The Ultimate Corporate Entrepreneur

Rewriting Your DNA: Prep Now for the Post-Great Recession

What keeps people holding on white knuckled to a net that can no longer catch fish? 

Well into the third year of this economic meltdown and many unemployed professionals are still hopeful that not much has changed in the workplace since they were asked to leave.

False hope or denial?

Whatever it is, this mindset prevents people from investing in themselves by adding new skills and upgrading existing ones that foster value creation. They stop short of reinventing their careers altogether because they don't believe it's necessary.

Many companies continue to row the same boat of denial. Their "support net" for downsized employees include the standard outplacement package of a resume rewrite, classes and tips on interviewing, and if people are lucky, some mini-workshops on communication and negotiation skills. 

No one was prepared for a non-standard recession and, thus, no one noticed that the nets were frayed and ripping at the seams.

I know that no one likes reality news, especially if it makes us feel bad. But stick with me a bit longer and I'll give you something that will make you feel good.

 

Times are a Changin'

The world has gone through a fundamental shift that has forever changed how business is done. Companies and individuals capable of adapting for this reinvented world will redefine success for everyone else. Just a few examples...

• Governor Rick Snyder was elected a few weeks ago on a ticket of Reinvent Michigan

• Newspapers, magazines, libraries, and journalists are reinventing themselves

• Trailblazing hospitals are reinventing healthcare, community, and education

Innovation and value creation is for everyone and not just R&D and New Product Introduction groups. Everyone has to bring something to the beach party and you'll want to show up like you mean it--communicating, collaborating and contributing while you're there. Why?

• Innovation expands the creative output of work teams
• Innovation generates revenues from new products and services
• Innovation repurposes products and services for marketplace re-entry
• Innovation increases process improvements that sustain value over time
• Innovation improves productivity through redesigned work environments
• Innovation results in new inventions that reduce, reuse and expand offerings

 

Three Ways to Get it Right (Post-Great Recession)

So, how do you begin rewriting your DNA for this new world of work? You can't rewrite your DNA for the post Great Recession unless you're clear on how you invented yourself in the first place. You have to know where you've been before you can reinvent for the future.

Unfortunately, no one has a decent working crystal ball these days. Optimistic economists say the U.S. and many industrialized countries can expect a real uptick in employment Q3 or Q4 of 2011, while pessimists project decent job creation and employment gains to occur late into 2012 (or even 2013!).

Now that I have your attention, I'm going to offer you three low-cost opportunities before the end of the year to get it right post-Great Recession (I'm an optimist who believes that opportunities always present themselves when we're prepared to act on them).

Here's the deal:

• 1 hour, three webinars, 3 Fridays in December
  
• You'll receive worksheets for note taking
• I'll share the slides following the webinars
• No recordings will be available (you'll need to show up)
• Low cost, but not free (folks don't always value free)
• Net proceeds will go to one of my favorite non-profits
  
• No "tire kickers" please. Take a spot only if you're ready to change your status quo

Side request: Please don't take up space if you're "scouting" to see what I'm up to--I'll share the slides and if you have questions just ask.

 

Opportunity #1 for Unemployed Professionals | $3 USD | 200 spots

Fast-track Career Reinvention 

Friday, Dec 3 from 11:00-12:00 noon (Pacific Daylight)

How do you reinvent when you've spent the last year or two unemployed?

• The biggest challenge for people reinventing themselves for the first time is in knowing what to expect along the way. You'll learn how to prepare mentally, emotionally, and physically for developments that can derail your efforts if you're not expecting them. 

• Tips on how to take what you've done, what you enjoy, and find a match for yourself in a new direction.

Sign up here

Opportunity #2 for Professionals | $23 USD | 200 spots

Growing and Sustaining Your Career Value

Friday, Dec 11 from 11:00-12:00 noon (Pacific Daylight)

You must approach your career like a business and be prepared to attract and pursue opportunities that sustain your value over time.

• Learn how to identify breaks and weak links in your "Innovation DNA"
• Quick tips on performing corrective "DNA surgery"
• Leveraging your strongest links in the workplace

Sign up here.

 

Opportunity #3 for Managers | $33 USD | 200 spots

Redefining and Measuring Workplace Success

Friday, Dec 17 from 11:00-12:00 noon (Pacific Daylight)

It's all about adapting, but how do you adapt for a post-Great Recession world when you're not sure what dots to connect?

• Where to look for new "wins" within the status quo for the new world of business
• Tips on how to prepare your workforce for navigating the post-Great Recession landscape

 Sign up here.

 

Career Transition: Visualize Today, Plan for Tomorrow

During a recent cafe visit, I eavesdropped on a conversation between four men with one telling the others that he had "Just enough money left for this transition."

Remember when career transition was an in-between stage? It was a time when you left one job to go to the next or moved to a new position within the same company and was typically a short-term action.

Career transition, today, is something that you can expect to do for as long as you plan to work. And with 1 in 4 American workers over 50 saying they don’t ever plan to stop working, professionals need to continuously assess their tools and techniques for what will become lifelong transitions.

This is especially true for professionals who have lost their job in this tanked economy. Losing your job, and unemployment, are among life's most traumatic events.

With the average time for finding a new job in the U.S. approaching 25.1 weeks, people are definitely feeling the stress. But did you know that how you react to the loss of a job will make or break your search for new employment?

Forced gaps in employment can have a negative impact on your creativity and slow down your innovation spark--differentiating qualities in any economy.

Job-recovery and visualization expert, Dr. Lynn Joseph, is my guest this week on Coach for Innovation and will share five exercises from her groundbreaking job-loss program and visualization system to get you back to work fast. 

You can catch Dr. Joseph at the Career Reboot Camp conference October 26-27 in San Rafael, CA.

Resilience Tools for When Setbacks Happen

The holidays somehow make personal and professional setbacks feel all the more intense than at other times of the year.

Whether they come in the form of job loss (why do companies decide to "squeeze in" layoffs during the holidays?) or the loss of a loved one, we've all experienced setbacks at some time or other in our lives.

Even though a failed attempt at something you and/or your team cared passionately about doesn't come close to that of job loss (unless you lose your job because of it!) or the loss of someone we care about, rebounding from a setback still requires similar resilience tools.

My special guest this week for the last show of Coach for Innovation in 2007 is Mike Robbins, a man who knows a thing or two about bouncing back from personal and professional setbacks.

A former baseball Pro for the Kansas City Royals, Mike faced the end of his dream career as a pitcher following an injury. After working in sales and development for two Internet start-ups until the dot-com bubble burst, Mike found himself, once again, at the crossroads of facing the end of something.

He saw this career setback as an opportunity to figure out how he could make a living doing what he loves: motivating others.

Join us this Friday, December 21 at 3pm (Pacific), for a very special 30-minute segment When Setbacks Happen: How Do You Focus on the Good Stuff? and discover what resilience tools you need to have handy in your life toolbox for those times when things get tough.

Persistence or Reinvention? 10 Ways to Explore Your Direction

One of the common themes I see professionals struggle with time and again is when it makes sense to persist in pursuing a goal and when it makes sense to try something new.

Unfortunately, the lines between persistence and reinvention can sometimes get “smudged”; however, there’s an exploratory process I like to use with clients when they’re feeling stuck about their direction. 

Ask yourself these 10 questions and explore whether you might be pushing against a slab of wood with a lock and a peephole that won't budge or whether it makes sense to hang in there and just try something different.

I've also included a 1-minute audio coaching tip for each of the questions to help you take your exploration a bit further.

1.  What barriers and roadblocks are in the way of achieving your goal?

One Minute Coaching Tip

2.  What 3 actions have you taken in the last week to move your goal forward?

One Minute Coaching Tip

Resiliency: Getting Your Mojo Back

Setbacks happen to everyone. The challenge of "bouncing back" from a setback has much to do with how long we wait between the experience and the time we truly put our disappointment behind us.

This doesn’t mean going through the action of burying the pain only to have it pop up at different times in our lives as unresolved conflict. It means facing the facts and the emotions surrounding the situation, learning from the experience, and then moving beyond it. 

I learned the importance of getting back into the game without letting too much time pass when I was a new manager.

One of my direct reports was an intelligent, analytical type who preferred his own company. One afternoon while I was doing paperwork at a corner table in the company’s cafeteria, I saw Ricardo at the far end of the room deep in conversation with one of our VPs. 

It turns out that Ricardo had been a senior operations manager with this VP at another company. He had made a gutsy decision in his new role and when it failed to meet the executive team’s expectations, they came down hard on Ricardo. So hard, in fact, that he never fully recovered from the fifteen-year-old pain.

Tips on Getting Your Mojo Back

Building lifetime resiliency begins with muscle-building exercises before you need to lift the heavy weights. If there’s something in your past that you did or didn’t do and find your career sidelined because of it, here are a few exercises to help strengthen flabby muscles and get you back in the game.

True Grit: Passion-Persistence-Perseverance

Last November I attended my first International Coach Federation (ICF) conference along with my foray into the world of live event blogging.

On day two Cheryl Richardson, one of my fave coaches, delivered the keynote address. Part motivational, part practical advice to the over 1,200 coaches who packed the San Jose McEnery Convention Center, she shared her sometimes bumpy path to success.

Intended for coaches in various stages of business development, Cheryl’s key learning could just as easily apply to corporate engineers, marketeers, finance analysts, entrepreneurs, as well as college students.

• Set realistic expectations
• Continue to educate yourself
• Courage to reinvent yourself
• Ability to persevere and rebound
• Choose something your heart feels
• Bold pursuit of your passions

Set realistic expectations

One of my clients, a senior manager in her late forties, was antsy about leaving the corporate nest to start-up her own business.