Ditch the Desperate and Align Yourself

These days there are a lot of over-caffeinated bosses who are pushing us to “Buck up and make those calls! You need to be positive! When the going gets tough…” You know the rest. Or how about that little, desperate voice in your own head pushing you, urging you to: keep up appearances, spend money in a public way, give gifts you can’t afford. Even worse, you may be unemployed and the voice is damning – “You’re worthless. You may never work again. You are an embarrassment to your family.” I have one word for all of these voices – STOP!

Stop and go for a long walk away from civilization and all its invasive messaging. Stop the noise and realize where you are. Just as if you’re lost in the forest, your first, best move is to stop and assess your situation. Stop and see the landscape for what it is. Pause your spinning world, your old life and see things anew. The world has changed. It always does. But now, in your life, my life, in most of our working lives, we are at an inflection point. We are at a point of upheaval.

Human nature and free markets being what they are – we over spent. We let incentives and mind-numbing complexity in the financial world run amok. So, now, it is a time of paying debts, a time of new constraints: financial and professional. It is a time of struggle: financial, professional and emotional. But it is also a time of new possibilities if you stop and get your bearings.

One example: A sports broadcaster named Bruce McGowan contacted me several weeks ago after having been laid off from his job of 17 years at KNBR in San Francisco. Local radio and TV stations are slashing staff everywhere these days as their ad revenue shrinks. I had no great advice for Bruce except that “I do think the Web is where most opportunities lie”. Bruce emailed me on February 15th that he has landed a job, “I'll be working with Comcast Sports Net Bay Area in San Francisco, "behind the scenes," as a show booker, producer, will come up with story ideas, work with their web TV, and so on. It seems after all of those years behind the mike, (mostly with radio), that I needed to "reinvent" myself to stay in the profession.”

Bruce realized that he had to “reinvent” himself because his work world is reinventing itself. Stop, pause and see what changes are happening in your profession. This means that you have to be as realistic as you can, that you have to recognize that the ground is shifting beneath your feet. Now more than ever, listening and observation skills are needed prior to big decisions. Or as Andy Grove the co-founder of Intel once said to me, “You have to immerse yourself like a sponge into the environment and make yourself available to be influenced by people who want to influence you, who need to influence you. So, each of these decisions has to be preceded by a period of absorption.” Aren’t there people around you who’ve been trying to get through to you? Listen to them, vet them, gather data about your performance, your company, your industry. See your world and your capabilities for what they are.

One more critical bit of advice – do what you love. Do what you feel you ought to do with the precious little time you’ve been given on this planet. Stop and assess who you are, what you’re committed to and even where you want to be. Remember what former U.S. Senator Bill Bradley says, “I’ve always felt that the externals ought to reflect the internals -- of where you are, where you live, how you live and that feeling has as much value as thinking.” This isn’t some airy fairy notion about feeling good. This is about tapping into your true motivation. This is about tapping into what the world truly needs and wants. This is about harnessing your energy to answer the world’s wants and needs. How else will you make the most of your drive and talent?

Shut out the sounds of the desperate. Stop and absorb what’s truly going on in your work and in your life. Then, as you align your greatest purpose with your world’s greatest need or want, carefully plot your next moves. If you do so, you will steer yourself in the most productive and rewarding ways, regardless of the economy.

Donald Van de Mark can be reached at donaldvandemark@gmail.com. Donald will speak next to San Francisco’s Commonwealth Club on July 16th.