Be Where You Are

(This column is posted at www.StevenSavage.com, Steve’s Tumblr, and Pillowfort.  Find out more at my newsletter, and all my social media at my linktr.ee)

“What’s your next career move?” I hear people ask each other a lot. Some people even ask me, and as I’m fifty-five, statistically it’s not going to be a long discussion. Maybe I seem really fascinating, but I somehow doubt it.

If you wonder about my hobbies – writing, art, etc. – that might be of interest, but they’re not exactly careers. No, people are more asking about my job, which is IT Portfolio Management. I’m a nerd wrangler and productivity guy – which probably makes most people want to hear more about that creative stuff and not, say, workflow diagrams.

The thing is that my ambitions are more or less staying where I am. That can mean some pretty short dinnertime discussions when talk turns to jobs (and I’d like to discuss things like the latest anime).

I like managing Projects and making them harmonize together. I like data mining and measuring real performance and what’s valuable – and getting into fights over real value. I like helping people make things happen.

I mean maybe I might be some kind of Associate Director or Specialist Manager which are often more “Portfolio Manager who gets to come up with ideas.” But I’m just the getting things done guy. That’s who I am, I like where I work, so you know . . . let’s stick with it.

I think we’re encouraged to want to keep climbing, and for no good reason. If you have certain goals and so on, then go for it – I’ve met people who have achieved lofty heights (and pay rates) but it was part of a plan. But don’t climb just the for sake of climbing – the money is probably not worth it, trust me.

The other problem is if you learn to climb up, you’re going to have to learn to climb down. You need to factor in things like stress, retirement income, impact on your social life, and so on. You might also find yourself dealing with politics and publicity you might not be ready for, especially in the age of social media.

There’s no reason to keep climbing if you’re happy.

Honestly, maybe there’s a future career for someone – Reverse Job Coach. People come to you to learn how to slow down.

I just won’t be doing it. I’m happy where I am.

Steven Savage

The Job Search: You’re Not The Customer

(This column is posted at www.StevenSavage.com, Steve’s Tumblr, and Pillowfort.  Find out more at my newsletter, and all my social media at my linktr.ee)

“I’m tired of the dehumanizing, violent slog of the job search,” a friend said to me.  Those words made me put on my career coach cap, which I haven’t worn in awhile.

Why is the job search such a pain for people?  Sometimes the job search is degrading and dehumanizing in a way that some, like my friend, can consider psychologically violent.  Why do some recruiters and companies make hiring people such a pain?

For that matter, why is it some recruiters and companies make it easy?  Whereas other job search tools require you to endlessly re-enter data and watch your resume be mangled, why do others make it so simple?  How come those making the search hard don’t learn from these people?

The answer is (and yes, this is Agile) who is the customer and what do they want?  The bad news is the job search too often is not designed for the searcher.

People who need to find employees and talents have limited time, money, and people.  Managers have their own projects and priorities, legal departments have their worries, and so on.  The job search process has to factor in many people’s needs, demands, and limits.

If you’re lucky you factor into those choices and are a high enough priority.  If not, then you’re probably facing incoherent recruiting sites and incomprehensible job search requirements.  You’re not the customer.

As depressing as this is – and it is depressing – I also use this as an indicator of who actually cares and can be worked with.  A poorly done job search site and recruiting process is a sign of problems, bad priorities, or employees not being valued.  It’s a warning.

On the other hand some company or organization that makes job searching and applying easy – even if you’re not hired – is one to pay attention to.  They may actually care, or at least realize you don’t find quality people by making quality people decide you’re stupid.  At worst, an organization that makes the job search easy at least hasn’t screwed it up, which is a good sign I suppose.

In my personal experience, the ease of finding a job that interests you and getting into the interview is a good measure of what it’s like to work for that employer.  It shows enough awareness to find and talk to the right people.  Sadly, I have found speed of the process is not always a measure, having seen good employers take forever, and bad ones quickly hire (the wrong person).

So next time you’re facing the job search, for each recruiter and job site, ask yourself who seems to at give a damn about you – or at least isn’t making you miserable.  They’re probably easier to work with.

Steven Savage

The 4 Day Work Week?

(This column is posted at www.StevenSavage.com and Steve’s Tumblr.  Find out more at my newsletter.)

I’m going to put my geek job guru hat on for this column and discuss the idea of the four-day workweek. I’m sure we’ve all heard about Iceland’s experiments in such an arrangement. I want to go into how it’s possible to do so with little interruption – but there’s something else to address first.

Namely, a lot of current working arrangements are awful. People are underpaid, abused, work in bad conditions, etc. We must fix these things, and we must have a robust social safety net. Also, a four-day workweek would be good for mental health, period.

With that out of the way, let me explain why I think a four-day workweek is possible for many jobs. I believe that people can be just as productive, with some exceptions. I also don’t care about the exceptions because I think a four-day workweek is a good idea.

But, anyway, a four-day workweek is possible because many businesses and organizations burn a lot of time on useless stuff. Imagine if organizations worked to do things better and that saved time meant less time on the job?

FIXING MISTAKES IS A PART OF TOO MANY JOBS: And I’m not talking QA or editing, but fixing mistakes that should be rare. People burn cycles going over poorly filled-out forms, bridging gaps that shouldn’t exist, and so on. Ever know someone whose job boils down to “talk to people who don’t talk to anyone else?”

TOO MANY BUSINESS PROCESSES ARE TERRIBLE: The reason so much goes wrong is many business processes are awful. Endless forms with no guiding documents and poorly implemented reports suck up time. Many people waste time doing things that don’t work very well as no one wants to fix them.

MEETINGS: Somehow, in the last two decades, meetings got even further out of control. I suspect technology has made it even easier to schedule time-wasters – meetings with no point or where only a few people are needed. What if we, you know, had less?

USELESS TOOLS:  I remember being excited about business tools – programs, spreadsheets, etc. However, they may not solve problems and can even create more if they’re not the right ones. How many times did you give up on something and use Excel (the duct tape of tools).

NO IMPROVEMENT: Agile has taught me how to focus on improvement. However, a lot of businesses don’t seem to want to improve by, you know, improving. THere’s not much bottom-up feedback (like Agile) but plenty of consultants ready to take your money. In the end, it seems not enough changes anyway.

LACK OF TRANSPARENCY: I have heard this since . . . forever. It’s hard to know what’s going on in any large organization. This may not be nefarious – sometimes miscommunication happens. But when you don’t know what’s going on, you can’t plan.

BURNOUT:  All of the above leads to more people burning out. Burnout leads to failure, resignation, inefficiency, etc. If you had fewer of these problems, you’d have less burnout. Burnout makes bad things worse.

I firmly believe if organizations committed to a four-day workweek, many could make it happen by making things run better.

For fun, spend a week or two and ask yourself what tasks could be more efficient – or removed altogether. The answer . . . well, it won’t surprise you.

Steven Savage