Every time I board a train, a few minutes before departure, the same announcement comes over the speakers. “If you’re not travelling with us, please leave the train now.” It’s said politely, almost as a courtesy. But underneath the politeness is a clear message. The train is about to move. Once it does, it’s going somewhere specific, on a fixed track, at a particular time. If that’s not where you’re going, this isn’t the train for you.
I’ve started thinking about that announcement as one of the most useful things any organisation could borrow.
Most organisations I’ve watched over the years carry a quiet problem. There are people on the train who aren’t actually going where the train is going. They boarded it for their own reasons. They’ve stayed on out of habit. They tolerate the route because they haven’t quite found a better one. But they’re not aligned with the destination, and the longer they stay aboard, the more energy the journey costs everyone involved.
The healthy thing, for the people themselves and for the rest of the passengers, would be a polite, honest version of that announcement. If you’re not travelling with us, please leave the train now.
Why alignment matters more than enthusiasm
There’s a common assumption that what an organisation needs most is committed, energetic people. That’s true, but it’s incomplete. Energy without alignment is just noise. Commitment to the wrong destination doesn’t move you closer to the right one. It just gets you to the wrong place faster.
The people who genuinely move an organisation forward are the ones whose direction matches the direction of the train. Their values overlap with the organisation’s values. Their goals run parallel to its mission. Their energy compounds the collective effort rather than pulling against it.
When that alignment is in place, almost everything gets easier. When it isn’t, almost everything gets harder, even when individuals are working hard.
Joshua makes the announcement
There’s a moment near the end of the book of Joshua that captures this exactly. Joshua is old. The people of Israel have made it into the promised land. The big battles are behind them. Now they have to decide who they’re going to be.
So Joshua gathers the entire nation and stands in front of them. He recounts the journey so far, what God has done, where he’s brought them from. And then, instead of softening the ask or trying to keep everyone on board, he does something extraordinary. He gives them an honest choice.
“Choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve… but as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.” (Joshua 24:15)
It’s the train announcement, said three thousand years ago.
He doesn’t beg. He doesn’t plead. He doesn’t try to manipulate them into staying. He simply names where he’s going, makes it clear that he and his household are committed to that direction, and gives everyone else the dignity of choosing for themselves.
What’s striking is how grown-up the moment feels. There’s no fear of losing people. No anxiety about the numbers thinning out. No softening of the message to keep the room comfortable. Just a clear, honest invitation: this is where I’m going, decide whether you’re coming.
That kind of leadership is rarer than it should be. Most of us, when faced with the prospect of people walking away, instinctively water down what we’re asking for. We try to make the train more accommodating. We let the destination get fuzzier so more people will stay aboard. The result is usually that the train ends up going nowhere in particular, with everyone vaguely on it but nobody clearly aligned.
Joshua refused that compromise. The result was a generation that knew what it had committed to.
Three signs someone isn’t actually on the train
If you lead any kind of organisation, the alignment question is one of the most important ones you’ll keep having to ask. It’s also one of the easiest to avoid, because the conversations that follow are uncomfortable.
A few signals that someone might not actually be travelling with you:
- Their priorities consistently pull in a different direction. Not occasionally. Consistently. When push comes to shove, they’re protecting something different from what the rest of the team is protecting.
- They drain energy rather than add it. Aligned people, even when they disagree, leave conversations feeling generative. Unaligned people, even when they’re agreeable, somehow leave the room a little flatter than they found it.
- They’ve stopped engaging with the mission itself. They’re still doing the tasks, sometimes very competently, but they’re no longer connected to why the work matters. The train is just a job. The destination is no longer theirs.
None of these are crimes. Most of the time, they’re a sign that the person needs to be on a different train. The kindest thing you can do is help them find it, rather than letting them stay on the one they’ve quietly outgrown.
Letting people leave well
The hardest part of leadership, in my experience, isn’t recruiting the right people. It’s helping the wrong-fit people find a more honest exit. The temptation is to keep them on the train because removing them feels harsh, because we hate confrontation, because we’ve grown fond of them, because they’ve been there a long time.
But every wrong-fit person on a team takes up the seat of someone who would have been right. Every misaligned voice quietly slows the journey for everyone else. The kindness we think we’re showing by avoiding the conversation is rarely kindness at all. It’s usually just our own discomfort dressed up as compassion.
The healthier model is the train announcement. Said clearly. Said with grace. Said early enough that everyone has the chance to make a good decision.
If you’re not travelling with us, please leave the train now.
Boarding deliberately
This works in the other direction too. Worth checking, occasionally, that the train you’re currently on is still the one you actually want to be travelling on. Are you here because you genuinely believe in where this organisation is going? Or are you here out of inertia, or fear of change, or because leaving feels harder than staying?
Joshua’s challenge is just as sharp pointed at us as it was at the Israelites. Choose this day whom you will serve. Not vaguely. Not eventually. Today. Either commit to where you’ve boarded, or have the honesty to step off and find the right train.
Both questions matter. The leaders who keep their teams aligned are the same leaders who keep checking their own alignment too.
So when the next departure announcement plays in your own life, are you genuinely travelling with the organisations and people you’ve boarded with, or have you been quietly riding along with a train heading somewhere you don’t actually want to go?