctional the organisation, the more difficult this becomes (I suspect it becomes exponentially more difficult with increasing size). In most cases, bottom-up approaches are merely folly to give the impression of incremental improvement in these situations. It is an inappropriate delegation, particularly when incentives at different levels of the system are not aligned.
In these situations, unionisation and coalescence of power can help to exercise change. The most disruptive and extreme action these unions can take is temporary striking until conditions are met. Even if the conditions are eventually met, I think this sows the seeds of future unrest and tension in the system.
Vote with your feet
I don’t think that this is the solution to every problem, but I think it is one that needs to be considered with more weight: vote with your feet and leave.
Don’t hesitate to exercise your optionality if you have it and it’s the right thing to do. It is the greatest power you have in these situations. Vote with your feet and leave for a better system.
To be very clear, voting with your feet is not the same thing as giving up. It is not a sign of permanent failure. It is the result of insight into knowing yourself, knowing what you want out of life, and not wasting time getting it. Voting with your feet is the result of not settling for a compromise, and not squandering time and energy working against a broken system.
You owe no loyalty to a system that doesn’t work for you. Vote with your feet and leave for a system that facilitates success.
You are not obliged to try and fix the system you work in if that is not what you want to do with your time. Vote with your feet and leave for a system where you can do what you find fulfilling.
You owe it to yourself to be in your own niche, where you are playing the games you create, that you are best at. Vote with your feet. Create or find an environment that works for you, so that your work feels like play.
Well said! Voting with your feet to me sounds like an intuitive response to the environment. We often can't put our finger on exactly what the problem is, until we leave the environment and are able to view it through a fresh perspective.