A group of farmers was asked what they would do if they woke up in the morning to find their $100,000 tractor had been stolen from the shed. They indicated a rush of activity around police, insurance and other such matters. If all else failed they would seek to buy a new tractor. As soon as possible.
When asked has a senior manager with an equivalent salary recently left the organisation - the group said yes. What did they do? Aside from lunch or a brief exit interview the answer was nothing.
We can easily fall into the trap of prizing the tangible resources at our disposal and ignoring the less tangible. It’s easy to replace a tractor so we know what to do - and we jump to it. It is not easy to assess the value of an individual. Sometimes it’s just too hard to do anything - no matter what we’ve lost.