Staying or Changing?

Staying or Changing?

One of the hardest questions I’ve faced over the years has been this:

How do you know when to stay the course, and when it’s time to let go?

Watching the World Cup recently, I found myself thinking about that question again.

When a match isn’t going to plan, coaches have decisions to make.

Sometimes they make substitutions.

Sometimes they change formation.

Sometimes they stay with the plan.

From the outside, those decisions can seem obvious.

The score isn’t changing.

Time is running out.

The pressure is building.

Surely it’s time to do something.

But I’m not sure it’s that simple.

Sometimes staying is wisdom.

Sometimes it is stubbornness.

Sometimes changing is courage.

Sometimes it is panic.

The difficulty is that, in the moment, they can feel remarkably similar.

My instinct has often been to persevere.

To keep pushing.

To stay with the work.

To believe that breakthrough may be just beyond the point where others give up.

I’m grateful for that instinct.

It has carried me through difficult seasons.

Major transitions.

More than one fresh start.

I’ve also stayed too long in some places.

And I’ve been grateful I didn’t leave others too soon.

Perhaps that’s why this question keeps returning.

Because sometimes leadership asks us to stay.

Sometimes it asks us to change.

The difficult part isn’t finding the courage to do either.

It’s recognising which one this moment requires.

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