Section No. 1: This week's BIG Takeaway Be the change you want to see even if the culture is toxic
Image: Pleightx
Bully at the helm? Check. Why should we expect anything different this time?
The context: Elon Musk began cost cutting measures at Twitter, with reports indicating that between 25% and 50% of the company's staff was terminated on Friday.
People learned if they were fired via email.
“If your employment is not impacted, you will receive a notification via your Twitter email. If your employment is impacted, you will receive a notification with next steps via your personal email.”
This comes after Musk removed many senior leaders and dismantled Twitter's board of directors.
Musk has also indicated that many of the restrictions on certain types of speech and possible false claims could be removed from the platform.
What we can learn: An entire company's culture can reflect the behaviors and views of one person and sometimes there's very little you can do to change things - except change yourself.
Musk has quite a reputation as a leader and a person; the list of transgressions is extensive.
His past actions and current decisions at Twitter paint a clear picture of what is on the horizon for the company and its employees.
Amazingly there are open positions at Twitter("Here, your voice matters.") and I am guessing that the company will receive many applications despite the chaos.
My favorite - and you couldn't make this up - is the role of Senior Manager, Safety & Integrity.
My take: Being surprised by the Twitter situation is like joining a football team and being shocked that people are slamming you to the ground.
Remaining employees know what the culture is going to be; they have to acknowledge they can't change it.
One thing they can do is to model the behaviors they want to see from others.
Sometimes the culture will be what the culture will be even if it might be a toxic environment. Despite this a person can still take the high road and be true to their values - as difficult as that might sound
What's the worse that happens? You get fired for being a good person, respectful, empathetic and kind?
To recap: Be the change you want to see even if the culture is toxic
Section No. 2: Other lessons from the week
Image: NBA
The NBA's Nets set a new standard for a dysfunctional culture when guard Kyrie Irving posted a link to a movie with anti-Semitic views and lies.
Irving refused at first to apologize and, in a move that probably had members of the Nets PR team frantically searching Indeed.com, didn't say "no" when asked if he had anti-Semitic views.
Teammate Kevin Durant said he "felt like we could have just kept playing basketball and kept quiet as an organization."
And, just to make sure they couldn't be outdone, the team also fired their coach and planned to replace him with former Celtics coach Ime Udoka who was suspended this year for breaking team rules related to sexual misconduct.
This video is what the Nets culture looks like right now.
Mass General Brigham announced a new patientcode of conduct.
"The code of conduct prohibits physical or verbal threats; offensive comments about someone’s race, accent, religion, gender, or sexual orientation; refusing to see a hospital employee because of such personal traits; sexual or vulgar actions or words; and disrupting the care or experience of another patient."
Is it me or does it feel like as a society we are driving in a car stuck in reverse?
LSU takes a risk and beats Alabama on a gutsy play.
Down by one in overtime LSU had a choice - play it safe and kick an extra point to tie the game or push all the chips to the center of the table and go for the win on a two-point conversion. They chose the latter and won the game.
This fits nicely with the "F" in our Safety Model - Failure, Risk and Vulnerability.
Random acts of kindness inspire and bring joy.
Imagine if random acts of kindness weren't so random in your work culture. Here's some inspiration to help you consider what is truly possible.
Vote.
Enough said.
That's all for now Thanks for reading and please remember:
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Rich Trombetta @trombettarich
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