Musings at Altitude

I’ve mentioned several times that we’re going through change now in our company, much of that change as a response to the enormous growth that we’ve experienced over the last 5 years or so.  Unbelievably (but oh so true) we woke up one morning and we were a billion dollar corporation, and that growth from just over $200M to $1B over five years spooked lots of people.

As I think back to five years ago, I would define our culture as one of pure heart – it was based on trust and empowerment and all of us that pursued our passion of growth with a common cause jumped right in and drove hard to deliver far above the expectations of our owners and overseers.  As that trust and empowerment resulted in growth beyond belief, with more growth came more concern, and with more concern came more oversight, and with more oversight came more process, and with more process came more logic, and with more logic came less heart. 

As new team members are added today, they are added to oversee the billion dollar business and they bring with them the expertise and structure of their own past experiences.  Those experiences, though very needed to achieve a new level of maturity in the corporate operations, often times are implemented with experience based biases that seem logical to those that are new but seem heartless to those that have given their all to achieve the growth that now creates such grave concerns for so many in those overseeing roles.

Our incredible success came straight from the heart and it oftentimes defied any possible logic.  As we threw structure at opportunity, the heartbeat of the organization synched up across multiple companies and the success of one drove the success of another.  Our logic was simple – follow your heart; and as we followed our heart, our companies grew, and as our companies grew, the passion to provide even more to our owners grew even faster.

As I look at us today, I remember back fondly at the smiles that were created when all we did came from the heart.  Intellectually, I too understand that structure and process are needed to mitigate risks, but I wonder if too much logic and too much maturity will eventually destroy the very heart that got us to where we are today.  If smiles comes from the heart, then what comes from the logic?

As you can tell, I follow my heart.  I certainly hope that the logic that is rapidly permeating our organization today can in some way recognize and accomodate the critical importance of heart in who we are and what we do.