Burning Bridges
Sunday, April 13th, 2008I asked this question a while back as I was going back and thinking about the relationships that I saved and those I burned. I have to say that burning a bridge is sometimes just as useful as keeping one since without the burning a new one cannot be built…
Have you ever had to burn one bridge to build another?
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Ricard Cave
Contract-Consultant Test Manager
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I am a consultant Test Manager working on a contract basis.
Although in theory, most large IT shops involve Testing at an early stage in the SDLC, in practice Testing tends to be brought in at the last minute to test quality into the system (!?)
My job therefore is to come along late and tell everyone what they’ve done wrong - great way to make friends. Among my most successful jobs I count projects I stopped completely, a couple after more than $3 million in development. The damage to the companies concerned had the software been released whether to the bottom line or reputation would have cost more than the wasted development costs. These decisions certainly put a lot of noses out of joint.
In my job I necessarily burn bridges as part of doing my job ethically, but for every person who wouldn’t rehire or recommend me, I hope there are many more who appreciate the hard decisions I sometimes have to make.
Cheers,
Ric Cave
Douglas Stevenson
Principal Consultant & ENMS Propellor Head
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Unfortunately. I don’t like being put in a position where I have to.
In a technical world, its OK to fail. You are going to make mistakes. Everyone gets smarter as the team evolves.
In a political world, to Fail is a death knoll. You lose any and all credibility and power of negotiation, once you fail. Especially if you fess up. You may survive if you can stick the mistake on someone else.
I SUCK at politics. But I will not compromise my ethics. So, when I get in a position where I lack the moral flexibility to survive, I tend to look for a way out. Politics and Engineering do not mix. Once politics becomes prevalent, your team will become afraid to try new things or afraid to express new ideas.
The one lesson I’ve learned -> Once you’ve made the decision to move on -> NEVER EVER EVER SAY ANYTHING. Anything you say, you own. If you declare the problem, you own it. And all of the problems around what you own as well. It instantly becomes your fault and folks that were there seem to remember only selective things. After all, its EASY to pin something on someone whose no longer there because you can’t defend yourself if you don’t know. And others are not going to stick up for you because it puts them in the ownership seat.
Bryan Shelby
Principal, Contek Systems Inc.
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So far, in a career of 30+ years and a consulting career of almost 15 years, I have not burned any bridges. As a consultant, I have always believed in the importance of leaving a happy client behind.
Sometimes this has been rather painful — I recall one situation early in my consulting practice that was particularly difficult (horrendous office politics) but I stuck with it and finished the job by re-engineering the process and eliminating my role! The manager was so appreciate that he then gave me a year-long second assignment. Then, after we had both moved on to other things, he brought me in at his new company, where I have (off and on) spent 5 years. In addition, I have leveraged experience from those assignments into several others!
If I had walked away from that assignment, burning my bridge with that particular manager, my consulting career would have been much less rewarding (in every sense!) over the past 10 years.
Finish the job if at all possible — and then (and ONLY then) move on…
Stephen Frenkel
Director of Negotiation Programs, Mediation Works Incorporated, Boston, MA
Gene,
Great question. To answer your question specifically, I would need a heck of a lot more information about you, the situation, the type of burning, etc.
However, in general, I would say that burning one bridge to build another is typically the result of your moving on from one person/company (a supplier, contractor, vendor, etc.) for another with more favorable terms (offering you more, cheaper, better, etc. services).
In my opinion, if you have a good relationship and history of good communication with the first (who’s bridge is about to be burned), you can explain the situation in such a way that they agree with your decision. Put the onus on them - to match the new bridge’s deal (cost, quality, reliability, etc.). If they can, good for them and good for you - no need to burn the bridge. If they can’t, you can explain to them that you hope they understand why you have to move on.
Doing this in a way that is honest, truthful and compassionate, rather than threatening them that you’ll walk if they don’t give in, makes it much harder for them to harbor resentment. Ideally, they’ll understand your predicament and hope you’ll come back when the situation is right.
I hope this helps.
Stephen
Links:
Engineering Manager at Yahoo!
Yes, ofcourse. This happens with sincere regularity in a hot market, where there is a lot of churn.
One simple thing each one of us could do is to keep our side of the bridge strong enough and to NOT to let the entire bridge collapse. One side of the bridge is sufficient, so that the other person at some point could always reconsider the option.
Creative thinking “inside the box”
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I would be more likely to try to connect the bridges. I have had to burn my side of a bridge to fend off attacks. It’s sad when that happens because building bridges is a good part of what I do.
Multi-Specialty Senior Healthcare Sales-Analytical, Strategic, and Multifunctional Solutions
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Hi Gene,
When I was new in my profession I ended up calling on an intensely political lattice of unnamed group of people. One subgroup had a history with the rest. I separated myself to pursue business relationships with the majority who saw more patients that I could impact.
What I learned is that in an office, if they are truly anti-industry, then you should let them be-there’s probably more that meets the eye 
I would have handled it differently knowing what I know now-being less naïve.
We are all professionally friendly now as bygones are bygones and everyone understands……..
In everyday life, I believe we all have to make trade-offs to align ourselves to support and be supported by those that share our values, which at the end of the day is all you’ve got. -scary if there isn’t any……
Cheers,
Sherri
Clarification added 6 months ago:
Gene, I felt obligated to communicate that it was revealed over time that there was a lot of jealousy towards the success of these individuals. Recognizing their leadership in their field, I have since referred both patients and physicians to their practice. As professionals, jealousy-in individual or lattice type is an interesting dynamic to ignore, manage, etc…
Angsuman Chakraborty
CEO, Taragana
Once. Personally I tried my best to re-create it but it was only barely mended. With 20/20 hindsight I realize that it was a correct decision. I would say that you should seriously think if you are about to burn a bridge but then sometimes that is the right step to move forward.
Stephanie Cadirci
Owner, BARCODE Productions & Event Management
Of course…I think this happens more often than not! In the event industry it really is a small world…almost borderline incestuous….everyone knows everyone and therefore everyone tends to be afraid of “burning bridges”…but recently I found that once you burn a bridge, if in fact it was a legitimate burning, others will come out of the woodwork and admit that they have burned the same bridges.
Everyone seems to “play nice” on the outside, but once it is known that you feel the same way about a company/person/etc as they do, you realize how many others out there feel the same way and burned those bridges long ago while wondering how you “played nice” for so long….
Burning bridges at times is part of doing business…some bridges are better off burnt than in tact, so as to make sure that you have no association or connection with them what-so-ever…
Test & Process Consultant Squerist
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rather not. but if you have to you have to
Field Operations Staffing Manager at NetApp
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I have recruited from a former client because my existing client asked that I do so. It was a very difficult decision where I avoided buring a bridge..Whenever possible, never burn a bridge..
Product Manager
Sometimes you stand on an edge, where you have to make a decision, which will result in a burnt bridge, but sometimes it is something you have to do to reach something you want to archive. I think the most important thing is that you can look into yourself afterward and know you made the right decisione, choice etc.
In a competitive and small market, you sometime end burning a bridge or two, but it is important you keep building other bridges ..
HR Consultant at Efficient Frontier
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My goal has always been to build bridges and not waste time burning bridges but in the business climate that we all exist in sometimes due to politics it may be necessary to burn a bridge.
The only time that I burn a bridge is when trust has been broken. Integrity and accountability is lacking to a great degree. I do not waste my time on bridges where the other party lacks accountability and more importantly integrity. Life is to short to concentrate on bridge building with folks that focus just on themselves to the detriment of the others.
Just my opinion, Nathan
CEO/Founder, Savant Protection and Cambridge R&D
In my experience, burning bridges normally comes back to haunt although we all know it is impossible to ‘never” do it.
The only time I burn a bridge on purpose is if I feel the person has done something unethical personally or in business. Once someone has burned my trust I can never go back to them. The nagging doubt always remains and I find it draining to have to consider what I can and cannot say or do around a person…
In that one case, I will burn a bridge if only to build an new one to move on.
Ken
Project Manager at General Electric
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You never, ever know who’s going to show up on the other side of the table as manager, interviewer, client, whatever. The world seems so big when you’re burning the bridge and so small when you walk into a conference room and find the other end of that mess on the other side of the table.
The only time I’d deliberately burn a bridge is in the case of unethical behavior. Sometimes you’re force to separate yourself actively from actions or people. The rest of the time, I keep my mouth shut, smile, take everyone to lunch, and move on.
Allen Fogel
President, Kingsgate Diamonds, Inc. Summit, NJ
Burning Bridges? Depending on exactly how one might define it; this should almost never be necessary. Highly refined interpersonal, leadership, and management skills, together with simple old fashioned gentlemanly behavior, should negate the need to burn a well constructed bridge.
Certainly, there will be times in business, when one might need to assertively protect ones business interests; however, it should practically never be done in an aggressive, bridge burning manner.
Of the CEO’s and corporate board directors that I have known, added to the numerous executives that have written business books, it is my experience that most do not burn bridges.
Feel free to comment and or disagree.
Energy expert, educator, award winning sculptor
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Only on the very rare occasion. I typically enjoy building bridges and keeping them in tact.
IT Professional, Information Security Quality Assurance Operations & Administration / President, CMU SEI LI SPIN
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Hello Gene,
Very rarely, unless the fire has started from the other side and I have no control over it. Even then, I bring the water.
Eileen
Director - Strategic Relationships at Persistent Systems Inc.
If you can be diplomatic - you could do both. But the genuineness of the bridges would be in question.
As long as you are genuine - what you will find is that building a bridge at the expense of burning one is the easiest thing to do. And building a genuine bridge without burning the old one would be the toughest. Apologies for getting philosophical on this one…:-)
SW Engineer at Intel
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I don’t burn bridges I had build. Never. But sometime I abandon my bridges to move on. Even when I strongly disagree with some one or with the entire business I don’t like to stand up and to declare my disagreement loudly. I just don’t touch the subject when I know I have a different position then an other person. I don’t say I silently leave when someone does something wrong from my perspective. I try to find a common ground in soft manner, but if I see I cannot find right words and right action to fix a disagreement I just leave. My point is: some people learn from their own mistakes only, they don’t like to hear about other people experience and to leave them alone on their way to the fail is the only way to teach them.
Management Consultant and Training Sytems Architecture Developer. President of Pierre Jones & Assoc.
This is such a final decision that it requires very carefull consideration. In an ideal world you should never have to burn bridges to build others.
One should opt for alternatives until the last…+ 1, before ever burning a bridge. If you have to break a link to replace it with another, something must have gone really wrong. Also burning a bridge to build another sounds really like betraying or abandonning a relationship. I believe you have to be in a dire situation to act like that.
This has happened to me, over time, when I had made a wrong judgement call in building a bridge to begin with and after every effort had been made to salvage it.
Owner, cassim unlimited
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gene
i have never let go a client or a friend just so that i could be more appealing to someone else.
i have often had to decide between one and the other in business and in relationships. i have never wanted to burn any bridges and normally dumped the side that created this option or applied the preassure in the first place.
if both sides preassurised me then often i dumped both sides. an absolute waste of time trying to keep up to the demands of such people. it is a moving target really. may as well concentrate on somethinbg else. the world is a large enough place for people like myself.
sayeed
Sr. Project Coordinator at Mondo A/S
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There will always be bridges that will be planned, built, maintained, strengthened, weakened, broken, burned. There are many factors that prompt these activities, both in the professional world and the personal world.
In the long run, what matters is, not how many bridges were built, or torn down, or burnt, or salvaged for another bridge, for me, it’s a matter of realizing that this is part of life in the professional world. I do my bit, making my efforts towards the maintenance and improvement of the bridge, and my efforts towards countering any factors from damaging it be it from the other side, or from external forces.
If for any reason the bridge cracks, find out why it cracked and find ways to mend it, so it doesn’t crack from there again. Sometimes, it’s inevitable that a bridge will come into disuse and eventually weaken and break. This happens to bridges which for some reason are not worth investing in their maintenance and up-keep.
Then there are the really bad cases where bridges have to be burnt to the grown and their ashes thrown away.
Bottom line, there should be a clear understanding of why a bridge broke, be it from any side, why a bridge should be burnt. Because, without this clarity of understanding, and sometimes acceptance, it can get a burden of unanswered questions.
Salman Khan also suggests this expert on this topic:
AIX\Linux\Unix- SA at Enterprise Integration
I have not burned any bridges yet in my career. I feel that at times it could be necessary to continue to move on. I think it is good not to *torch* the bridge just in case you have to cross it again in the future. Even if you build a new bridge that goes in different directions from your old bridge. You never know how the bridges could be eventually “linked” one day.
Risk & Control Analyst at GMO
Definitely. When it comes to work - it is just what it is -business. It should not be taken too personally. If I believe I’m right in the particular situation - I’ll burn a bridge.
Media Development Coordinator at the White House Historical Association
Most definitely, but there is always an element of risk that the future bridge will not work as well. In general, I try to hedge as often as possible.
Best,
William