I was running this morning on a friend's treadmill. This particular treadmill is well used and I know that many miles have bee run and walked on it over the years. The foam covering the hand rails is torn in places and some of the paint is chipped and faded. About a quarter of the way into my workout the machine developed a very annoying rattle. I stepped off and looked around the machine with the intent of fixing the rattle. Fortunately, I didn't see anything and I couldn't duplicate the rattle unless I was running on the treadmill. Fixing the rattle by fixing the machine didn't look to be an option...and, the rattle was becoming increasingly annoying.
Fortunately...
I mentioned above that I "fortunately" didn't find any cause for the rattle. It was fortunate because, absent a quick fix, a thought occurred to me. If I couldn't fix the machine was there anything I could do to fix how I was using the machine? With this in mind, I started paying attention to my gait. I noticed that I was landing heavier on my left foot than on my right. An old knee injury had been acting up and I had unconsciously compensated. I focused on shifting my gait so that I was landing more on the ball of my foot. The rattle disappeared!
The place to begin "fixing" something is with me...
Where in our organizations do we notice "rattles" that are increasingly irritating to us? If you are like most others, you'll try to "fix" the rattle by looking at the organization and/or at others as the cause of the "rattle". It is highly likely that most organizational "rattles"are caused by leaders and managers landing awkwardly on their organizations. If we want to sustain success we need to learn to first look to ourselves as the cause of the rattles that are causing distress and poor performance in our organizations.
