It can be difficult if not impossible to know where your career should go. It’s not that you can’t pick a direction, it is making sure it is the right direction. You may climb the career ladder of success, only to find out it is leaning against the wrong wall.
Here is a great article on how to figure out where you should go.
Posted in Focus, management, Perseverance, Promotions, Quitting or Fired
Tagged career direction
I was at a gorgeous house. It had radiant heating, an indoor basketball court and swimming pool, wonderful view, and enough room for anyone’s desires. I loved it. The hosts were generous and kind. Then I decided to tally up the cost of owning a house like that. My estimate is $24,000 per month without mortgage payments. Owning that great house had a price tag that I can’t ever see myself paying.
Last week I also talked with people in jobs that paid $100,000 – $250,000 per year. They are wonderful jobs. Nice offices, private secretaries, authority over others, and a sweet lifestyle come with the jobs. They are leading financial and accounting people.
There is a price those people pay. First is education and certification. Then comes an apprenticeship with 60-90 hour weeks for months at a time during peak seasons. Without that apprenticeship with the “right” companies, they would be earning half of what they are. The “right” companies now means choosing from 4 major CPA firms and toiling there for at least 4 years.
With all that hard work, we still need to mention another 5-20 years of always putting in 50+ hours per week. There is a very high price for those jobs, and there is high pay. Many people try to get around the education, certification, and apprenticeship. Notably, a few people make it without those exact experiences. But those who get around it are either obviously geniuses, or have worked even more to rise from obscurity to notoriety than the path I outlined would have taken.
If there is a high and mighty job you want, there is also a price to be paid for it. Go ahead, get that job. As you earn that job, make sure that you always understand the price of the next step or two in your progression.
Both a big house and a great job have fine rewards. They also have their own unique costs. It can be worth it. Is it worth it for you?
Something To Do Today
Invite to lunch a person who has the job you want. Ask them about the price they paid in the past and they price they pay now for that job.
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Later: What may happen in the next recession
Posted in Focus, management, Perseverance, Promotions, Raises, talent, Time management
Tagged job costs
Into everyone’s life comes people who just don’t get it. There is even a chance that you will be that person for someone else at some time. The fact is, no one sets out to be an idiot. They are always well intentioned, they just don’t get it. So how do you deal with an absolute idiot? What if he’s your boss?
Pretend he is 6.
How do you deal with a 6 year old? If they are not causing any real trouble you just smile and ignore them. Sure, you correct them occasionally, but you let them mature until they understand something about life. Smile and enjoy it. You don’t spread malicious gossip. Why should you? They are only 6 after all.
And what if the 6 year old just gets too annoying? Do you gossip behind his back? Do you shoot him for target practice? No. You give him chores. If you can, you give him chores that will educate him and make him less of an idiot. Otherwise you just have him do a lot of things that need to be done. That gets him out of your hair, and gets things done. In the end he may even learn that if he is annoying, he gets more chores to do.
If that 6 year old is destroying property or reputation, you take him aside tell him to stop, and tell him what the consequences are if he doesn’t stop. Then you follow through. He may consider it a threat. You should just consider it a statement of fact. You essentially tell a 6 year old, “I love you too much to let you do that.”
What if the 6 year old isn’t yours? Then you politely draw boundaries with the kid. If the kid goes past them, you rudely let him know. You call his mom if he won’t cooperate.
Can you do that to your boss?
What if the idiot is your boss? Same thing. I mean, do the same things.
Sometimes you just have to smile at your boss and let him go about doing whatever he wants. If he is doing something destructive, give him chores – try to help him see that there are things he can do that will help, or at least won’t slow people down.
If your boss is destroying property or reputation, take him aside and tell him what the consequences are if he doesn’t stop. Are you telling his boss? Leaving the company? Asking for a transfer? Let your boss know that what he is doing is absolutely unacceptable and you will not allow him to continue doing it. Be prepared in case he fires you. Think about it, if your boss is damaging your reputation, won’t you be better off looking for a new job?
Of course there is always the final way to get rid of an idiot. Move. Get a new job or a new house. Maybe you should try the other things I mentioned first. Treat the idiots in your life like a 6 year old. It will preserve your mental health.
Something To Do Today
Don’t get mad at idiots. Get an attitude change. Look at them as really big 6 year olds.
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Later: Did you notice that job boards are mostly ads by agencies?
Nerds don’t just happen to dress informally. They do it too consistently. Consciously or not, they dress informally as a prophylactic measure against stupidity. (Paul Graham)
My partner changed the career of a man stuck in a job rut. He was looking for a job and no one would hire him. His current boss wouldn’t promote him.
Dress for your career, not your job
He was a banker. He had a great personality, was a hard worker, smart, self assured, and educated. He got things done. He was going nowhere in his career. His white shirt under that nice suit and tie was slightly wrinkled and just didn’t look sharp. Karen gave him one piece of advice that made all the difference, “Get your shirts done at the dry cleaners.” He got the job and rose like a rocket in his new bank. 20 years later he came into our office and expected her to notice that he still got his shirts done at the cleaners. She noticed.
The secret
If you are applying for a job, you have to be dressed in at least the same crispness as the hiring manager. A little better is okay. The hiring manager has to get the first impression that you will work as hard as he does. That first impression is often the only real thing that keeps a job candidate from being hired.
When you dress up to the level you want to rise to, you are seen at first glance as someone to be reckoned with. People will automatically figure out where you want to go. Your clothes need to be clean, pressed, and sharp. Your shoes need to be nicer, cleaner, and shinier than the shoes of your boss’s boss. And wear nice socks that never show skin at the bottom of your pants leg.
Look at how your boss’s boss dresses. If you want to impress him, you are going to have to look like him. Sorry. That is just a fact. If you are of the opposite sex, it only applies more strongly. You have to look like you are in his circle of acquaintances in order to be invited to work directly for him.
The way you dress will actually change your performance. Other people will subconsciously give you more respect and more opportunities. Take advantage of it.
Instead of dressing like all the rest of the nerd herd doing your job, dress like the person whose career is going places.
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Something To Do Today
Ask your boss to tell you how you should dress.
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Later: Resume blasting
Certifications – gold and lead
Recruiter motivation
Posted in Interviews, management, Promotions, Raises, talent
Tagged dress for success, how to dress, job rut, make an impression
A Fortune 50 Executive said it was one of the more difficult times of his life. He was in charge of identifying 2000 MBA’s in their organization who would receive layoff notices in December. These were dedicated workers from top schools who were earning fat salaries. They were putting in long hours on important projects, sure their futures were secure. Just before Christmas they would get their pink slips. Their lives would shatter.
Of course he had been on that same track and made it past middle management. He was actually going to be well rewarded that year. He was dramatically cutting costs. His bonus was tied to how heavily he slashed employees. It was tough, but every person fired was a little more gravy for him. He was earning more than he could have at any mid-sized company.
The rewards are great, but so are the risks in the Fortune 50.
Most of those huge companies are divided up into groups and divisions so that they run a lot like a mid-sized company with strong financial backing. That does provide stability and a chance to be part of a high risk/high reward project. However, all that strong financial backing can disappear when 3/4ths of the company has a bad year. Then out come the knives. The most profitable divisions also have job cuts at those times.
Just last month I was talking with my son about the Fortune 50 company he is working for that is cutting folks at a division with a 50% profit margin and high growth rate. Sometimes it seems odd. There is always a good reason somewhere when they do something like that.
Is it better to work for a mid-sized or small company? No one knows. That’s because no one knows the future. I’m sure that at least half of those 2000 MBA’s went to mid-sized and small companies after they were cut loose. Their experience and education got them all new jobs within 6 months or a year.
When you get a chance to work for a huge company, remember the risks as well as the rewards. There is no free ride. Reward and risk always go together. Don’t forget the rewards of experience as well as the money, or the risks that come with being part of an organization where you are an expendable replaceable cog.
Something to do today
Look at your own job stability. How subject are you to layoffs not related to your area’s performance?
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Coming up
Scrabble and muck and get ahead
When to give up and go elsewhere
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And a final thought about the same question and the government
You will find that the State is the kind of organization which, though it does big things badly, does small things badly too. (John Kenneth Galbraith)
Posted in Attitude, Finding jobs, Focus, management, Raises
Tagged job rewards, job risks
10 years ago the average car buyer visited 4.1 dealers before buying. Today he visits 1.7 dealers. The buyers are better informed. They can even find the dealer invoice amount, dealer only incentives and other bargaining information before they buy. The speed of decision making has dramatically increased.
3 years ago companies we deal with sometimes took months to consider who exactly they should hire. There was no hurry. Candidates were plentiful and not moving into new jobs quickly. Slow hiring was not a problem.
Now the need to fill particular jobs is more acute. I’m talking about the highest demand jobs. Even in this economy there are critical jobs that desperately need to be filled. Companies need to hire quickly.
Even after an offer is accepted, more candidates are being courted by the company they are trying to leave and the companies they turn down. That courting often continues for months after they start their new job. For these critical jobs, 20% or more of the people that accept a job, get stolen by someone else before they start. The speed of decision making is increasing as well as the need for good decisions.
Companies are less and less likely to seriously consider you unless you are serious about a move. They won\’t allow you two weeks to decide if you want a job. If the company waits that long then they may lose their two backup candidates. The companies just can’t wait.
Since companies and candidates are moving faster now, I\’ll give you some guidelines about how you can make decisions quickly over the next few days.
Something to do today
You are at least considering leaving your job. Write down why. It will help organize your thoughts.
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Coming up
How to make a quick decision
Support net preparation
Personal brainwork
Job research
Company research
Posted in Counteroffers, Economy, management, Negotiating
Tagged counteroffers, decisions, economy, hiring
All large projects do not fail. Only 1/3 of them. The 5 main reasons for failure of large projects that will transform the way people work are well explained. You just think this only applies to Information Systems. Think about the last large transformative project you saw attempted or completed.
Posted in management
Prepare yourself for the world, as the athletes used to do for their exercise, oil your mind and your manners, to give them the necessary suppleness and flexibility, strength alone will not do. (Earl of Chesterfield)
Julie called my office. She wants a promotion. I’m a recruiter, it’s my job to help her find that promotion in a new company. I hate to have someone turn down a job because their boss makes them a counter offer they can’t refuse. So, I asked her, “How often do you tell your boss you want a promotion?”
“I told him at my last performance review.”
“How long ago was that?”
“It has been over a year. We’re so busy the managers just can’t find time to do them.”
She’s a superstar performer going nowhere. When the office is jumping with activity for months at a time, no one counts her performance as exceptional. They just know she isn’t any trouble.
So, I suggested she declare her candidacy in a way that makes her an obvious choice for that promotion. It will also make it easier to find a new job with a promotion. First Julie needs to invite a few of her bosses out to lunch. She needs to let them know she wants the promotion. She needs to find a mentor. Then she needs to get a plan put together with her mentor’s help. She needs to prepare for promotion.
Deciding who to promote in an office of heads down hard workers is tough. There is no standout leader. No one has already taken the helm. However, in an office with a bunch of hard workers, one of whom has been working with the boss to develop leadership skills for a year, which will get promoted? Obviously the boss’s protégé. The person who has declared themselves for the job.
Julie may need to take a bookkeeping course, sales training, management classes and take the lead in 5 or 10 projects. What she needs can be determined with her mentor. As she does these things, she will be seen as the obvious choice for a promotion. Her bosses and her coworkers will both see she is the obvious choice for promotion.
If you want to be promoted ask one of your bosses to help you prepare now. Find a mentor.
Something to do today
Invite your boss or his boss to lunch. Ask him to mentor you and help you get ready for a promotion.
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Later: You are underpaid, right?
A manager is making you happy or miserable. A recent study by the Society for Human Resource Managers (SHRM) concluded that 79% of people who leave their jobs say that lack of appreciation is a key reason. Happiness at work is, therefore, the manager’s fault. People quit because of their managers. In the end, your managers will make or break your work experience.
The average person who changes jobs only gets a 5% raise according to another study. That is not a lot of money. Quite often the next raise would have met or exceeded that. So money is not a major factor
Recognition, praise, rewards and awards are part of a manager’s duty. Yet many managers get so caught up in projects and budgets that they never say, “Well done!”
So, when you are looking for a job or a promotion, you know the most important thing to look for. Find a good manager.
How do you decide who is a good manager?
Find a chance to ask people who have been working for that person how they like it. Listen carefully for hints of happiness or unhappiness. Follow through on any hints with more questions.
Think about the managers you have liked. Haven’t they been the ones who knew how well you did, and recognized you for it?
Something to do today
List your last 4 managers. First rank them by how well they appreciated your accomplishments. Then rank them by how you liked them overall as managers. Is there something to this? What kind of a manager or team leader are you?
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Later: A kick in the teeth
You vs offshoring
Prepare to be a manager
You are underpaid, right?
Posted in Attitude, management, Quitting or Fired
Tagged be a good manager, find a good manager
Seeing office politics is not easy. Seeing the final disastrous result of office politics is easy. You can train yourself to see invisible office politics before they kill you. Let me give you an example of being trained to see what is already there.
Discovery consists of seeing what everybody has seen and thinking what nobody has thought. (Albert von Szent-Gyorgi)
I took my Boy Scouts out into the woods. We went to look for animal signs. The boys couldn’t see a thing. Nothing. Then one spotted a bird. They all saw it. Another heard a woodpecker. Suddenly they could all hear it and they also noticed the trees with woodpecker holes in them. I pointed out a rabbit run. The leaves were broken up into littler pieces than the surrounding leaves and there was also a tunnel under some bushes. They started seeing rabbit runs. We walked down the road and I saw some deer tracks. They looked and found the path that the deer were using. It was just like a rabbit run, only bigger. As their eyes were trained, they saw more and more. Once they concentrated on looking for things out of the ordinary, they got good at spotting animal signs.
Training yourself to see office politics is difficult. Often you see the person who gets what they want, and not the people who enable it. Look at the interactions where you are. Who really makes decisions?
Choosing a guide is a great idea. Don’t choose the loudest person. Choose the most effective person. Who seems to get what they want? Invite them to lunch or just find a moment to be alone with them. Ask how they do it. Sincere interest is a form of flattery that is almost impossible to resist. You will quickly find out what you need.
Warning! As you are finding out who the gatekeepers and roadblocks are, learn to keep your mouth shut. Getting experts to trust you with their secrets depends on your keeping their confidence safe. Ask questions. Don’t spill the dirt. Funny thing about gossip, effective people shun it. They like helping people understand how a department really works, but they shut down and hurt gossips.
You can have a training program you don’t have to pay for. If you are worthy of their trust, the people who know will train you. They will want you for an ally.
Something to do today
Take a few days and become an observer. Ask questions. Find out the lay of the land. Who are the people who benefit from the power brokers? Who really are the power brokers?
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Later: Job ad red herring
Resume red herring
Interview red herring