Recession = change, that’s all

While the recession is evident around us, it does not mean it’s impossible to get a job that pays well and gives you satisfaction. It just means that a lot of businesses are forced to take stock of what they have now and what they will be doing over the next few years, forcing a paradigm shift to leverage on anything and everything they can come up with.

And this is not just because everyone other company is doing it. It’s also because entire markets are changing.

The question about jobs during a recession is not about whether you can or cannot get one. It’s about asking what change is going to happen and where you feel you can provide the most benefit in such a opportunistic time as this.

What skills that was useful in getting a job before the recession will most likely apply to getting jobs during a recession. The only difference is understanding the needs of the shifting job market – and not just emerging ones but the “holes” left by people who have moved on from “traditional” jobs.

It’s not scary, it’s like a date

I can’t help but recommend Bolles’ 2009 revision of “What Color is Your Parachute?”. It’s a job-hunter’s classic, and I’ve not seen a book quite like it – because it really gets to the point, and it covers a lot of ground. The only negative comment I’ve heard about it was from some Amazon reviewer who criticized Bolles’ religious reference every now and then, which I felt was completely baseless.

To be honest, I think that if you have never been in various types of jobs, or have never faced the reality of being assessed for employment, then the whole process can be daunting and scary. But seriously, it doesn’t have to. Simply because it’s all about people searching for each other. Like a romantic date, it’s always scary the first time.

It takes a lot of verbal exchange, thinking, manners, courtesy, inquiry, exploration, patience and good old-fashioned friendship. But you never stop doing it. It’s just something that you constantly have to keep working on.

And if you want my opinion, the internet job application process doesn’t quite help with that. Simply because buttons and websites don’t talk back. They’re just lazy ways to send a resume off. There are much better ways to find opportunities for work… and not just any kind of work, but the kind of work that’s the stuff of dreams. The solution? Just keep talking to people, and be open about your needs and wants.

In fact, even if you’re already IN a job and fear for your life so much so that you never ever want to consider moving even though you’re so sick of where you are now… I think you should reconsider. Simply because there are a lot of exciting things happening right now, that have not been happening for the last few mundane years. You just need to keep your eyes peeled and look in places you haven’t thought possible.

Recession – a melting pot of opportunists and scammers

What pisses me off are companies like TheLadders.com who charge an exhorbitant amount of money to “fix” your resume, baiting on people who are in a need for that “one golden interview”. There are better ways to spend that cash. Seriously. Just search Google for “theladders scam” and you’ll see what I mean.

It’s kinda like Swoopo. Not quite scammish, but getting there.

During the recession there are two camps – people who are scared shitless they will do anything to salvage whatever’s left of their potential future, and then there are people who understand that the changing seasons just means renewed perspectives and look forward to a refreshing start.

The good news is that you get to choose which camp you’re in.

Related: Business Week Article – “Help Wanted: What That Sign’s Bad”

Produce results and stay sharp

I once contended for a promotion with a colleague, and didn’t get the job. It was quite clear – I wasn’t the one people were rooting for. I could’ve spent a hundred years speculating why I lost out, and how I should do better, but I figured that this that was totally uneconomical and prone to failure. It’s one thing to be as great as someone, but it’s another thing to be someone you’re not.

I decided to focus on what I do best at work. I got all the credit for that effort because it was obvious to everyone. I didn’t do it with the expectation of gaining another promotion, although I almost got one… but that it just made sense.

Now, I get to choose what story to tell about my successes. It stays on my resume, and the lessons I’ve learnt from it are mine. I stick with those stories, and I handle all the objections from people who give me crap about otherwise.

Sticking with what you believe and the results from your work gives people less reasons not to believe you. If there’s one thing that’s scarce in the world, it’s trust. Build on it, and you’ll get far.

Be remarkable

Being remarkable is an art. Youtube is proof of that. If you haven’t discovered what makes you remarkable, maybe you need to ask your most honest friends.

A few months ago, I decided a push for a new way of implementing projects, and came under heavy fire for that. By some measure of fortune, I was allowed to do it, and I thank God the project actually went somewhere. It was a big gamble, but I’ve always taken gambles like that in life.

When I announced my departure, a few of my colleagues thanked me for being a “stubborn donkey” and praised me for actually doing more than mere talk. They encouraged me to stick to my ways. I know it’s not the best way to get things done, but it’s a way I’ve learnt by myself. I’m not quite sure how to explain it.

If you ask some of your closest friends about what makes you remarkable, you may be surprised. Sometimes, being remarkable isn’t about doing crazy things, but becoming more of the person you really are.

Give

Giving breaks a lot of social norms, and cuts to the chase. It instantly makes you vulnerable to the things you really care about, and people take notice. Even better when you don’t expect anything in return.

In a way, giving is a way to shut the voices in your head. A lot of people think they’re good people, but they also want to be successful. When is the right time and wrong time to give and get? Logic can be deconstructive as our minds play tricks on us. Giving helps you break that cycle, and keeps things in perspective.

In the past, I’ve given regularly to charities, tithes, personal gifts to specific people, the needy, children… I’ve done this because I needed to understand I could do this on my own, without anyone’s help. I needed to remind myself that climbing to the top of the food chain isn’t worth it without the essential things in life.

Giving helps me understand what’s important to other people, and not just myself. If they have different labels for what’s important in life, then there’s no real “top”. It’s just a personal description.

My first resignation was extremely low-key. I didn’t tell anyone short of one or two people, until the very last day. One person in particular got offended that I didn’t tell her I was leaving. She saw it as indifference, and that she was a nobody to me, although we got along OK at work. I told her that she didn’t get singled out, since I told almost no one about it, but I also apologized for any ill feelings. The rest didn’t care that much.

My second resignation took place in light of a downsizing exercise of the startup company I was working for. Although the company prepared new roles for us at an affiliated company, I wasn’t the only person leaving. But when I told my boss about it, he was concerned and asked me a lot of questions. The others were mostly silent. But everyone understood and supported my transition.

Resignations are about managing relationships

I don’t think I’ve ever burned a bridge before in my life, but I’ve dealt with all sorts of reactions and people change their views as time goes by.

I still have many of my ex-colleagues on facebook and on IM, and we talk occasionally. Most people get over the fact that a job is still a job. It’s not like Bobby running away from home.

This time though, I took more effort to manage my personal and professional relationships about my resignation.

Tell your managers ahead of time

Firstly, the moment I made the decision to leave, I told my line manager and my CEO about it, months ahead in advance. I know this doesn’t play well with everyone, but I’ve always managed the relationships with my line manager and my CEO to be able to do this. I feel it’s only important to take responsibility for the company’s needs and its people. This is because most HR departments are mostly a function of finance.

I was a senior member in the team, so losing me would mean a gap in the leadership and technical lead area. Still, they didn’t counter offer me anything, but I did get friendly support on my decision.

This is what it’s like to manage your own career, which is how it’s like in most companies

You’re expected to make your own choices, and unless a specific culture or policy has been put in place, communicated, and encouraged, it’s a norm for people to make up their minds to just get their work done, go home, come back the next day to do the same thing.

Prioritize your relationships accordingly

Secondly, the sequence of which I informed people of my resignation was based on my relationship with them. This depended on their authority, how close I was to the person, and on circumstances. Bosses and managers came first. People who were close to me came next. Next were people who worked with me on a project that had a stake in my work. After that came the rest of the team, and then the whole world (which is why I’m writing now).

Some say it’s politics. Some say it’s being nice. I just think it’s important.

Invest in people

I didn’t do this for my first job because I was a noob, but relationships will become more important than a resumes as years pass. Even LinkedIn CEO Dan Nye says this.

Thirdly, I told people why I was leaving. I’ve been accepted to pursue a Masters in HCI in the UK. There are many good reasons for me to do this, so when people asked, I told them. This was okay because I wasn’t going to a competitor firm, and it made sense.

People want the comfort of understanding that their decisions are sound

Almost everyone I spoke to understood my conviction and supported my decision to leave. They also clarified their own positions and didn’t feel threatened by my departure.

No employee should be afraid to leave a job for the right reasons. If it’s well-managed, it can be beneficial and amicable. You just need the right perspective and some effort.

Resources:

• How to be a star performer: 4 things to get good at

• Office politics is about being nice

• 6 Signs You Don’t Care about Workers
• How to quit a job: 5 steps and 2 warnings

• 9 tips for quitting a job gracefully

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I’m glad I found a place for myself, by not conforming to what is popular, to cliques, to overly simple things. I have found pockets of friends in different areas of interest. They are all different from each other but I appreciate them all. They share a part of me that’s unique that’s not popular but is authentic.

I’ve also gained success by not conforming. By not conforming, I set up a college newsletter by myself. I started new things that others hated me for, but ended up using because it was too good. I give away credit. I don’t hoard the limelight. I don’t burn bridges, but many don’t visit. The people who do are friends. Chalk it up to experience, and it’s worth a story. Nothing is lost at all.

Most of my successes are owed to these rules that I’ve lived by. It’s quite like a game that I’ve played since I was a kid. It still stands today.

• Observe the world
• Make up your own rules
• Generate good ideas, and implement them
• Don’t believe everything people say
• Don’t be afraid to object and have reasons for it
• Find the useless in TV, then give TV up for good
• Repeat for radio
• Control consumption of propaganda
• Practice what you preach
• Read stuff that’s world changing
• Write stuff that’s world changing
• Everyone is different, some look the same
• Forgive
• Rinse and repeat

Other resources:

• The Art of Non-conformity

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They’re not.

Marriage counseling is like psychographic and psychometric tests that everyone seems to get so addicted about. It can be really fun and really serious at the same time. It can be really sexy because it allows the couple to have an honest look at each other and be open about themselves for once.

There are many types of pre-marital counseling, and I have no idea what they’re all like. In my session, we both went through the Taylor Johnson psychometric tests. I was already familiar with my Myers-Briggs type, and I was keen on understanding my wife’s profile. Understanding my partner is really sexy and it’s great to talk about our differences and similarities over and over again. It’s one of those things my wife and I talk about a lot.

Of course, if one or both parties had lots of things to hide, that might be the end of the relationship altogether – but better earlier than never. That doesn’t mean you have to reveal everything to each other, but sometimes sneaky things happen – like learning she never really wanted to have children in the first place… stuff like that.

We did discuss 5-year and 10-year plans about our potential marriage. We even discussed careers, family, finances, friends, and the lot. Having a 3rd party there (our cell pastor) really helped. It doesn’t always have to be someone elder/wiser who knows you. It could be a certified counselor, and I know folks who make a living doing that and they’re really good at it.

We talked about how I wanted a fulfilling career, and that we both sort of wanted children in 5 years, and that I might want to further my education. We also discussed my propensity to be glued to the computer, and her inability to determine a goal in life. We discussed our parents, and how both families might get along. We discussed money. We discussed having a place of our own.

It’s funny, but these are issues we’re still discussing today, so I’m glad we started then!

This is our 3rd year of marriage, and we’ve been through good and bad times – but I think having the sessions really helped a bunch. It helped cement our ideals in one place, and everything else has been about going back to that and being honest with ourselves.

Those few short sessions helped shape everything – careers, relationships, aspirations, health. You’ll need it when you get there.

Resources:

• Is Premarital Counseling or Education for You?
• Pre-Marital Counseling 101
• Frequently Asked Questions about the PREPARE/ENRICH Program

Millennials. They are ‘peer-oriented’ (which explains why Facebook is so popular), don’t look at jobs in the traditional sense, and are comfy with gadgets.

I love working with them. They’re quirky, fun, groupish but not clique-ish, and have good working habits. I teach voluntary classes to teens around 15 to 19, and they’ve got entire books loaded onto their cheapish phones, talk about the latest movies and gadgets, but seem fine not owning them. It’s more of a really big club than a generation.

Anyway, you don’t have to ‘get’ Generation Y. Generation Y gets you. They’ll fit in mostly anywhere, and you’ll want them around cos they’re the people who know Facebook and ipods better than anyone else. And they don’t sound geekish either. Geek for the masses.

How this compares to life – I don’t know. I think that it helps me get an understand of where the world is going, and that ethics will be a big part in all this. Companies will need to run their businesses more ethically and authentically, because Gen Yers are socially conscious. It’s affecting other Generations too – even oldies like me (I’m sorta in Gen X) are looking at the world in a new positive light.

If you’re fearful that Gen Y is a cop-out, don’t worry. Generation Y can get jobs in IBM.

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Now, maybe I’ll use this excuse to get a Nintendo DS.

Some interesting facts from Wikipedia:

In their recent book, Reynol Junco and Jeanna Mastrodicasa (2007) ^[22] found that in a survey of 7,705 college students in the US:

• 97% own a computer
• 94% own a cell phone
• 76% use Instant Messaging.
• 15% of IM users are logged on 24 hours a day/7 days a week
• 34% use websites as their primary source of news
• 28% author a blog and 44% read blogs
• 49% download music using peer-to-peer file sharing
• 75% of college students have a Facebook account ^[23]
• 60% own some type of portable music and/or video device such as an iPod.

So why bother being popular? It doesn’t get you anywhere. It only gets you along with other people very well. And unless that’s what you want, you really should ask yourself if it’s really worth the sacrifice.

Focus on knowing who you are instead. It’s much much healthier, has longer lasting benefits, and leaves a trail of positive influence.

Specifically, in order to build a successful career, you must focus on building and improving your strengths, NOT your weaknesses. Studies has shown that people fare better being average performers on their weaknesses, while excelling at their strengths.

There are ways to resolve weakness through collaboration, delegation, outsourcing, or creatively arriving at a solution. It’s what some people call adapting. But you can call it whatever you want.

The reason why following popular vote is detrimental to your career is because there are way too many signals and it can be too confusing. It’s more economical to focus on yourself and knowing who you are, and just living your life according to your needs and wants.

I would even encourage you to challenge the status quo and stand up for something you truly believe in, and are willing to take a stand for. It is enormously rewarding and seriously impacts your ability to navigate life for the longer term. It may not be so rewarding short term, but you don’t want to end up regretting something you wish you should have done over and over again.

References:

• http://www.businessweek.com/careers/content/mar2006/ca20060321_794407.htm
• http://www.amazon.com/Comfortable-Chaos-Forget-Balance-Choices/dp/1551806045
• http://www.charlestonbusiness.com/issues/11_6/news/4310-1.html
• http://gmj.gallup.com/content/27514/Gallup-Reveals-the-Formula-for-Innovation.aspx
• http://www.gallup.com/consulting/61/Strengths-Development.aspx
• http://www.brazencareerist.com/2008/05/14/your-college-degree-is-not-a-free-pass-to-a-great-career/

There aren’t many “custom” job roles, here. If any, they’re not the norm, and it would be difficult to find people with specialized skills – particularly because people don’t want to specialize.

Usability engineering is one such role. The demand for usability engineers in the country where I work is close to none. This is a stark comparison to the West. But my point isn’t about usability. It’s about its departure from “traditional” jobs such as software development or technical support, and that some jobs (and increasingly more jobs) are better suited for some people than others.

Being an INTP, my role as an engineer seems to fit like a glove. I’ve managed to bring benefit to the company by leveraging on my strengths. But I wonder how many people find themselves doing something that doesn’t quite match up.

Penelope Trunk thinks that it’s not about doing what you love, but doing what you are, that’s important. And she’s right – love can be temporary. It’s much better to do things that are a natural fit for you.

It doesn’t help that some jobs pay much more than others, either. Just because CEOs have high salaries doesn’t mean that I should strive to be one. There’s much more to a job than the salary, and I’m a firm believer that it would be increasingly difficult to advance if choices were made based on what jobs we wanted to climb up to, for money’s sake.

I do observe, however, that companies are more willing to explore new job roles these days, and are willing to allow employees to introduce improvements and ease into specializations that will benefit the company in the long run. This means that it’s possible for someone to carve out a niche role – and be rewarded for it.

This can especially happen to people who do a lot of pioneering work. I wouldn’t discourage anyone from taking the initiative to do something different and beneficial for the company – even if it’s potentially out of the job scope.

Specialization is a good thing to have these days.