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Episode 095
Hannah Clark, the Editor of The Product Manager, joins to discuss the complexities of change fatigue in product management. We explore how the relentless pace of change can drive innovation while simultaneously leading to team exhaustion and frustration.
Hannah shares insights from her experience in startups and emphasizes the necessity for leaders to balance innovation with stability to maintain morale. We discuss the importance of psychological safety for individual contributors and offer practical strategies to navigate change fatigue constructively.
This conversation serves as a vital reminder for both team members and leaders to approach change with mindfulness, ensuring a thriving and engaged work environment.
RESOURCES
TRANSCRIPT
[0:02] Welcome to Product Voices, a podcast where we share valuable insights and useful resources to help us all be great in product management. Visit the show's website to access the resources discussed on the show, find more information on our fabulous guests, or to submit your product management question to be answered on our special Q&A episodes. That's all at productvoices.com. And be sure to subscribe to the podcast on your favorite platform. Now, here's our host, JJ Rorie, CEO of Great Product Management.
Introduction to Change Fatigue
[0:36] Hello and welcome to Product Voices. I'm so excited about our episode today. It's going to be on a topic that, unfortunately or fortunately, I'm not sure which one, maybe both, is near and dear to a lot of our hearts in terms of we experience it a lot, and that's change fatigue. And, you know, the thing about product management that makes it great, which is to me the fortunate part, is we're not doing the same thing all the time. We're learning new things. We're changing the way we do things. We're adapting. We're evolving. We're improving, hopefully.
[1:13] But the unfortunate thing about that is that sometimes we get really tired of changing. and we want to be there wherever there is. And sometimes we're always trying to learn or always trying to improve ourselves and our product and we just never feel like there's stability, if you will. And so change fatigue is real and it's something that we feel quite often in product management, regardless of, you know, our maturity in the role or our environment or corporate culture or what have you, change fatigue is real. So we're going to talk about change fatigue today and it's going to be a great conversation. I'm so excited to have my guest, Hannah Clark, with me. She's an expert and just really excited about this conversation. So Hannah is the editor of The Product Manager. Following six years of experience in the tech industry, she pivoted into the content space where she's had the pleasure of working with some of the most brilliant voices in the product world. Driven by insatiable curiosity, which is always a wonderful thing for a product person, and a love of bringing people together, her mission is to foster a fun, vibrant, and inspiring community of product people. And we will obviously put more information about that community on the show notes. Hannah, thank you so much for being here with me.
[2:26] Thanks for having me, JJ. I'm excited.
Understanding Change Fatigue
[2:27] Yeah, it's going to be a great conversation. And again, just a really kind of pertinent topic. So obviously, very short intro there, but what does change fatigue mean to you in your terms and kind of, you know, why do you think about change fatigue and kind of the background there? Tell me a little bit about how you've experienced it and what it means to you. Sure. So I have a background working with a number of different startups. And a lot of the time where I find that change fatigue really starts to sink in is really at that point where we start to scale and we're starting to change our mindset, especially from a leadership perspective, from a really small, scrappy team to a team of a lot more people in which the need to change direction is just as frequent, but it's much more difficult to do when you have a larger boat. Um, so from my perspective, change fatigue really, uh, kind of encapsulates, uh, an issue that's one of the dominoes and a domino effect of problems that can occur when, uh, somebody, uh, let's say, let's say a product team, uh, is being constantly asked to change directions. Uh, and oftentimes I feel it's especially prominent when we're, we're changing directions before we've really had the satisfaction of attaining a measurable result.
[3:49] And and this all kind of comes down to this agile mindset that I think it's quite prominent in a startup mindset when you're you know early on if you're a team of five people just trying to get something off the ground it's okay to have a lot of owned knowledge it's okay to have a lot of changes and iterations in a very short period of time but as this team scales and information is passed on differently to different team members according to how long they've been with the company, according to how long and how far along a project is, it just gets to be much more difficult to change directions while still effectively managing the energy of the team. And that's where the fatigue really sits in.
Factors Leading to Change Fatigue
I love that perspective that you just shared. And it makes sense in terms of what and what change fatigue is. So when you think of change fatigue in that way, are there factors that lead to fatigue? Could be internal, external, you know, you alluded to one or two there, but are there some factors that you see as drivers of change fatigue? Yeah, I think when we're talking about sort of the factors that lead to change fatigue, it starts at the leadership level in which... Let's say we have something, an exciting opportunity that comes about, you know, we see an opportunity because our users are requesting something specific or we can see that a specific feature is, you know, there's an opportunity there to build on it or to, you know, to introduce something new.
[5:12] When we have a team that's already mobilized and kind of developing that feature or they've really started to kind of to make progress on that roadmap you're really dealing with a lot of different energies from different individual contributors who are kind of building their own momentum and kind of creating their own sort of systems and processes even if they're not really communicated like we all kind of have our own way of doing things and kind of making sure that we get from point A to point B, as we're supposed to, as we move through different tasks and deliverables. But then ultimately, where I think that a lot of problems start to crop up is when there is this pressure, usually at the leadership level, to pursue the next best or the even better thing and cut off what's in progress in service of the next thing that we want to pursue. So this is not what this is not the only situation that can lead to change fatigue, But it's certainly one that I see frequently in which leadership gets a little bit ahead of themselves in terms of either doubting what they have in progress is going to deliver the results that they were hoping for or expecting that what they have in mind now is a better opportunity. And therefore, the resources that were previously allocated should be reallocated to something new.
[6:29] And then that kind of leads to a number of different issues that contribute to change fatigue. So, for example, individual contributors that feel like they've really gotten close to an outcome feel a little bit discouraged because they haven't really been able to see the fruits of their labor. They haven't been able to get the full learnings of having seen that deliverable to completion and being able to learn from the outcomes. They're also now having to back up and punt as far as all of the systems and processes that they've kind of implemented in order to get their existing projects done. All the administrative work, the context switching, like there's so many other things that are happening kind of in the background as you kind of switch from one project to the next. But then what can really compound on this is that oftentimes leaders that are prone to to these environments. Tend to have a cycle in which this is repeated. So, you know, it's one thing to switch from one project to the next, because it's just an unmissable opportunity or the material realities of the organization of change, maybe there's been a significant layoff, and now we have to change things and change priorities because of a lack of or fewer resources.
[7:46] But then when it becomes a repetitive cycle in which there's always something new to pursue, and there's always a reason to kind of kneecap the project that has just been in progress, there becomes a trust issue between individual contributors and leadership in which the mentality that's difficult to avoid is, okay, well, you know, the last time that this happened, they said that this thing was going to be the next big thing. And so I switched my focus, and now I'm focused on this. And now that has happened again, I'm not convinced that I'm not going to be asked to back up and punt yet again and divert my energy. And therefore, it's really difficult to muster that same motivation and energy and investment from the team that they had the last time. Yeah, I completely, I see that. And it's, you know, it's unfortunate. And, you know, I always tell people that I'm working with or teams or coaches, you know, someone I'm coaching, et cetera, that the leader is, The leader isn't necessarily, well, the leader almost always is doing it out of good intentions, right? They believe this is the right way to go. They believe that we need to make this, this pivot or this change. But to your point, it doesn't, it doesn't matter what the intentions are, right?
Leadership's Role in Change Management
[9:02] But because the effect are similar. But here's my question to you, and it's kind of a two-pronged question from both a leader's perspective and the individual contributor or the team member, right, perspective. What can we do about it, right? So how can, let's start with the leaders. How can leaders be more balanced in the way that they approach market conditions? And, you know, like you said, there are some times where it's just glaring, you've got to change, right? COVID was a good example from a few years ago, right? Of course, it's still around, but the crux of it was a few years ago, and everything changed. And so many businesses had to do things dramatically different, literally from one day to the next. Or some other market conditions can be that apparent. But those are somewhat rare, let's be honest. Right. So how can that leader balance, you know, be be, you know, dynamic and shift when they need to shift for market market changes, but still not, you know, cause this kind of fatigue and environment in their organization? I think a lot of it comes down to just being more aware of how the decisions that you're making are impacting the productivity and outcomes that the team is able to deliver.
[10:22] Because I think and to an extent, there's a level of leadership that I'll be honest, that is a little bit opaque to me. I've been a leader, but not at the very, very top level. But I can surmise just from conversations with folks who are a little bit higher along in their career. It seems to me that there, um, as you become responsible for a larger and larger team, the resources that you are responsible for, um, become a little bit more diffused in terms of how you see them and how, you know, they, um, I don't want to accuse anyone of, you know, devaluing their team. But at the same time, I think when you don't get to know or you've kind of lost touch with the people that are working beneath you on various levels and you become removed from them as individual people, you kind of start to see them as, you know, resources or means to an end. They're there to do their jobs and they are. But it's difficult to kind of have a real good conceptualization of how the energy levels and the motivation and the trust and all of those kind of non-tangible factors that exist in the culture of your organization contribute to their ability to deliver what you want them to do.
[11:39] So that's kind of the mindset that I think is good to be aware of but then as far as what is to be done about that, I think it's really a matter of kind of looking at how you evaluate opportunities versus what you want to decommission. So, you know, for example, AI is a great example, we see a ton of companies now rolling out AI features, for better or for worse, I've got a whole other spiel on that. But, but when we think about, you know, if we're going to be decommissioning another project in service of an AI feature, there is definitely the benefits to be reaped as far as what does the feature present as far as business outcomes. And then there's also the factor of considering, well, what are we losing by pursuing that opportunity? What are the possible negative outcomes of decommissioning this project? It's not just about the dollar value, about what that feature may or may not deliver. And without kind of getting to that point where we have a measurable outcome. It's difficult to really have a good sense of that.
[12:40] But also in terms of, you know, the people who are working on this project right now, what has their journey been like for the last year or so? What kind of outcomes have they had in the past where they have been able to learn and iterate? If they haven't even been able to finish the last thing that they were doing and achieve a measurable outcome and learn from it and have that satisfaction of having a deliverable that they're proud of, are they able or best equipped to bring their best energy, bring their best learnings, bring their best their best skill set, put their best selves towards this feature that I want to develop? Well, it's maybe a different conversation. So I think it's more about kind of evaluating, you know, who are the people that we're going to be sort of taking away from other projects and putting onto this one? And what are the real impacts on a human level? And how does that connect to the business outcome that we're trying to pursue? That makes a lot of sense. And, you know, I don't think it's interesting, as you were talking, it's, you know, we do kind of shy away from that idea that leaders don't know who they're, their teams are and, you know, they see them as resources. But the truth is, you know, when you get that far above three, four or five levels, whatever it is, it's virtually impossible to know everyone. Now, some leaders can, but, you know, some leaders literally have thousands of people all over the world. And of course, they don't know them all.
[14:09] But the mindset is still what's important there. So I love that approach. And I think as leaders, we do have, you know, kind of that responsibility to the business, but the people are the business, right? And so we have to, you know, see it that way as well. So love that, love that. So let's talk about the other side.
Individual Contributors and Their Challenges
[14:33] You're an individual contributor or, you know, a team member. Maybe you're a manager of people, but you're still a team member that's kind of getting these changes thrust upon you, right, not necessarily the decision maker making them, what would you do? How would you advise them? How can they approach situations where, you know, they're experiencing change fatigue because of the environment that they're in? Is there anything that they can do to right the ship or to change things?
[15:05] Yeah, this can be a complex question just because, as we both know, all organizations have so many nuances that really affect how the team operates internally. I'd say that one of the main factors to make sure is established, and this is kind of on both leadership, middle management, you know, anyone in the team is about fostering psychological safety because part of addressing this issue is being able to have open and honest communication lines and the ability to deliver feedback to someone who is, you know, maybe a little higher than you on the org chart, which can be very scary. And if that psychological safety isn't abundantly clear from the point of onboarding and isn't reiterated throughout the course of the company's trajectory, it's very difficult even for an empowered product team to feel that they really have that kind of influence. So there's a level of that in which if that isn't present in an organization.
[16:07] The next steps become very, very difficult. And the next steps in that case would be to really kind of push back a little bit about, you know, what is being lost right now? So, for example, I'll give a kind of a personal example. I won't name names. This is an organization that I've worked for in the past in which the founder was very, very keen on pursuing new opportunities. And it became almost a meme internally that the founder would always be kind of really, really hyped on a specific initiative. And we would all get on board and everyone was excited about it. And then it just wouldn't come to fruition because we would be constantly changing directions just as we got to the point where we were almost there.
[16:55] He would get a little cold feet, you know, or something. Something was always the reason we had to change direction. And then after a few times of that happening, then the team, you know, the grumblings that you would hear were kind of along the lines of, well, you know, this is what he's saying now, but give it a few months. Like, don't don't get too invested because sure enough, he's going to change directions. And then sort of conversations had to change in which it was less about, okay, yeah, you know, yes, boss, let's, we'll get right on it. You know, I might be a little bit disappointed, but I can see where you're coming from. And then it starts to become about, well, hold on now, I can see, you know, the opportunity that you're, you're kind of highlighting here. And I can see that the, that there's a benefit to that. There's also benefits to what we're doing right now. For example, you know, like we, we have, uh, every deliverable is an experiment, right? Like no matter what you're, we're launching. Um.
[17:48] Whatever it is, you never really know the outcome until you've really put it in front of people. And you've really had the opportunity to kind of collect feedback and learn from things and iterate. So if you haven't really reached that point where you're able to get that, first of all, that satisfaction, second of all, the learnings, third of all, the practice and the competencies that you can then build into what they really want to pursue next, you have kind of a good case for why it's worth completing that before moving on to the next thing.
[18:17] So then the conversations with that founder became more to the effect of, well, you know, what if we just get to this point or what if we have a longer offboarding or what if we just kind of table that idea just until we've reached this point so that we can apply the learnings from that project to this one and do a better job of it. So I think there's an element of negotiation, but that's only really possible if you have that kind of relationship with your leadership team where you're able to give some of that upward feedback. I love what you're saying there. And I think it's a skill that's really important in product management and for product managers to be able to negotiate and prioritize and with all kinds of stakeholders. But I love the point about psychological safety, because I think that that's overlooked a lot. And sometimes we don't even realize we don't have psychological safety until something like this hits and we realize that, you know what, there's no way I can go talk to them because it doesn't matter, you know, or, or there may be some negative impact if I do. So I think that's, it's really important for, for leaders to hear that, that we've got to set that culture from the beginning. And then as individuals, we, we have to kind of, keep showing that value. Really love the point about telling the story about the value of what we're doing now, because for the most part, I mean, obviously, you know, shiny object syndrome or whatever we call it is real. And it sounds like your, you know, former founder or CEO had that a bit.
[19:46] But, you know, for the most part, a lot of these new ideas that are thrust upon us are somewhat related. And so the point about, to what we're doing, meaning, and so the point about, well, if we get to a certain point, if we keep going and get to a certain point, we can learn certain things that will help that new idea, right? So I think that's a really important point. And again, it's just about us as individuals influencing, even those that are two or three, you know, steps above us, which is not easy, but really important. So tell me a little bit more about, you know, if, if an individual is finding themselves in this kind of change fatigue, sometimes it may feel like burnout or, you know, there's just something that you're, it's just not the, the, the happy, you know, jumping out of bed every morning kind of energy that you have when you're, you're going, going to your job every day. You know, what are some things that they can do in addition to trying to right the ship and talk to and kind of stave off some of that change? What are some of the things that you would suggest from a kind of personal level or just professional level to help them get through some of this fatigue? Yeah, I'm glad you asked this question because this really comes back to some of the things that we really try to pretend we don't do.
[21:08] And what I'm referring to is when we tend to start to feel those beginning effects of change fatigue, of burnout, of the erosion of trust in leadership, if we're feeling that things are changing so frequently that we're starting to doubt that judgment that the leadership level is sound, or that there is a firm control of where the company is headed.
[21:29] Those kinds of doubts and, uh, drains on energy in a team can really lead to some negative thoughts, which tend to manifest as sort of toxic workplace behavior. I hate to say it. Um, but that when we're really talking about the human consequences and then ultimately what trickles down into the business consequences of, of something like this, this is why it's important for us to, to really take this seriously is that the culture of an organization is a fragile thing. It requires the active participation and contribution of everybody there. So when the team begins to feel detached from or at odds with the leadership team, that can unfortunately lead to things that erode at the culture or degrade the culture of the organization in a way that's very difficult to recover from.
[22:23] And I don't think anybody joins a company with the intention of becoming that person, but I think even the best intended of us can find ourselves with those kinds of thoughts. And, you know, it doesn't really take much for, you know, folks to start planting seeds of doubt in other teammates' heads and then people start to feel less attached to or motivated with their work. And then that can just drag out a whole host of issues within the team that become very poisonous. To team morale, to employee engagement, to the quality of deliverables, to retention.
[23:06] It connects to so many things that are very, very tangible, but seem so intangible in origin. So I think that that's something that we have to be thinking about when we think about, well, you know, so they're annoyed, so they're tired.
[23:25] It's easy to have a, well, buck up, it's your job kind of mindset. Even in a tough job market, folks have options. And sometimes the option that they choose is to leave the company. And sometimes the option that they choose is to stay and grumble and make other people want to leave the company. So in terms of what we should do then, when we think about that as just a real human reaction to an environment that's no longer serving us or that we feel that we've disconnected from. I think that if you're listening and you found yourself tempted to fall into that pattern of behavior of, you know, starting to grumble, starting to take your frustrations with the leadership team inward to your colleagues at the same level of contribution, you know, it's really important to, I have to be straight up, check yourself a little bit. Because the consequences of becoming that, and even if you have a very valid reason for feeling frustrated, and for feeling that change fatigue, I think it's just so important to just keep in mind that the decisions that you make, your behavior, impact your entire career.
[24:33] So the difficult choice in that situation to make is to choose to not take those frustrations inward, because that will do the opposite of what you hope it will not make things better. Instead, I think that needs to be the signal that you, whoever you report to, you need to have a conversation with them immediately, that the frustration is starting to build and that you need some kind of accommodation in order to find, you know, some kind of a path forward that's constructive for everyone. And, and hash out your concerns? What's the reason that you're so frustrated that you feel that leadership isn't really hearing you? That might mean having to kind of present the reasons why you think that the change is premature or ill-advised or et cetera, et cetera. But really the point that I'm trying to make here is if you can avoid turning your change fatigue into something more toxic, absolutely take any initiative that you can in order to make that frustration into something constructive, because the moment you start taking it to your colleagues, that's when you do more harm to the business, more harm to your team, and more harm to yourself, because that becomes, something that influences you as you try to approach a different role.
[25:50] That's great advice. And I think it's, you know, really important to find those, like you said, those triggers that are happening, those signals that are happening in ourselves, right? We can kind of literally feel things differently and our energy levels, the way we react, all of that. In addition to the situational, you know, signals, it is important for us to be self-aware and environmentally aware of what's happening. And then go, you know, use some of the advice you mentioned earlier about trying to influence people, starting with your manager, whatever it may be, right? But trying to change the environment and absolutely, as you say, trying not to make it more negative. And that's not easy because, again, and it's not intentional. I don't think anybody, you know, wakes up one day and says, I'm going to, you know, sabotage everything because I'm annoyed with this place, right? I guess there are some people who do that, but most of us don't, right?
[26:49] But sometimes our actions are even just, you know, sarcastic or, you know, even slightly negative can definitely change the energy of a team and the trajectory. And it goes back to the, like you said, the leaders, you know, being aware of what's happening. But we all, you know, we're all, for the most part, educated, experienced, well-paid, relatively speaking. You know, it's our responsibility to some extent to not only try to change the environment, but absolutely take care of ourselves. Right. Like you said. So I love that we had that part of the conversation as
[27:27] well. Um, so just to, to wrap up, um, I've loved our, our talk today. Tell me a little bit more and tell everyone out there listening, um, a little bit more about how and where people can learn more about you and what you do and the product manager, et cetera.
Resources and Community for Product Managers
[27:43] Sure. Well, I'd love if folks could visit us at theproductmanager.com. We produce a number of different resources, articles, how-to guides, et cetera, for how to win at work and get better and sharpen your craft as a product manager. I also host the Product Manager podcast. If you want to join our listenership, we'd love to have you. And then we also have a community that we've recently launched. So if you are interested in getting more involved and chatting with folks who are also in the product space. We're specifically looking for folks who are kind of struggling with some of the challenges of being in a growth stage startup. If that sounds like you, then we'd love to have you on the team as well. That sounds great. Thank you for sharing that. And we will also share links in the show notes so everyone can find you and the product manager in the community. Hannah Clark, thank you so much for being here with me. I've loved the conversation, really important topic, and I appreciate your insights on this. Thanks for being here. Thanks, JJ. And thank you all for joining us on Product Voices. Hope to see you on the next episode. Thank you for listening to Product Voices, hosted by JJ Rory. To find more information on our guests, resources discussed during the episode, or to submit a question for our Q&A episodes, visit the show's website, productvoices.com, and be sure to subscribe to the podcast on your favorite platform.
[29:03] Music.