Here’s the dilemma of one of my recent recruits; He likes his job, his boss is great, Co-workers are friends both in and out of work. So what’s wrong? Well his work environment stinks because of the internal political games played out between divisions at the Sr. management level and above. So while he has no problem with the day to day work he also has no sense of direction where the company is going (technically) and what they hope his group can achieve for the business. Additionally, while the company is financially sound he feels that without a clear direction that the other divisions will try to take over projects leaving no real work for his group (i.e. project leaves and he’ll be shown the door).

The interesting aspect is that he is a strong performer who is loyal to his company, peers and direct supervisor and quite frankly he’s having a difficult time making the decision to leave. Now this isn’t unusual, but as recruiters we try to assist candidates in making good decisions for themselves. And therefore we ask candidates to review these questions in an attempt to assist in the decision process.

• Can this situation be addressed and changed by your manager alone or with very few people being involved? (examples: a raise/promotion, a change in projects, a change in team members)
• Will this potential change cause disruption to the way your team/company works?
• Is it realistic to think that your company/boss/co-workers will go along with your request?

So here’s the skinny. If it’s a minor change involving few people and no systematic change the odds are good that you can work with your boss to make the changes happen and help make your situation a more satisfying one. However, if the changes are more drastic (read systematic), unrealistic or require many people being involved most companies will balk either because they don’t want to change or simply they can’t change (or if they change for you everyone will want what you get – think working remotely).

So as for our above mentioned candidate you can imagine that for systematic political change to happen many upper level managers would need to get fired or leave, and quite frankly that’s just not realistic. So the conclusion he came to was to move on down the road and find another good job with a better work environment.