Love Your Work? (What Are You, Crazy?)

I got an email this week from a lovely 25-year old reader – she asked:

Since you work with a lot of professionals and others in the work force – what’s your experience? How many people out there really love their jobs?  I wonder if I was being too negative in thinking that there’s no such thing as the perfect job or that I’ll never just LOVE going to work every day.  Any advice to thoughts along these lines?

This is a great question, whether you’re 25 and just launching your career, or if you’re 55 and in the thick of your working life.  Can’t wait to answer it.

First of all, there seems to be a collective idea about The Plan.  Know what I mean?  The Plan goes like this: Do well in high school –> go to a great college –> go to law school/get a MBA/become a doctor –> get the perfect job.

And guess what? Doesn’t always happen like that. Sorry to burst your balloon, kiddo. There’s a story in the Washington Post that might be of interest – 22-year old Bekah Steadwell graduated from a competitive college – Oberlin – and is working two jobs as a cook while living at home with her parents. And her two college-graduate sisters. Her path is much different from the one we outlined above, huh?

The trick for Bekah and anyone else whose path did not go the way they planned – they couldn’t get a job in their field, or worse, got a job and realized they didn’t really want to do that kind of work – is to accept that their path is different, and that it’s not necessarily a bad thing.

Because sometimes the deviations from The Path turn out to be the most serendipitous. Don’t believe me? Watch Apple’s CEO Steve Jobs talk about his own Path in this Commencement Speech delivered at Stanford.

Perhaps the biggest hurdle is accepting that The Path is a myth – one which creates legions of quietly desperate anxious strivers in pursuit of the impossible. Because you could go to the very best schools in the world, achieve academic excellence, get a coveted job in a prestigious place – and absolutely hate what you are doing.

It happens.

So what do you do if you find yourself hating your job?

Here’s what I tell my clients who find themselves in this fix – ask yourself four questions:

1. What can I do all by myself to create a better work situation? Could you break up the monotony by consciously doing things differently? Can you learn to manage difficult people?
2. How can I shift my thoughts away from the negative, toward the positive, about this job? Can you focus on the outcomes – like how, because of your job, you can afford that gym membership, or that trip? Can you seek to find the good?
3. Have I ever been happy? Look at past happy experiences and see if you can replicate any of the factors you loved back then into your current work. But if you’ve never been happy in any job, then there may be something you need to explore. See #4.
4. Are there underlying issues I need to work out? If you’ve had a series of unreasonable, demanding female bosses and you had an unreasonable, demanding mother, it doesn’t take Dr. Freud to determine that a bit of therapy might be in order. Really. Burying past ghosts is the single best path toward creating a happy now.

The first step in any situation that’s not working is to look  at yourself and make positive changes.  And if you try, and you still can’t find relief… then it’s time to leave.  No matter what The Plan says.

I’ll write more on figuring out when it’s time to quit – and how to do it – next week.

The Integrity Thing

A few weeks ago I talked about how to get  Finally Un-Stuck – remember?

“People who are stuck often face some kind of big decision or life change.  And they torment themselves with, ‘Is this the right choice? What if I make a mistake?’ That is the stuck place.  Can’t move forward for fear of doing something wrong, and can’t go back due to the space-time continuum, so… stay stuck. There’s only one way to break through the muck and get un-stuck. And that is to reframe the question from, ‘Is this the right choice?’ to ‘Am I choosing growth?’”

So, we choose growth, and get un-stuck. But there’s something else – something vital – to factor into your decision-making.

It’s called integrity.

To me, integrity means I’m not going to lie, I’m not going to cheat, I’m not going to take advantage of anyone, I’m not going to allow anyone to take advantage of me.  I will say what I mean, and mean what I say.  I will do what I’ve promised to do.

You may have other elements surrounding your personal integrity – but if you don’t, now’s the time to get clear on them, pardner.

Because when you choose growth within the framework of integrity – there is no way you can make a mistake.

Want an example?  Okie doke.  Tom is offered a  job working for his company’s biggest competitor and marketplace rival.  It’s a big leadership job, and it feels like growth to Tom – exactly the kind of step up he’s been looking for.  The new company promises him a signing bonus (asks him to keep quiet about it) and then kinda asks if he can bring over his files on a particular innovation Tom has been overseeing at the old company.

Now, some people would say, “Sure, that’s the way the game is played.  He should absolutely bring everything to his new employer!  What are you, Michele?  Some kinda dope?  This happens all the time.”

Ah, yes, grasshopper, it does happen all the time. Especially with people who have lost touch with their own integrity.  And that’s why this is such an important moment for Tom – he can choose a new opportunity where he knows his integrity will be challenged, or say no and preserve something important to him.

I’m going to humor those who say, “Take the money and run, Tom!”  Let’s say he chooses to take the new job.  A year later, where’s Tom?  Unhappy, compromised, constantly fudging the facts and lying to his team.  He’s miserable. And his former colleagues? He’s lost them – they’re still smarting from his conduct as he walked out the door. Day to day, he’s struggling with the consequence of abandoning something really important to him – his integrity. It’s crushing stress.

I’ve seen this sad scenario play out hundreds of times.

Remember this line from above?  When you choose growth within the framework of integrity – there is no way you can make a mistake.

Well here’s the corollary: Any opportunity that asks you to put your integrity aside is most assuredly not a growth opportunity – and ultimately will be a mistake.

There’s a lot written these days about “Your Personal Brand” -hey, I’ve even written about it:

…your own personal brand is really about living in alignment with your integrity and what’s best about you. And when you’re truly in alignment that way, life becomes easy.

Any of us can convince ourselves that nearly anything is a growth experience. The gut check, then, is seeing where the new opportunity lines up with your integrity. When you can grow while preserving your integrity, you are, indeed, making the absolute right choice.

Would You Like Fries With That?

During my senior year in high school, it became glaringly evident that my need for hip huggers and puka shells exceeded my parents’ willingness to underwrite my wardrobe.

It was clear that I needed a job.

One crisp autumn day, I walked into the fast food restaurant closest to school — a Roy Rogers, then owned by Marriott — and asked if they were hiring.  I imagine I was wearing jeans with huge bell bottoms.  I may have had a plaid shirt on.  I was likely wearing either desert boots or Famolare Wave Sole shoes.

I was totally rocking the fashion. Which is why I was looking for a job in the first place.

The manager, a woebegone man who’d seen many a late night and too few an early morning, looked me over, head to toe, and wearily asked,”What do you do over at the high school?”

“Well,” I chirped. “I’m President of the Student Union, on the Superintendent’s Advisory Committee, in the ski club, in the drama club, and I’ve applied for early admission to Virginia Tech.”

I was hired on the spot, and given a schedule and a uniform.

Roy Rogers was a Western-themed fast food restaurant, so my uniform consisted of a calico skirt, a white peasant-type blouse and a red and white cowboy hat.

Which totally offended my fashion sensibilities.  And since the restaurant was across the street from my high school, I was continually embarrassed to be seen by classmates who came in for a tasty Double-R-Bar burger.

But Marriott offered a terrific training program.  Believe it or not,  I use what I learned then every single day.

• I rotate my stock — when I go to the grocery store, the new can of diced tomatoes goes behind the old so I’m always using the oldest stuff first.
• I know when to flip — my hamburgers come out medium every time.
• I know how to listen to customers and what they want.

And I know how to do suggestive selling.  Which is when you ask, “Would you like fries with that?” or, since our Roy Rogers fries came in particular packaging, “Would you like a ‘holster’ of fries?”  [Yes, the large fries were served in a cardboard gun holster.  What can I say?  It was a different time.]

I mention suggestive selling for a reason.

News reports out this week indicate that the real U.S. unemployment rate  stands at 17.5 percent:

In all, more than one out of every six workers — 17.5 percent — were unemployed or underemployed in October. The previous recorded high was 17.1 percent, in December 1982.

This includes the officially unemployed, who have looked for work in the last four weeks. It also includes discouraged workers, who have looked in the past year, as well as millions of part-time workers who want to be working full time. (New York Times, Nov. 6, 2009)

If you are out of a job, now is the time to do some suggestive selling.

In a regular economy, 70% of job openings are not even advertised and are filled by personal referral.  In my experience, right now it seems that about 90% of jobs are filled that way — because if an organization can only hire one person, they want a sure thing.  A personal referral from someone who knows you and has worked with you is testimony that you’re smart, sharp and can do the work.  With a meaningful personal referral, you will get you the interview, and probably the position.

To get the referral, you have to suggestively sell your contacts.  You have to tell them what you want and how you can solve the pain of an employer.  Because all job hires are made because someone, somewhere is in pain.  There’s the pain of work overload, there’s the pain of work not getting done, there’s the pain of opportunities missed.

There’s always pain.  Identify it, sell how you can solve it, and you will rise to the top of the list.

If you’re working part-time, it’s even more important to suggestively sell.  Saying things like, “I noticed that XYZ is not getting done. I’d be happy to do it,” is the perfect way to move into a full-time slot.

And remember.  Every job in your past has contributed to the skill set you have now.  Play up all of your talents to sell yourself. Just because you had a certain job title in your last position doesn’t mean you are limited to only that kind of work. I’ll bet there are a lot of things you can do.  Even though I’m no longer “Pardner Of The Month” (March, 1978), I could walk in any fast food joint today and make a credible hamburger.

And know how to ask, as I was trained, “Would you like fries with that?”

What’s Not Working?

Boy, we human beings are creatures of habit. We love routines! So comfortable, isn’t it, to mindlessly know what to do first, then go on to that, then move on to the next thing. Oh, we love it! The sameness of routine is so comforting.

Even if the routine sucks.

And is boring.

And might even be bad for us.

Kinda like having a habit we just can’t give up.

But it’s known and comfortable and predictable.

Which makes us feel safe.

And sometimes feel stuck.

It’s at this moment of awareness of our stuckness that we need to stop, and think, and ask, “What’s not working?” It’s a scary question, most certainly, but an eminently sane question. And exactly the right question to ask.

You’ve got to start by identifying what’s not working — what doesn’t feel right — so you can move out of stuck and right into happy.

Let’s say you’re stuck in your career. You’ve been in the same job with the same group for five, ten, fifteen years. You’ve got the system wired. You know where the bodies are buried. You’ve got the routine knocked.

And you are bored out of your freakin’ mind.

First, identify what’s not working. You’ve probably got pages to write on that one. Am I right? But then you start to say, “Well, yeah, but who else would pay me what I make here”, or “Well, yeah, but I’d have to start over and wouldn’t know anything”, and maybe even, “Well, yeah, but it’s not really that bad.”

For those of you who have such big “buts”, let me challenge you to look at your situation in a new way, with one more question: Did you get what you came for?

When you took the job, what did you want? Why did you take it in the first place? Because you needed the money? Because you could pick up certain skills? Because you could work with specific people? Because of prestige? Because it was the only job open?

And now, five, ten, fifteen years down the road, have you gotten what you came for? Have you met that initial objective? In spades?

Then maybe the reason you’re stuck and bored and not as happy as you could be is because you’ve actually done what you set out to do. And the task at hand is to set new objectives and figure out if you can achieve them where you are — or if you have to find a new place to do what now needs doing in your life.

We human beings are designed to learn and grow and, believe it or not, be happy. And if your career has become like a bad habit, a routine that no longer gets the results you intended, then now is the time, and this is the place, to start making changes.

Life In The Balance

“Suffering is normal.”

“Work is supposed to be hard.”

“I have to keep busy.”

“No pain, no gain.”

“Idle hands are the Devil’s playground.”

“Life is not supposed to be easy.”

Damn that Protestant Work Ethic.

It’s those deeply ingrained PWE messages that hold us back from making changes leading to more satisfaction, happiness and meaning. We’re all so nose-to-the-grindstone, unhappy-as-hell, but-hey-what-can-I-do-about-it people.

What frustrated folks may not know is this: the key to a balanced life is a fair measure of joy. Of purposeless fun. Of play.

Which is diametrically opposed the good old PWE.

Know what I mean? We take something that is supposed to be joyful fun, like, oh… running through a forest, feeling the wind on your skin and your hair, smelling the fragrance of the deep woods, spying a shy fawn, or a curious fox. And we turn it into, “Gotta go nine today so I’ll be ready for the marathon.”

Sure, having a purpose gives us something to strive for, but often bypasses the underlying joy of simply doing a thing we love.

A woman I know was lamenting this week that her just conferred Master’s degree didn’t seem to be that valuable in this job market. I asked, “Why did you decide on that field of study?” She answered, “Because I was really interested in it, and I thought it would be fun.” I paused a moment. “So you enjoyed the learning?” She said, “Oh, yes!” I asked, “Isn’t that enough?”

Learning for learning’s sake — ever known that feeling?

To achieve balance in your life, sometimes you need to allow yourself to do something for the sheer fun of it — and not because it will lead to something else. Something “productive.” If you have the time, the money and the interest, why not take a class? Or get a Master’s degree? Or a PhD, for that matter? With no eye toward where it will “get” you?

Why not enjoy yourself?

There’s a point that comes in everyone’s life — and for some of us it comes more than once — when you know things have to change. Yet you ignore the stirrings of your heart, the urgings of your soul, because making a change might seem indulgent.

Which is a definite PWE no-no.

There’s the doctor who would really like to open a bead shop, but how would that look? All those years of medical school — a waste?

Or the lawyer who would like to be a non-profit case worker. Law school down the drain?

Or the one-time-CPA mom who would like to go back to work, but do something that doesn’t involve numbers. At all. Ever. Shouldn’t she just keep up her certification, just in case?

Not necessarily.

We are all the sum total of our life’s experiences. I know that nothing I’ve ever done in my life — the good, the bad, the extremely ugly — was a waste. It’s all added up to make me the person I am today, and that feels pretty daggone good.

When you get the chance to reinvent your life, you get the chance to use everything you’ve got. When you get the chance to increase your joy, and, nifty by-product, achieve that elusive life balance, take it. Regardless of the little messages that tell you that following your heart is indulgent or purposeless.

If you are stuck, or itchy, or worried, or out of balance — forget the PWE. Focus on joy. And the rest will follow.

Next Page »