Chosen to Lead? Do Your Own Due Diligence First.
My conversation with Andre on the Business Transformation Journey podcast, episode 11
One day the phone rings.
Someone wants you to lead the transformation nobody else could pull off.
Come be the hero.
It feels like recognition. Often, it is.
And still.
Before you say yes, get curious. Why wasn't this done before? Who is really on board, and who isn't? What resources will you actually have? What happens once the transformation is done?
You would never buy a company without due diligence. You can do the same before accepting a mandate.
Andre and I talked about the red flags. The first one I see, in organizations and in people, is a lack of real commitment. Rarely bad intentions. Usually conflicting ones.
It works the same way inside a person. I want to drink less. My friends party every weekend, and I'm afraid they'll stop inviting me. I'm committed to my health. I'm also committed to my social life. Both are true.
When a transformation is pushed only from the outside (a new law, the market, the board), it becomes compliance. Compliance rarely crosses the finish line.
We also talked about founders who sell and then stay on for a year or two to lead the integration. For years, they sold their team one vision. Now they have to bring everyone in a new direction. Sometimes one they don't fully believe in themselves.
That's hard. And it's rarely talked about.
Then there's life after the exit. I hear it all the time: once the deal is done, everything will be fine. Then the calendar opens up, the family routine gets shaken, and the new life doesn't look like the picture.
"I'm going to be a full-time parent." Wonderful. When was the last time you did it?
I know this gap from the inside. I spent 25 years as a senior HR executive, including leading national talent acquisition teams. I knew every interview question by heart. After my own career ended on someone else's terms, I froze in an interview. Knowing what to do was never the problem. The story running underneath was.
That's the work I do today. We look at the stories you tell yourself, about yourself, about others, about the world. Sometimes they're small. Sometimes they run the whole show.
One client came to me before selling his business. He said: "If I sell, if I get all this money, and I still believe I don't deserve to be happy, why am I doing this?" We worked on that belief. He started at a 3 out of 10. He's now at a 7 or 8, building his new life.
What we covered:
The questions to ask before accepting a transformation mandate
Why conflicting commitments stall change, in companies and in people
Deal junkies vs. founders who love what they built
Why founders who stay after the sale face a transformation of their own
"Get a life before you exit," and preparing your family too
Balance: why I rarely see it, and what to aim for instead
My Sunday night calendar exercise
The belief hiding under "I can't delegate"
The three ways transformation happens: spontaneous, retroactive, gradual
The beach of transition
Here's where I landed.
Forget the 10 out of 10 life. Aim for progression. And create 10 out of 10 moments: on the soccer field with your daughter, in a real conversation with your mother, the day a contract gets signed.
Those moments fill you up more than you think.
Give the episode a listen, and tell me: which red flag have you ignored before? I'm curious.
Hypnotically yours,Janylène xo
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