Inherited Debt

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"The leader must own everything in his world. There is no one else to blame." — Jocko Willink, Extreme Ownership

Having just been assigned to a cloud migration team, I was trying to get the lay of the land and understand where project work stood. What I gathered wasn't good. They hadn't had a project manager for about a year, and work had started to drift badly. That first week was when their manager called me into his office. He laid into me about how far behind everything was. His frustration directed at me felt like an accusation, as if I'd personally caused the delays. I could hardly get a word in edgewise as he vented. It became very clear to me that although I had no hand in creating the mess, it was mine now anyway. 

This is part of inherited debt. When you step into a team, you don't just inherit a role. You inherit the technical shortcuts nobody documented, the cultural habits that formed before you arrived, and the strained relationships with stakeholders who were burned months ago. The debt is real even if you didn't take out the loan. Most new leaders underestimate this, expecting a clean slate that doesn't exist.

You have two options in this situation. You can either spend your energy resenting it, explaining to everyone that it predates you, and quietly distance yourself from the mess. Or, you can own it. Not as an admission of guild, but as an act of leadership. The people watching you don't remember who caused the problem nearly as long as they remember how you handled it.

I left that manager's office with a communication plan in place with him as a key stakeholder. Then I went to work collaborating with the engineering lead to map out where we were, where we needed to be, and how to get there. The teams and organizations worth working in are ones where inherited debt gets acknowledged honestly rather than hidden or blamed on whoever just walked in the door. And if you're the one who just walked in, start by listening more than explaining, and resist the urge to announce what you didn't break.

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