Yes, I just left a company after 30 years because of ONE word

30 years! One word, really? "Crazy" you may say. Actually, I was extremely methodical in assessing the decision to leave…or rather the decision to seek better for me personally. 

I printed this Epictetus quote about 9 months before I made the final decision to leave so that I was reminded everyday (and multiple times a day given working from home) of the objective to seek the best for myself.

So that one word? Well, it is “ikigai”. What is ikigai you ask? Well, if you have followed me for years, you know about ikigai as I published a LinkedIn article May 24, 2017 after my good friend Guillermo Salazar pointed me to ikigai during one of our mental gymnastics intellectual lunch coaching sessions. I then published a follow-up LinkedIn article on September 2, 2019. This article is now the third leg of the trilogy.

I have explained my decision to leave Deloitte Canada after 30 years to join KPMG Canada to dozens of people from each of Deloitte and KPMG, friends, clients and members of the business and social community. I think every time I have started the explanation by pointing out that both Deloitte and KPMG are great organizations and that instead the decision was based on my ikigai analysis. So many of these people are waiting for this article so that they can do their own ikigai analysis.

Judging from the response from the people to whom I have explained my decision verbally, I dare say that this may prove to be my most impactful of my close to 30 published LinkedIn articles. Some (many?) who read this article and the related articles will make massive life changes as a result. Be forewarned that ikigai is logical and intuitive and that how I have leveraged it for this life decision is powerful.

So here goes…

Ikigai 101

Ikigai is a Japanese concept that I define as “extreme fulfilment”. I will briefly summarize ikigai here, but I encourage all to read my 2017 article and then my 2019 article.

The diagram shows how ikigai is the overlap of all four circles in the Venn diagram – you love what you do, you are good at what you do, there is a need for what you do, and you can get rewarded for what you do. 

Happiness or career satisfaction therefore comes from maximizing time and effort on those activities that are in ikigai. 

I often use this diagram to clarify what circles are YOU as opposed to external to you.

My personal ikigai journey

In 2017, after completing an informal personal ikigai analysis, I concluded that I had a tremendous amount of ikigai. At that point, I had spent about 26 years at Deloitte and things were great. Things started to change for me in 2018 and more drastically in 2019. Deloitte made significant senior leadership and strategy changes in 2019 that started to impact me significantly. To be clear, whether I agree with the changes or not is irrelevant. The key is that the changes started to impact my ikigai to the point that in late summer 2019, I performed a two-day intensive personal ikigai analysis thinking deeply about my role in this new paradigm. I placed everything I did for Deloitte in a chart like this:

I concluded that I could and should make changes to increase my ikigai. I then wrote and published my 2nd ikigai article in September 2019 suggesting that people perform a similar analysis, make the changes they can make and then, if they still thought they could or should have more ikigai, change organizations.

I spent almost two years trying to improve my ikigai including engaging in very open and vulnerable discussions with various Deloitte leaders. 

Throughout 2020, I figuratively looked myself in the mirror and considered another Epictetus quote:

I decided that I had no control over many things at Deloitte that were reducing my ikigai. These things were clearly external to me, but I had earlier thought, ultimately naively, that I could influence those elements. That was a frustrating observation. I had a deep sense of loss, disappointment and, admittedly, of unrequited love. It was hard to effectively admit defeat, that if I wanted more ikigai, I potentially needed to consider moving from Deloitte.

Should I stay or should I go?

With time, I processed my feelings and was reminded of one of the nine core Stoic beliefs:

We Don’t Control External Events, We Only Control Our Thoughts, Opinions, Decisions and Duties

In essence, the Stoics believe that events in and of themselves are neither good nor bad but instead that it is our interpretation of the events that define them as good or bad. I challenged myself to consider whether I could think like a Stoic and consider how this situation was good? Was I perhaps being prompted to make a change that I would not have considered had Deloitte not made the changes?   

Leaving Deloitte would be scary in many ways: as someone who has at times suffered from impostor syndrome, would everything fall apart? Would I disappoint and be ostracized by my Deloitte colleagues and friends who I loved deeply? There was also the catastrophizing that comes to many of us as we consider all the things that could go wrong. I then considered this quote about fear that seems to be attributed to many.

Historically, I never wanted money to influence my decision to stay or leave. As I started warming to the idea of potentially leaving Deloitte, I concluded that for the sake of my family I needed to understand the financial ramifications of leaving. As I learned more, I learned that I was going to be leaving a lot of money on the table. I asked myself if I had the courage to seek more ikigai now at all costs. Was I brave enough to follow my own advice from my 2019 article to change organizations if needed to increase ikigai…even if it meant leaving a lot of money on the table? That was an existential moment where I considered my personal moto from the last 25+ years which is, in fact, one of our license plates (no longer on the BMW 335 though!).

The acronym explained for this PG audience is “Firetruck It You Only Live Once”. You get it, I know you do. I am what many people call a Maximizer: I want to live life to its fullest and have the greatest impact on those around me. That influences everything I do or do not do personally and professionally.

At that time, I also considered my desired epitaph that I included in an “Introspective Personal Narrative” exercise I spent 2 days doing in October 2019:

He passionately and authentically helped others while staying true to his personal moto of FIYOLO

No matter what lens I applied, I was concluding that I needed to leave Deloitte.

Now, serendipity plays a key role in my life, so I have learned to pay attention. At the very moment I had finally decided I needed to leave Deloitte, KPMG leaders approached me to consider joining them. The timing could not have been better choreographed. I focused our discussions on my desire to have positive impact: on clients, on peer partners, on colleagues, and on growth of the business. Remarkably, the discussion was very limited in terms of the financial elements. That was important in its own way but more important was the impact that I wanted to make. Quickly, I became comfortable that I could have a greater impact at KPMG and improve my ikigai. 

Life has funny ways to send you strong messages. Over 33,000 people have viewed my LinkedIn video announcing that I had resigned from Deloitte. What was more important to me and that at times had me tearing up, were the hundreds of comments including dozens and dozens of Deloitte people from across the country, from over the years, from all levels and all practices who told me about the impact that I have had on their careers. THAT was so rewarding and a strong confirmation that I had made the right decision to make a change to have more impact.

This is about courage. This is about self-reflection. This is about impact. This is about maximizing the magic at the intersection of passion, need, proficiency and reward that allows for a happier, more fulfilled career.

I encourage all to consider performing a similar ikigai self-reflection and then to act upon their findings even if it means leaving an organization that you have loved for the better part of 30 years.