Grits

Career track and job satisfaction

Is there really such a thing as a “career track” these days? I used to think there was something like that  -- something I was supposed to articulate, find and stay on....but to be honest, any achievements I have had in working didn’t follow a track or pattern, but more having to do with “satisfaction.”

Now, maybe to a lot of people satisfaction is defined by following a set path to a particular career goal (by X number of years I can be partner in a law firm? Managing director of a consultancy? Senior manager of a company?).

To me, job satisfaction has way more to do with internal checkpoints, not punching your ticket with job assignments.

When I was just starting out, I had to be challenged. In my 20’s a headhunter once observed about me that it was death by a thousand cuts if I felt I was coasting in a job – I had to be striving constantly to learn more and accomplishing tasks that were just out of reach. Hard to maintain every day. Consequently, I was mostly dissatisfied in my early work life! Hard on a boss too to keep me engaged.

At one point, I was working at a regional advertising agency and my boss was pretty good at throwing stuff at me that was very challenging. But eventually I felt like I was doing the same thing over and over again. AAAACK! Also, I owned some shares in the agency, so technically I was an “owner.” But it didn’t feel like I had any juice whatsoever.

And then I had a brilliant idea. I heard that one of the majority owners who had one-third ownership was ready to sell his shares.  So one day I marched into the president’s office (he was my day-to-day boss) and said I would like to buy all the shares.  Hah! That would keep me revved up for awhile!

Well, he was gracious about saying “no thanks” but it was a little too fast. Could be I surprised the hell of him. Not sure why, he was my age (29) when he started the agency.

I hung around for several more months but I really wanted the experience of running my own shop. Around that time, my husband wanted to open a division of his home furnishings company to focus on office furnishings so I jumped to establish that.

During this time I was also getting serious about my spiritual development. I was studying the Bible
pretty regularly and figuring out how to apply the insights I was learning into my life, particularly my work experience.

One of the lessons that kept tugging on me was Jesus’ statement “Not my will but thine be done.” Jesus utters this when he asks God to let him off the hook for the crucifixion. Phew! What trust, what love, what humility!

Somewhere in my consciousness I knew that kind of yielding to a divine direction – no matter what – was NOT the kind of direction I had been following. It was more, “gee I’m bored, what else can I do?”

After a couple of years of spiritual study and discovery, I had a new realization about what would satisfy me in my work experience. Instead of continually looking for yet another challenging task, I really wanted to contribute to whatever workplace I was in. How could I make it better? In other words, the job wasn’t about what I needed – what did a workplace need that I could help with? This would be my job.

Interestingly, about this time I did a strategic plan for my husband’s business and it became obvious to him and me that my role was extraneous!

Instead of madly rushing around looking for another job, I paused for several days in deep study and prayer. I asked God, the Spirit of all Life, what did She want me to do? How could I contribute to a workplace by expressing Her qualities of goodness, respect, creativity?

After a couple of weeks of thinking about this and praying to know that not only would Spirit guide me in the right direction, I would recognize it as God-directed too!

One day, when I was reading another of my favorite Bible commentaries, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, I stopped and said outloud “OK, God, what do you want me to do? I will do ANYTHING – EVEN go back to work for my old boss at the agency!!”

Oh man, this was my moment of total yielding – it was the first time I knew what it meant to believe, “Not my will but thine be done.” It is hard to describe the peace and exhilaration I felt...because at the same moment of utter yielding, it was also a “calling forth” – a total expectation to see and experience what God wanted me to do.  No doubt, Spirit was already guiding me to the right place. I felt free!

A couple of hours later – I am not making this up – the phone rang. It is my old boss. “Remember a few years ago when you wanted to buy a third of the agency? Well, I am ready to retire and I would like to sell you my ownership (over half of the total stock).”

Oh, God is so good...and clear!!! Within the month we had negotiated the deal and I stepped in as president of the firm. For 15 years this experience gave me all the challenges and accomplishments I could hope for. But most important, the spiritual lessons I learned became a foundation for continued spiritual growth.

How could it not? The experience was based on yielding to total trust in Her will, not mine. And that is job satisfaction for me.

Is money necessary for commitment?

For the first time in over 30 years, I do not have a job to "go to" in the morning. I am not an employee of anyone. This is not to say that my work habits have changed -- I still have a Monday-Sunday, 9-to-whenever work ethic. Only now it is filled up with projects and responsibilities that come to me because of my capabilities, not a company that I represent in a particular role. The luxury of this new work dynamic is that I only work on stuff that is truly meaningful to me, that makes me feel in some way I am helping other people or my community. But the flip side is that, since I am no longer an employee, I no longer have a steady income. This has made me think a LOT about why I work, what I work on and even what is the source of my income.

In one of my early jobs as an account executive for an advertising agency, I had a boss who felt there were three reasons to consider taking on a new account -- and if you could answer TWO of the three (any two), then Congratulations, you have a new piece of business! The three reasons are: Will it be fun? Will you learn something? Will you make money? His feeling was that if you werent going to make money, then you will learn something, which you should leverage into making money on something else. What I liked was that making money wasn't the only reason to take on an assignment. Pretty important lesson to learn as a 25 year-old.

So, fast forward to my last job as an employee. It was the best job I ever had, and the hardest I have ever worked. It was fun, I learned a WHOLE lot about my spiritual self and I was compensated well. The Trifecta of my former boss' criteria for work!

SInce I left that job last June, I have worked on several projects and all for equity positions. Meaning, no money coming in until the projects are funded. Let me tell you, that gets you focused very clearly on what is worth doing, if you are not getting paid. Sure there is the expectation that what you are helping to develop will be valuable some day, especially if you have confidence in the quality of the team and the concept. But still, having the hope of a future payoff isn't enough to pull me through the present day to day UNLESS I am totally, 100% committed to it.

And that made me wonder, how many of my previous jobs would I have stuck with if I weren't getting paid?  None, most likely...would have gone off to find a job that paid, regardless of whether it was fun or meaningful.

What a difference a few decades makes. I am working on a new project that doesn't pay. But I am committed to it 100%. In fact, it takes priority over all other projects I am working on. Will it pay off in the future? I expect so. Because the purpose of it is to help tons of people be better and happier in their lives. So I think it will provide value that people will pay for.

Bottomline, meaning comes first for a commitment. Then pay. And pay must come because it is the mechanism by which we know if we are providing value. So commitment is necessary for money.

If my old boss were around, I would have to tell him that after 25 years, I figured it out. It's fun for me if it is meaningful...when it is meaningful I am committed...and when it is meaningful for others the money will come.

Just Start.

What are you starting...or starting to think about -- a big project, a new business, a new department in an old company? You gotta read Guy Kawasaki's latest book, The Art of the Start. This book demystifies every single freakin' aspect of starting, shaping and giving life to something. Heck, this book is so fun to read, even if you aren't starting something half-way through you want to!!

"I'm Grits and I am a serial entrepreneur...." Seriously, I am always sniffing around to find the road less traveled. If tons of people are on the same road I get the heebie-jeebies...too common, too vanilla, and I suspect too many compromises to appeal to so many people at the same time. Don't like being in the middle of the road. I'm on the lookout for the gaps in services needed or the "orphan businesses".

But there are scads of ideas out there -- the hard part is making them tangible. Guy's book lays it all out there so that you don't have to reinvent the process of the start-up, but can focus on developing the sure-fire idea itself. This book gives you better than a fighting chance to make a go of your nifty idea.

10 years ago -- yeah, really -- I had an idea for a website-plus-TV show that was all about re-employing the US workforce. This was during a period of very high unemployment (around 12%, I recall) where big chunks of employees were being laid off. But it also appeared that there was demand in other places -- people needed to be redeployed. And there wasn't an efficient way to connect the vast supply with the new demand. I thought the Internet was the way to do it. Mind you, this was before Monster.com.

The TV show was short stories of people who had reinvented their employment and shared tips on how to do it. And it punted the viewer to the Internet for more info, community discussions, job listings, etc. Yeah, a built-in traffic strategy!

It didn't help that not only were people just beginning to learn about the internet (the WWW was just getting some traction and the web-browser had just come online), the technology wasn't there to do what I and my colleagues had envisioned.  Too big, too audacious, too soon. And we were marketing people, not technologists! Ooops.

But I lived through a lot of the trials and tribulations that Guy is helping a new breed of entrepreneurs avoid. Believe me, this book is right on the money.

I have a shelf of books that is right above my head because I refer to them repeatedly. These books have notes in the margin, stickies, related articles -- they are living guides. This joined the shelf.

My New Year's tip: Just start this book.

Maura, the manicurist philosopher

My manicurist-pedicurist, Maura, is a deep thinker who is constantly stretching her opinions and mental foundations by reading, travelling and philosophizing with her customers. I am hardly worthy of her conversations, except for one thing: I graduated from Berkeley during the Vietnam War protests which gives me some kind of "street cred" to Maura because she wishes she could have been there during that time.

I haven't the heart (or guts, more like) to confess that I was a member of a sorority; in fact I was elected the President of ALL sororities in my senior year. I want Maura to think of me as a young radical (instead of a boomer radical which I have become).  Some people become more conservative as they get older. Not me. Maybe by the time I am a senior citizen I will get what Abbie Hoffman was ticked off about.

Anyway, I go to Maura less for the manicure-pedicure (she is awesome, truly) and more for the conversation. Even though there are times during the chat when I hear Maura describe her latest insights and I think "What a loser I am!".

Here's just one example. Saw Maura right after the election. She had just come back from a three-week tour of Mongolia via the Trans-Siberia railroad. Seriously.

Sidebar: Vacations to Maura are supposed to be challenging, stretching; even if they are scary Maura wants to push herself into new experiences to teach her new things about herself. AAACK! She tells me this a week before I jet off to Paris (business-class to use up United miles) for a week.

So we are bemoaning the election results. Maura had said that before the election if the results didn't go her way she was going to move to Europe (she is first-generation Irish). Well, she changed her mind. Several of her friends got together and decided that instead of splitting, they were becoming activists: each woman would join an activist group representing an issue close to their heart: land-mines, north-slope drilling, etc. Maura was joining the Wildlife fund.

What am I doing? Muting the news whenever the Republicans come on. My finger on the mute button is the only action I take.

Toward the end of our session, Maura tells me that her favorite book in high school was Che Guevara's diaries. And that she still reads it from time to time. "Che Guevara is someone I wish I could have met," she said. What pops into my head as the person I wished I could have met? You are not going to believe it. Bobby Darin.  I am not making this up. What am I thinking?

I am hanging with Maura. No way am I ever going on the Trans-Siberia railroad but I want to hear about the experiences from my comfy chair.

Geez louise, I just thought: that's kind of how I observed the protests at Berkeley.

A Heart for Giving

I am reading the coolest book. Yeah, really. It's called "Never Eat Alone...and other secrets to success, one relationship at a time". This is not something I would have picked off a Best-Sellers shelf (betcha it will be in January) only because I would have said to myself, naaah I don't need that.

Wrong-o. I think anyone who works, socializes or inter-relates with others should read this book. Cuz it describes in detail how you can give more of yourself, help others and create numerous communities of giving. Now that's cool, huh?

Lucky for me I met the author, Keith Ferrazzi, at a conference a few weeks ago. He was leading the whole conference (about 250 CIO-types) into a speed-dating exercise where we learned how to make more meaningful conversation that could lead to helpful business relationships. Changed the dynamic of the two days of the conference as people moved off the shallow topics (or avoided conversation altogether) into deeper issues. Happened to me and my two colleagues.

So at a break I had to tell Keith how much I enjoyed the session. Which was a total surprise to me. I really was dreading it. Usually I am right about these things (ya think they are self-fulfilling??). Not this time. Had to spill my guts to Keith. Not only was Keith gracious, he gave me a galley-proof of his book.

Here's the thing you notice right away in the book: it's a very personal story about the author's life and business career. Keith is  open and honest about what works and what doesn't. He's giving everyone who reads this book the Secret Sauce of his professional and personal life. Whatever has made his life work and successful, he is giving away. No strings. He's not worried that someone might pick up his tips and compete in the marketplace -- in fact, I get the feeling that nothing would tickle Keith more than to have helped everyone be as successful as he is.

But that isn't really the point of the book. At least to me. The basic foundation of the author's message is to be willing to give give give: ideas, support, advice, contacts, time, joy, yourself...and to be willing to be vulnerable. Oooh, a toughie. You gotta share your passions, your hopes -- even your fears. And you will be blessed with more deeper relationships than you can shake a stick at (whatever does that mean??). Imagine all your relationships like that!

Maybe the book resonates with me cuz it coincides with starting to blog...there's an undercurrent in my heart that really wants to connect deeper with others. And the sure-fire way to do that is open up, give it up...and be willing to be vulnerable. I need that.

Cool.

We may be bozos, but we are improving bozos

Stephen Hawking is interviewed in the NYTimes Magazine today. I almost skipped it, even though I usually read the interviews. They are short, sometimes insightful and, depending on the subject, can be pungent. Turns out, this was all three.

Why did I feel like skipping it? I'm almost ashamed to admit, but I thought it might be too cerebral. Wrong. Hawking was very down-to-earth and abrupt. It was refreshing!

He said something right up front that I have been thinking about all day. The interviewer asked what were the hot ideas in physics this year. (Well, words to that effect.) He snapped back (I am imagining, cuz this was all done by email): We won't know for a few years.

Wow. Hawking is clearly making a distinction between what we in the general public hear about in a year versus what hot ideas are actually known in the significantly smaller world of physics. But most importantly (is it supposed to be "important"? I always get confused), it seems to me that he is noting that the significance is in the effect of some new discovery....which is when we hear about it.

One of my favorite authors (Mary Baker Eddy) who writes about spirituality and its practical application wrote, "Future ages must declare what the pioneer has accomplished."

Seems kind of dicey, if you are the pioneer, to leave the measure of your work to future generations. I mean, they could be bozos! But I guess that is the point, right? A really good, practical idea lasts, stands, benefits, no matter what the quality of the future.

Hmmm, when you think about it the good idea is probably influencing the future generation, perhaps even preparing it to accept or even recognize the idea. So, while we might be bozos (and there are sure to be bozos to come), we are improved bozos.

I'm ok with that. Actually, it gives me hope.