For my last class of the semester, I share a few of my thoughts on life, work life, and generally, how to be happy. NB, n=1.  Just one person’s opinion.  One of the more practical diagrams is the following. On the left side is formal education = school. It is a straight line because it’s predictable. You know when classes start / stop. There are due dates, guidelines, and a grading rubric which tells you how to “get an A”.

Life is a bunch of S-curves.

Same with career.  Career is a bunch of S-curves.

Commencement

Recently, thousands of Emory graduates celebrated their hard work. Poetically, it is called commencement – the start of something new. Commencer. Yes it’s time to start.

Career and life, not linear 

Recently, I was reflecting with a friend (hat tip: EL) on how you can’t really predict life perfectly. Life gives you nudges. For example, I moved to South Korea when I was 25 years old, and just a little lost in my career. I planned on staying for 1 year – uh – I stayed 7 years. Since graduating from college 25 years ago, the life has looked like the diagram on the right, S-curves, and it has been wonderful.

S-curves have 3 parts

Yes, S-curves come in different shapes and sizes, but generally have 3 parts:

1. Start, launch – hard, (often unglamorous) work; gravity is real
2. Cruising altitude – got “flow” and things are going well; promotions abound
3. Leveling off – nothing left to learn, you are bored, or the size of the box is limited

1. Starting out 

This is the launch of the career / job rocket. Enormous amount of energy to lift off. Here you are doing the extra work to build a reputation as a smart, self-aware, eager, and fun person. Building relational equity. You are saying “yes” a lot because, well, you’re the new kid at school. Networking = being a useful human. 

• Inputs = High, Outputs = Lower than you’d like
• Time to be a little more patient, show grit. Be dependable

2. Ramping up 

This is the fun part. You are crushing it. You’ve found a rhythm. You have a virtuous cycle of activities = where it’s almost getting easier to do your job. People are seeking you out because you get stuff done. Here, you wish that there 2 or 3 of you, because you want to pick up all the opportunities in front of you.  Woe is I.

• Input = High, Outputs = Higher than you expected
• Don’t complain, keep doing good work, say “thank you” when you get compliments
• Keep shipping product, harvest the good crops you have planted

3. Plateauing

This happens to everyone. Things aren’t fun any more. You are in a lot of meetings that kinda don’t go anywhere. You are a mailman who is delivering messages (light on content) between departments and people. You are busy “getting alignment” and “managing change” and actually have trouble explaining your job to your kid.  Not good.

• Inputs = Frankly, you’re fading not putting in your best work, Outputs = and it shows, meh results
• You need a career Red Bull, executive coach, new role, or a new job
• Don’t coast. Coasting = career death 

1-2-3. know where you are

So, for me here’s the key. When at (1) show some grit, do the work. If it’s worth doing, and you set your mind to it, push through. Don’t give up. Think Vince Lombardi. When at (2) keep going. When at (3) time for a change.

Unlike school,  the remaining 30-40 years of our career / working life is not broken into semesters with conveniently timed winter, spring, and summer breaks. This is what makes it life, and fun. You decide.

Entry-level jobs are not so “entry-level” anymore

The WSJ notes that college graduates have the opportunity for more meaningful work, right off the bat:

• Massive technology investment (think: ERP, massive fiber optic, Moore’s law) has automated a lot of the low-end, manual, menial jobs of the past. New hires will not be transcribing or entering data.
• The World is Flat (affiliate link) and the work has been chopped up into pieces and outsourced; the work has been given to the person with the least opportunity cost, and frankly, that’s often not the student from the East Coast liberal arts university education
• Unemployment in the US is at a 50 year low.  Yes, lowest since 1969.  Wha?

“They almost get to skip a step of evolution in their career path because we’re automating the least common denominator of lower-level tasks,”  – Kurt R, founder of software maker

It’s good and bad

It’s good because . . .  well, it’s good. All the flattening of organizations, outsourcing, and private equity tightening up of organizations has created lean companies. This means that new graduates will be closer to the action; they will be interacting externally with customers, vendors, and competitors more quickly.

It’s bad because there is less training and less time to “study up”. Nope, there’s less time for you to “get ready to add value”.  Nope, here’s your horse, pistol, and badge. You are now a deputy sheriff – just like you wanted to be.

Today’s hires—whatever their age—need to be independent and savvy at uniting people within their sphere of influence, says Keith Ferrazzi, ex-CMO at Deloitte.  “You have to find new ways to get coached. . . Learning to lead without authority is now the only way to get anything done”

Less training for new recruits

Training is lumpy. Senior leaders are getting more of the training dollars, while employees are getting less. New hires need to quickly de-code their boss’ working style, become an easy-to-work with, easy-to-coach person.

The proportion of employers spending more than $1,000 a person annually to train middle managers, supervisors and rank-and-file employees fell below one-third in the past two years, according to a 2017 survey of 237 employers by Brandon Hall Group. Meanwhile, employers spending that much on training senior leaders rose to 58% in 2017 from 55% in 2015, says David Wentworth, a principal learning analyst for the research and advisory firm.

Sometimes you go backwards

Every S-curve does not start where the last one left off. I have worked 6 different companies / organizations in my professional career, and twice, my salary went down, not up. It’s a mountain climb, not a ladder.

Pivot, plan, then jump

A Deloitte partner (hat tip: AG) said that when you are shifting in your career – you should think of it like Tarzan. Don’t just “jump” from one project to another one. Find commonalities, and don’t let go of the old vine, until you’ve grabbed hold of the other one. Pivot, and Plan. In the end – however – you decide. No academic adviser is going to nag you to apply for that new job opening. It’s all on you.

Career advice from CEOs

Read the following advice and let me know if you agree with them, or not.

• Pick your early bosses wisely.  A good test: Do you even like them? – Barbara Corcoran (Corcoran Real Estate)

• Don’t just take the highest-paying offer. For your first job, go for the one with the best role models. – Clara Shih (Hearsay)
• Dig in. Don’t treat your first job (or second or third) as a temporary stop. – Laura Alber (Williams and Sonoma)
• No one likes a phony. Don’t be a different person at work. – Mandy Ginsberg (Match)
• Be sensitive. The must-have skill: Empathy – Mark Hoplamazian (Hyatt)
• Don’t overestimate the risk of failure. – Rich Barton (Zillow)
• Embrace being ‘purposefully direction-less.’ (That doesn’t mean stop working.) – Logan Green (Lyft)
• Realize the power in saying “no” – Gary Erickson and Kit Crawford (Cliff)

S-curves vary by stage in life

Building on Cal Newport’s Idea of Be So Good They Can’t Ignore You (affiliate link), in the early days of your career, you’ve got to do the hard work of gaining rare and valuable skills. Gotta get the career capital – Seth Godin might call this becoming a Linchpin (affiliate link) – so that people want to work with you. At this point, you can start using this career capital to get on better projects, make more money, have more control.

Before you have career capital – uh – gotta do the work. Become a mini-expert in something.

Once you have career capital – time to think like a strategist and work with people you like and trust.

Other advice on jumping S-curves?

Think of all the words you think of with the new working environment. Agility. Flexibility. Network. Competitive Advantage. Competencies. Gig-Work. Shift. Team. Remote. Self-insured. What else comes to mind?