Self-Preservation - A Sense of Wonder at Work:

Okay, everything is certainly not okay. You just lost your job…

I’ve been an outplacement consultant and career coach since 1998. During this time I have worked with hundreds of grieving people bereft of their livelihood. Many people say that what I do must be awful; with a look a bit like they’re talking to the taxman. The truth is that I love what I do because I care about people and want to minimise the blow.

Up to the age of 32 my career caused me a lot of pain. I had no clue about how much pain I used to be in until I discovered my calling. And looked-back. I’ve written mountains of stuff on my own transformation and how my life turned around. The point is, I empathise. I know how it feels to lose your job and fear for how the bills are going to be paid come Friday.

I’m working with a guy at the moment who has had the sword of redundancy over his head for months and months. It's painful to watch. The firm thought it might be kinder to give him a lot of advance warning because of the many decades of loyalty he has invested in them. In reply he has mirrored their ‘kindness’ and works tirelessly to make sure the department he runs doesn’t miss a beat in order that he can walk away in a few months’ time with his head held high, conscience clear, dignity and integrity intact.

During the many decades since he joined The World of Work has changed beyond recognition. A big part of the relationship between employee and employer used to be loyalty; sometimes referred to as the ‘psychological contract’. It basically states that a paternalistic and caring employer will provide pay, job stability and nurturing environment in return for conscientiousness, reliability and commitment.

About 10 years ago, possibly longer, younger workers entering employment could see the instability of employment and recognise a power-shift arising from the huge skills shortages at play in the labour market. This meant the market changed and younger workers would take whatever training and development they could from one employer and leverage it with the next. I found their skills of assertiveness compelling. Whereas in the 50s, 60s, 70s, 80s and 90s a good CV/resume might have one or two employers listed, a good CV in the 2000s will show many along the making of an enviable career trajectory.

Traditional sense of loyalties can therefore be misplaced:

If you are being made redundant take stock – this is happening. And it is not your fault. But your company don’t think they need you anymore. Perhaps they’re on hard times too. But they cannot afford you. Or your role has become obsolete. Similar to the anguish of losing a loved-one, there comes a time to move-on.

The focus of your concern is now upon you. Who else is going to help you? Metaphorically-speaking, the plane is depressurizing, the oxygen mask has dropped in front of your face and it is time to act calmly and put it over your mouth to ensure your survival.

Fear is a natural instinct:

Recognising your fear when losing your job is an integral factor in your ability to survive the trauma. You can only manage what you recognise. Fear of the unknown is a natural phenomenon. And this is the nub of the point of this blog: Fear is a symptom / Convention is the cause.

Convention is a particular belief among people as to how things should be done; or how we ought to behave. Conventions are helpful when teaching a child to stay out of the road – because collisions with cars are extremely dangerous. Conventions are unhelpful however when they perpetuate an unhelpful myth or obsolete attitude.

The Number 1 job-search convention is that we must get straight back to permanent work as quickly as possible. Part of this convention is that we’ll be happy to do anything even if it means doing a menial job many rungs in the ladder below where we stepped off. Another part of this convention is that we just fire at whatever jobs are available in the labour market and something will land.

Because fear can act like a set of blinkers on our strategy, it can massively limit our potential for success. Because of our misplaced loyalty, when we’re investing time helping our employers when we should be investing in ourselves, fear is, again, distinctly limiting. We must exercise our decision-making muscles, accurately identify our career attributes and the corresponding job target. 

As I’ve written before and I’ll no doubt write again, The Path of Least Resistance is about tuning into to ‘wonder’. Don’t wander, wonder. Getting future hirers inspired about us involves triggering rapport. There is no better mechanism for sparking rapport than passion, enthusiasm and wonder. And this must be evident in all of our self-marketing materials: CV, covering letters and interview scripts. 

Could it be that you’ve gone stale and have forgotten what it was the filled you with excitement in the workplace? Did you ever enjoy a sense of wonder in your work? Now is the time to get in touch with your working passions and infect others with your enthusiasm. If you don't do it somebody else will. There aren't limitless number of jobs available; the labour market is set to become increasingly Darwinian. 

Craftsmen and craftswomen never consider the long hours they invest in their work because they don’t consider applying themselves to what they love to do to be work. As our economy melts-down and the dole queue lengthens the Number 1 antidote is to tune-in to what it is that you love to do. Learn to be selfish for a time and invest in your own wellbeing. Should the time come, and you have to help others, they will only thank you for ensuring you are fit and well.

Connecting with Hirers is key:

However, every now and again stop to consider whether it is realistic for you to connect with the 'Wonder of your Work' and work for someone else at the same time. Often, discovering wonder in our work, involves working for ourselves. Although this is indeed a challenging path to tread; sometimes it offers a ‘Path of Least Resistance’. The rewards for courage, independence of thinking and the ability to take charge of our destiny can often justify the risk.

Here again, we will need to understand the presence of 'Wonder in our Work' if we are to succeed. Rest assured, if you can do the painstaking detective work to identify your authentic vocational identity and take it forward to a place where it will harbour and grow, you will have given society a sense of wonder that will likely remain your legacy long after you are gone.

Look around you, what is it you wonder at? What caused wonder before, will again. 

Answers to Unemployment Number 1:

Make a considered career decision first - the job you truly love is far easier to land than the one you don't!

Job Search SB 6

The Path of Least Resistance:

When you are looking for a job make sure you understand exactly what your career passions are. It is no good moaning about rejection when you haven't taken the time to do the detective work necessary to identify your working talents and career attributes, such as - skills, strengths, interests and values.

The shortest journey to you getting a job that you truly love, where you outshine your competitors on the interview shortlist, is to decide what you do best - and do it.

The double bereavement of job loss Part 1

In the early 1970s Elizabeth Kubler-Ross translated the findings of her extensive research into bereavement into what became known as the ‘Bereavement Curve’. As is so often the case, this diagrammatic representation of her thesis left a powerful impression on one’s mind; in parallel with the old adage that ‘a picture paints a thousand words’. Kubler-Ross summed up that those losing loved ones appeared to pass through seven stages of grief: shock, anger, denial, stress (either in the form of anxiety, or for some full-blown depression), apathy, acceptance and action.

Having worked as a freelance consultant in the field of redundancy counselling and performance coaching for 12 years, I am well versed in bastardising the ‘Bereavement Curve’ into what has also become known as the Change Curve. The fact of the matter is that human beings, in the main, are change averse. Often our security depends upon stability and routine combining to build up a sense of dependability and faith in the structures we surround ourselves. Often we subscribe to conventions to instil within us a sense of rhythm and repetition. Call it a ‘life beat’.

Job loss hits us hard primarily due to this breach of our life’s rhythm. Conventions lapse and the anchors with which we secure our routines are lost. For some, momentarily, and depending on how well we are prepared for change, for protracted and painful periods. Paradoxically, the more we wed ourselves to convention, the harder the flail of redundancy hits us. Let’s put it this way, the more indelibly etched the habits, the greater the turmoil.

The traditional psychological contract between employee and employer has shifted through 1800 from pre 1970 where employees were loyal to employing firms for providing jobs for life. To post 1990 where ‘The War for Talent’ (by Ed Michaels, Helen Handfield-Jones, and Beth Axelrod, Harvard Business Press), seeing companies battling for flexible workforces and the freedom to deliver ‘just-in-time’ products and services, meant that more and more companies struggled to instil any sense of loyalty in their workforce. And why should employees develop any sense of loyalty when the average number of jobs in career had shot up from one or two jobs in a lifetime to as many as 18 career transitions from job to job.

So if that is Bereavement Number 1, what is Bereavement Number 2……..?

How meaningful work always wins through

90% of the people I meet are in the wrong job. Outspoken words indeed. However, they are true. The reason? 90% of the people I meet don’t love themselves unconditionally.

So few people I meet are cool about who they are. It is a dreadfully sad state of affairs that somewhere along the line we brought Victorian attitudes with us into the 21st Century and we so often spurn a healthy self-image. In fact, if you think about it, our tabloid culture specialises in destroying anyone lucky enough to have a healthy self regard.

What does this mean? Because I understand this needs to be put simply. Let’s start with a sporting metaphor. Successful sports stars would achieve very little if they did not believe deep down inside that were good at what they do. And that they can win! Inner belief is essential. Yet in the workplace there seems to be some kind of expectation that everyone has to be conventional and spend their days conforming to accepted standards regurgitating mundane tasks.

Most companies specialise in hiring conventional people with mediocre skills to deliver unexceptional tasks. Yet business managers and HR managers talk about talent management; managing talented people so that they can perform highly and fulfil their potential and, as a result, help the organisation deliver upon its strategic objectives; thereby growing value.

As I state in ‘How CVs are killing the corporation’, the reality is that if we are outstanding, we are often outside of the building staring in. Instilling and cultivating meaning in our work is critical if we are to survive in an economic downturn. You will be found out if you don’t do your work with a sense of intention. I recommend that you appreciate what you are doing for work is recognisably valuable. If it is not in your work today, what have you got to do to find it?!

I often talk about the ‘Invisible Transaction of Work’; which has nothing to do with money. The ‘Invisible Transaction of Work’ means that we receive a payment for doing something we recognise as being fulfilling. We can see the results of our labour and it makes us feel good. Our work instils within us a sense of purpose and we learn to appreciate who we have become.

What are you going to do to instil meaning in your work life?