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Tag: create

5 steps to new job opportunities

Looking for a job?
You’ve made your first mistake. As cliché as it sounds, you won’t find it if you’re looking for it. Instead, make moves to create the position of your dreams (a place you feel valued and valuable, projects you’re interested in, opportunities that benefit from your talents, people you admire).
1. Skip small talk and have real conversations.
Schedule twenty-minute informational calls (or coffees) with people you respect to learn more about their work. Ask about the good, bad, and ugly bits of their industry. Then, find parallel roles in different fields and ask those individuals how they tackle similar challenges. Meaningful conversations build meaningful relationships.
And say thank you. You never know when your paths may cross. I’ve met strangers in Shanghai I’ve introduced to entrepreneurs in California. Your rolodex is one of your most prized commodities.
2. Know thyself.
What’s your anchor? You need something grounding you, a general direction you’re heading. It doesn’t need to be entirely specific, but you need a fencepost to harness your efforts (think of a laser beam vs. diffused light; concentrated anything is stronger and more effective).
Find a quiet place to relax with a cup of coffee and honestly assess what makes you miserable, what you’re good at, what you’d like to be doing, and what you can’t live without. Reserve an afternoon — or a week — to pay close attention to moments your heart flutters. Is it anxiety, excitement, or both?
3. Are you hunting or fishing?
You can look for freelance work or you can start writing articles about topics you’re passionate about. You can ask for job openings or you can volunteer a few hours of pro-bono consulting and evaluate a company’s needs. You can ask for references or you can send role models invitations to lectures that pertain to their projects.
By placing yourself in environments that highlight your strengths, you will attract opportunities and connections that are right for you. Just because you don’t have a job doesn’t mean you can’t start cultivating something great.
4. Walk with confidence. 
Unemployment doesn’t mean you’re less of a person. When you’re feeling down and out, it shows. Pay attention to your posture and the way you walk. If you’ve completed Steps 1-3, do so confidently, with your head high.
You have skills, you have talents; flaunt them. Your childhood, your struggles, your unique lessons and experiences all contribute to what makes you uniquely valuable. Make a list of your areas of expertise and fold it into your wallet if you’re needing an extra boost. 
5. Open windows and doors and screens and welcome everyone over for tea.
If you can reframe “unemployment” as an opportunity, you’re on your way to gold. Imagine yourself as a traveler, an adventurer. There will be ups and downs, exhilaration and disappointment. Open up to all of it. It’s too easy to focus on one thing and dwell; you’ll think yourself into a frenzy, or worse yet, paralyze yourself from action. Force your anxieties to adopt a wider perspective and welcome whatever comes your way, regardless of form. If you allow it, your journey may surprise you.

Figure out what you want to learn and go do it.

The most valuable things I’ve learned I’ve learned by doing. I didn’t read them out of a book or listen to some famous person who drastically changed my life (although some of these things surely helped).

I knew little about business jargon and brand platforms until I began consulting for Fortune 500 companies.

I learned about people’s psychology and motivation conducting clinical assessments.

I became a producer and creative consultant while organizing events.

I became a writer (a long time dream of mine) when I started calling myself one (I was always writing).

What do you want to be good at? Go.

 

Ben Franklin was an impresario.

Ben Franklin was 21 when he first gathered friends and thought leaders for drinks and dinner on Friday nights. Invitees included poets and laborers, academics and politicians. The cohort was a motley one, but they shared one thing: a desire to improve themselves and their communities.

In his autobiography, Franklin laid out basic terms for these dinners:

“…every member, in his turn, should produce one or more queries on any point of Morals, Politics, or Natural Philosophy, to be discuss’d by the company; and once in three months produce and read an essay of his own writing, on any subject he pleased.

Our debates were to be under the direction of a president, and to be conducted in the sincere spirit of inquiry after truth, without fondness for dispute or desire of victory; and to prevent warmth, all expressions of positiveness in opinions, or direct contradiction, were after some time made contraband, and prohibited under small pecuniary penalties.”

Each meeting followed a set format, a series of business and personal questions acting as a springboard for conversation and creation. Volunteer fire-fighters, night watchmen, and a public hospital emerged from these discussions. In hopes Franklin’s questions might inspire you, I’ve included a few here:

  • Have you met with any thing in the author you last read, remarkable, or suitable…particularly in history, morality, poetry, physics, travels, mechanic arts, or other parts of knowledge?
  • What new story have you lately heard agreeable for telling in conversation?
  • Hath any citizen in your knowledge failed in his business and what have you heard of the cause?
  • Have you heard of any citizen’s thriving well and by what means?
  • Do you know of any fellow citizen, who has lately done a worthy action, deserving praise and imitation?
  • Do you think of any thing at present, in which our group may be serviceable to mankind, to their country, to their friends, or to themselves?
  • Do you know of any deserving young beginner, whom it lies in the power of our group in any way to encourage?
  • Have you lately observed any defect in the laws, of which it would be proper to move the legislature an amendment? Do you know of any beneficial law that is wanting?
  • Have you lately observed any encroachment on the just liberties of the people?
  • Is there any man whose friendship you want, and which our group, or any of our members, can procure for you?
  • Have you lately heard any member’s character attacked and how have you defended it?
  • In what manner can we assist you in any of your honorable designs?
  • Have you any weighty affair in hand in which you think our advice may be of service?
  • What benefits have you lately received from any man not present?
  • Do you love truth for truth’s sake and will you endeavor impartially to find and receive it yourself and communicate it to others?

There are men and women everywhere who are committed to asking questions, doing good, and improving themselves and their communities. Find them. Bring them together. Our world will be better for it.

“Either write something worth reading or do something worth writing.”  -Ben Franklin

Life is meant for sharing.

In over two years, hundreds of people I respect and admire have attended my events. Many have asked how to easily find and connect with others within this community. Now it’s possible.

I’ve spent the last few months building a private online resource just for this reason. My friend Clay and I have made unique profiles detailing the skills and interests of those who have requested to share their information. It’s a curated rolodex of individuals who are kind, generous, adventurous and creative.

I can’t help but imagine what the world might be like if we all gave a little more when and wherever possible. I hope this online network encourages the Project Exponential family to do so.

 Note: If you’ve attended a dinner event and would like to be included, send me a note.