Rebooting Your Career

May 12, 2012 By 1 Comment

Time to install your updates and hit the restart button.

The most frequently asked questions by unemployed readers of megadisrupter come from those who were laid off after holding a single job for many years. They held the job for so many years that looking for a new one feels awkward, foreign and terrible. They liked their old job and never even looked for a different one when they had it.

And while it is tough to get started looking for a new job, the hardest part comes during the search itself. People aren’t finding anything similar to what they were doing, and the few who do are finding the compensation to be drastically lower than what they were making. These folks are feeling too old to be taken seriously, too outdated and irrelevant to the professional world. Some have sent out over 1,000 resumes and gotten fewer than five responses.

Of course, on a long enough timeline the survival rate for all jobs drops to zero. At this point in our history, it is normal for people who have had the same job for 20 or more years to be laid off. If you haven’t evolved what you do and who you are, you cannot view yourself as a victim if you get the boot in favor of a cheaper person who does the same thing or a solution that replaces what you do entirely.

If you are in this situation, the good news is that you are still valuable. If you’ve been striking out in your job search, it’s not because you have nothing left to offer but because you are searching incorrectly. Here are a few problems to keep in mind about your situation and how to reboot your career to overcome them: [Read more...]

Filed Under: Job Hunting Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

Staying Out of the Ivory Tower

April 23, 2012 By Leave a Comment

You can't rock from an ivory tower.

Have you ever noticed that your favorite band or writer was a lot better when they first broke out? Those first couple of albums or books really resonated with you. They inspired and shaped you. Since then, though…meh.

What happens to our favorite artists when they get popular? A lot of things do, but the reason they resonate less is that they’re in an ivory tower. The pains and struggles they sang about when they made their first few albums are gone. The unique perspective they drew upon to write in an original way no longer exists. They are different people. They still have problems and struggles, it’s just that now those are ivory tower problems; problems that are meaningless to you.

This is the same thing that happens when you are promoted up through the ranks. You were a rock star and led your peers in overcoming problems. You led disruptive change – that’s why you are an executive now. The bigger you get and the longer you are away from an individual contributor role, the less you participate in the small picture and flex your critical thinking muscle. Since your role now involves spending more time on big picture communications to executives and external stakeholders, that’s what you focus on. When you talk to your team, you may notice they become quieter over time. They have less to say because they don’t relate to you anymore.

The cool thing about those now-famous artists is that sometimes they hit bottom. They realize they have lost touch with themselves and aren’t relevant to the real world anymore. It hurts them. Bouts of depression, followed by time off and self-discovery, lead to a new album or book that is totally excellent. You love it because they are relevant to you again, only this time they are more evolved and inspire you in new ways.

When it comes to your own corporate ivory tower, you don’t have to hit bottom or go through depression to come out of it. Here are some ways to proactively be more relevant to your direct reports and individual contributors: [Read more...]

Filed Under: Hiring & Managing Tagged With: , , , , ,

How to Read

April 3, 2012 By 3 Comments

If it makes you think it makes you better.

Critical thinking is one half of the skill set needed to overcome obstacles. A big part of developing that critical thought muscle is the consumption of subjective viewpoints. This can be done through a variety of media types, but the most practical way to consume a large of amount of information is by reading blogs, books, journals and magazines. The great thing about written subjective views is they are plentiful and diverse. Unfortunately, normal people fail to take advantage of this because they don’t know how to read.

Experts and pontificators are not there to give you an instruction manual on how to be good at your job, but this is how they tend to be used by their readers. Most of the time normal people who are “well read” find a few authors they totally agree with and relate to and stick to them. They attempt to directly implement the things they’ve read into their job function. This is the wrong way to read because it develops critical thinking very slowly. For example, the rise of ‘ten tips’ articles has diminished the value of reading subjective viewpoints because they are used as instruction manuals with minimal thought applied by the consumer. This translates into continued mediocrity by employees and managers who mistakenly think they’ve got it all figured out.

The best way to read is to: [Read more...]

Filed Under: Hiring & Managing, Intrapreneurship Tagged With: , , , , ,

Your Single Greatest Asset: Overcoming Obstacles

March 12, 2012 By 5 Comments

A study published by Expert Choice shows that when it comes to finding the top project managers in the world (the ones who really have to make sure execution is flawless and manage $100 million+ budgets effectively),  senior executives are looking for one quality above all others: the ability to overcome obstacles.

To be a disruptive force in your organizations, you too must possess this trait. More than math, finance, data analysis and even communication skills, you need the ability to overcome. You will need it: [Read more...]

Filed Under: Hiring & Managing, Intrapreneurship Tagged With: , , , , , , ,
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