4 Ways Complacency Will Damage Your Organization

Every leader wants to see their organizations become successful. There’s a problem that comes along with success:

Complacency

That’s when you reach a level of self-satisfaction accompanied by unawareness of actual dangers or deficiencies. You no longer feel that urgent need to be on top of things.

Don't let complacency kill your organization

This is a scary place to be. You’re satisfied with where you are. You no longer pay attention to the dangers surrounding you. You’re vulnerable and don’t even know it.

How do I know this? Because I was there. Recently in fact.

One of my responsibilities is to maintain our system network and it’s backups. I’d checked and rechecked our system backups. They were good.

Then I stopped checking. That’s when things got bad. A perfect storm hit.

First, I was told we may have been infected with a virus. I checked and confirmed this. We were hit with the Locky ransomware.

Curiosity Didn’t Kill The Cat. Here’s What Did…

We’ve been told time and time again that curiosity killed the cat. Sure, it may be the case in a few instances. When you’re curious, dangers can arise.

But there’s something much worse that leaders should fear.

Curiosity won’t be the killer of most leaders. That falls at the feet of a true killer.

Leaders must be cautious of complacency.

What Is Complacency?

Complacency, as defined by the Merriam-Webster dictionary is:

Self-satisfaction especially when accompanied by unawareness of actual dangers or deficiencies

Think about the definition for a few moments. Let it sink in. Is this what you want?

The Dangers of Complacency

Leaders are called leaders for a reason. They get out there and blaze a new trail. Leaders take their staff to new heights.