Think As Inc

A Win-Win Solution To Labor Market Chaos

A Fortune magazine article for a past downturn highlighted the changing scope of layoffs  – affecting white-collar, as well as blue-collar; recent graduates, as well as experienced.  The downturn is even hitting historically stable jobs, such as banking and consulting.  In these precarious times, one might wonder, “Can anyone win in this problematic labor market?”

An indiscriminate market that hits even the safest careers highlights an important and often overlooked point about the choices we make.  There is no 100% job security.  Every choice carries a risk.  If you make a career choice just to mitigate your risk, you could experience a potentially bigger letdown.  Let’s say you choose that consulting job, even though your dream is publishing.  Because consulting is stable.  Because publishing doesn’t pay well.  If you’re one of a significant number of recent graduates who got laid off when several big-name firms downsized, you’ve lost out twice:  1) you’ve lost your job; and 2) you’ve compromised your dream for what turns out to be a false sense of security. 

A better approach would be to acknowledge that all careers carry potential risks and therefore to take the risk for something you truly want.  This approach is a win-win solution.  If things work out, you have your dream career.  If not, you have the satisfaction of knowing that you did your best for what you love.  Either way, you’ll have a fabulous time on your journey.

The 80/20 Rule

To get a better work/life balance, you can try bringing more personal life into work.  Some actual examples of this trend are casual dress at the office, telecommuting and flextime, and bringing pets to work.  On the other hand, you can introduce business techniques into your personal life – e.g., scheduling your social calendar in your Palm Pilot, conducting family “meetings”.  My favorite technique is to apply the 80/20 rule, or Pareto’s Principle, to both work and life.

The 80/20 rule refers to the idea that in many cases 80% of the value (sometimes measured as income, revenue, or profits) is created by the top 20% of the population.  Thus, a firm with five customers that generates $5 MM in revenues would fall under the 80/20 rule, if the top customer generated $4 MM in revenues (or 80%), while the other four customers combined accounted for 20%.  If this business understands the 80/20 rule, it will not treat all its customers the same because of the disproportionately higher value of its top customer.

What is true in business is true in life.  We have many different customers – people/ responsibilities vying for our time and energy.  Our customers might be our spouse, our kids, our employer, our community, our hobby, etc.  Each customer brings us value, not necessarily in dollars and cents, but if our bottom line is overall quality of life, then each customer contributes to our bottom line in some way.  Yet, we don’t always give the bulk of our time and energy to our top 20%.  For example, if you think that family and career are your top 20%, and yet you spend a lot of time and energy on social events, committees, hobbies, and many other things, you may not be recognizing Pareto’s Principle.  Instead of spreading a lot of time and energy in disparate places, try to focus on the few things that are most valuable to you.  When you are faced with an overwhelming TO DO list, remind yourself of 80/20.  Apply your energy to the “20” to get yourself “80%” of the way to fulfilled.

Time Diary

Having worked in professional services for most of my career, I am used to accounting for my hours.  As a consultant, you itemize which hours are spent on each client.  Ideally, the most valuable clients get the most time.  So, too, in our personal lives the things we value most should get the most attention.  How close are you to living up to the things you value most?  For one week (one month or even longer would be preferable), keep a Time Diary.

List all the constituencies vying for your time (e.g., family, work, household, finances, fitness, personal, etc).  They are your clients.

Keep a log of everything you do in half-hour increments.  Be specific and honest with the time you actually.  If it takes you two hours to do laundry one day, don’t log one hour, thinking you can get your speed up at some other time. 

Assign each individual activity to a client (in the above example, laundry is the activity, and household is the client).  Other examples:  taking the kids to school is Family; hours in the office is Work.  At the end of the week (or longer), total the number of hours you spend by client.  The percentage of time that you devote to each client is a point-in-time audit of how you spend your life. 

Sample daily entry:

*Includes time working AND commuting/ preparing for work.

Sample monthly summary:

Of course, quantity is not quality, but the Time Diary is a tool to keep yourself on track.  Are you even able to fill out  this type of report, or are many hours “unbillable”?  Is this how you intended your schedule to be?  Are you spending your time on what is meaningful to you?

A Matter of Life and Death

I saw a Dateline Survival Story of a young hiker, getting caught in a blizzard, and surviving for days with only his lunch and water bottle.  (He didn’t sleep to prevent freezing to death and used the snow to refill his water bottle, first warming the bottle with his hands.)  This story illustrates an important point:  when you want something that badly, you will find a way.

This man wanted to live.  He realized, if he lived, he had a chance to be rescued.  He couldn’t do everything on his own (i.e., rescue himself from the mountain), so he focused only on what he could do:  stay alive – not alive for a certain time, not alive with all his belongings, just alive.

So it should be with our goals.  When we have the same life/death clarity, goal or no goal, we focus on what we can do.  However, many of us pick a goal and assign extraneous conditions to it.  We don’t just want to be a successful actor; we want to be a successful actor by a certain time (typically very soon after we decide to be an actor).  We don’t just want a fulfilling career and family; we want them both now and moving in lockstep each and every day. 

Unfortunately, goals are messier than that.  Our goals push our mental, physical and emotional limits.  Our goals conflict with other things that we want.  How do you know to keep pushing yourself?  You need life and death clarity about your goals.  If the goal is as meaningful to you as staying alive was to that survivor, then keep scrambling.    You may be rescued and have your dreams come true.

Taking A Chance In A Down Market

A reader asks:  I’ve been planning a career move, but the market I’m targeting is slow.  Should I wait till the market picks up before making the transition?

Making a move in a down market is tougher than in a robust market.  In the heady days of the last labor market boom, employers were so strapped that they considered a wider range of candidates – candidates with less experience, different industry expertise, or different functional specialty.  Now, employers can be selective and demand exactly the profile they prefer.

That said, there are many aspects to consider in a career move, and the state of the market is but one.  Other factors include professional preparation and emotional readiness. 

Have you thoroughly researched your target field?  Do you know the top firms?  Do you know the major trends? 

Have you conducted informational interviews to gain firsthand knowledge of your target field?  Do you know what personalities and backgrounds are most successful?  Do you know what it means day-to-day to work in this field?

Have you considered the impact of this transition on your life outside of career?  Are there significant lifestyle changes (e.g., longer hours, less money) associated with this transition?  Are you ready to work harder as you always do when you embark on something new?

If you have done your homework and are professionally and emotionally ready for a transition, then this supercedes the market circumstances of the time.  Yes, you could wait for another market upswing.  But then you never know when this might happen, and in the meantime, your knowledge goes stale and your courage starts waning.  In a down market, people still get jobs.  If you feel you’re ready, go for it.

The Importance of Heart

Early in my career, I was told, “You will be phenomenal in whatever it is you put your heart in.”  I have been a pianist, actor, consultant, banker, recruiter, and career coach.  Can you guess who said that?  A musician seeking to inspire?  A coach seeking to encourage?  Actually, I heard this and similar quotes at every stage in my career.  This particular one came from a partner at an investment bank.

Heart is probably not the first thing you think of when you think investment banking.  Yet, this successful person in this quantitative, business-minded industry recognized the importance of desire.  When we discussed the elements of career success, grades, degree, experience, and other tangible qualifications were not mentioned.  We talked exclusively about heart, passion, and wanting to do what you do.

We all hit career plateaus.  It might be an outright setback, like a layoff, or something subtler, like remaining at a position that no longer challenges you.  How do you know if your career is still the one for you?  There are many techniques to jumpstart your progress.  You can find mentors to inspire you, read trade journals to get new ideas, and research industry trends to plan ahead.  You can also just ask yourself:  How badly do I want this?  If your career still gets you excited — lights the fire behind your eyes, pulls at your heart – then focus on that and allow yourself to get excited again.  And you will be phenomenal.

Blind Spots

We all know someone who looks good all the time –who knows how to dress for any occasion, who looks fabulous effortlessly.  Do we admire that skill (because it is a skill) or do we disdain it and criticize (oh, she’s so vain)? 

The same example can be made about other skills, such as money management.  We all know someone who’s good with money – frugal, disciplined, knowledgeable about finance.  Do we learn from this person or do we demonize her (oh, she’s greedy)?

We all have weaknesses, and we all want to improve them.  However, some weaknesses are blind spots because we don’t recognize them or we don’t admit that a particular area is actually useful.  A good way to identify if you have a blind spot for fashion sense or money management is to see which opinion you shared for each of the above examples.  When we have a blind spot, we resent people who do well in our weak area or rationalize that the skill is not important.  Blind spots are energy drains, and blind you to ways to bring out even more of your talents.

Instead of envying the fashion queen and begrudging the financial guru, learn from them.  Why shouldn’t we look better, have more control over our money, and ___________ (fill in the blank with the skill that you know to be useful but currently don’t have).  Pay attention to moments where you find yourself judging someone negatively for doing something well because these might be blind spots.  Obviously, different skills vary in importance for different people, but a financial genius won’t get clients by looking like a mess, and a supermodel can overspend herself into financial ruin.  A breadth of skills is useful to everyone.

Inspiration On A Budget

Dreaming is good for everyone, and regular bouts of inspiration are a prerequisite.   Yet, shows, movies, books, museums, and other creative outlets can seem like unnecessary splurges.  Here are some tips for inspiration on a budget:

Buy theater and movie tickets at a discount.  Check out www.playbill.com or www.theatermania.com for discounts to Broadway, off-Broadway, and other shows.  TKTS booths in NY sell Broadway tickets for half price; there are typically similar outlets in other major cities.  Audience Extras and Theater Development Fund are additional sources for cheap tickets.  Visit the website of your favorite movie theater chain for info on discount movie tickets or other specials.  AMC has a Moviewatcher club to earn points towards free tickets.  If your office doesn’t offer corporate discounts on movie tickets, ask your friends because someone’s office probably does. 

Borrow books instead of buying.  For NY libraries, visit www.nypl.org, where you can search on titles, subjects, keywords and authors, reserve books, and designate the branch where the books should be delivered.  You will be emailed when they are ready for pick-up.  Other cities might have a similar set-up.

Visit museums on the free day.  Many museums and cultural institutions offer blocks of time when you can pay what you wish or even enter free.  Keep a log of these free days, skip the Starbucks, and instead meet with friends in these climate-controlled, non-caloric, creative atmospheres.

Audit classes for free inspiration pick-me-ups.  Most acting schools let you audit one class for free.  Neighborhood colleges sometimes offer classes at no or low cost.

The Challenge of Parallel Careers

Many of us have parallel careers – the “money job” we do from 9 to 5; and the dream we harbor on the sidelines.  Even those of us who make the leap to turn dream into dream career may not earn a sufficient or stable income solely from this dream  – hence the prototype of the waiter/ actor.  Thus, we have parallel careers:  the one that fulfills our life; and the other that makes our livelihood.  Here are some tips to meet the challenge of parallel careers:

Clarify your motivations for each career.  What is your ultimate goal for your dream?  Do you want your dream to be your source of income, or do you want to keep both careers?  How much money do you need to make from your money job?  How much scheduling flexibility do you need?  Depending on your requirements, your money job may mean temping, a traditional career track job, or an entrepreneurial venture.

Follow the business protocol for each career.  Take the example of an actor who supplements with temp work.  Acting resumes differ from corporate resumes.  Audition clothes differ from interview clothes.  Interviews vary at a casting office versus a corporate office.  You need to understand the required marketing materials, dress code, and work environments of each career.

Maintain perspective about the benefits of both careers.  The benefits of pursuing your dream as a career include doing what you love every day.  However, resist the trap of begrudging your money job.  Your money job is an investment in your dream.  It sustains your dream and gives it a chance to succeed.  Both careers contribute to your ultimate life goals.

Helpful Tips for Sticking To Your Goals

You’ve picked your goal.  You’ve aligned your mind, your energy, your time and your money to reach it.  Now if you could just stick to it long enough to see results….A key to sticking to it is being flexible enough to adapt when initial plans and prior assumptions don’t pan out.  Here are additional tips to help you stick to your goal:

Share the work.  Form a support group of like-minded goalseekers.  Meet on a regular basis to share encouragement and tips.  Share your progress with each other, and promote accountability.

Pace yourself.  Reaching too far too fast is demoralizing.  In many fields, from athletics to business, goals are mapped out over a long-term timeframe.  Runners build up to the marathon.  Writers have drafts before the final product.  CEO’s hold several jobs during their overall career of CEO.   Find out what are realistic progress steps for your ultimate goal and plan accordingly.

Always find the fun.  Goals can be about pushing our limits, improving bad habits, and acquiring new skills.  However, while the ultimate destination may be self-improvement, the journey should still be fun.  If sticking to your goal seems like drudgery, ask yourself whether or not the goal is still relevant.  You want to honor your needs and values, not just prove your sticking power.  If you’re convinced that you’ve identified the right goal, then inject a fun factor in your strategy.  Losing weight does not have to mean x number of trips to the gym, if you’re not a gym rat.  It may mean dancing at the local club, walking to work, doing laps around the mall, or meeting friends over different workouts, rather than at the café.