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The Lesser of Two Evils

January 29, 2017
How many times in life have we been in a situation where we were supposed to make a choice, a choice not based on what was good and what we really liked, but to pick the lesser of two evils?

We make those kinds of choices with trivial unimportant things, like deciding between the last two not-so-great-looking loafs of bread on the supermarket shelf, or decisions during political elections that (we think) may influence significantly our lives and society in general. We can also see these kinds of decisions in very personal issues like love life. I know some people who decided to marry someone at certain age not because he/she was so good and they loved each other very much, but simply because he/she was less bad than some other option or being alone.

But why must we make decisions like these? Why don’t we simply avoid them? It’s clear. Due to pressure.

If we don’t buy bread we don’t like and it is midnight, we will be hungry because there are no other stores open. If we don’t vote at all, it may happen the worst candidate wins. If we don’t get married until certain age, in some communities, pressure can be so huge that having any kind of partner is better than not having a partner at all.

In business, it’s very similar. We make many decisions on a daily basis. And we are lucky if majority is trying to find good or the best choice. Very often we just choose between two options full of compromises, half-solutions, mistakes that we foresee, but cannot avoid…

How to approach decision making in such a situation? I will give you my experience which is based on several key pillars:
- get the job done
- protect personal integrity
- learn something for the future
And bear in mind: what I’m writing here is a survival kit, not business philosophy! I’m not proud to present this, but I find it useful.

First of all, I think that when you are deciding on how to choose the “less bad” option you should protect yourself. The fact that you are in front of such a choice in a complex business environment is most likely not your fault. If it’s not your fault, why would you take the biggest risk when making that decision? I know that this might sound as lack of managerial courage but actually it’s the matter of basic logic and not buying a bullshit philosophy about sacrificing for the business purpose. It also helps in healing the “serious disease” that many of us are suffering from: overestimating our personal importance.

Then, you should do a calculation. Since the goal of all businesses is to make money, make a calculation which of the options will bring you the most. Of course, you have to take into account, short-term, mid-term, long-term goals, impact etc. But, use the most logical time-frame that is of interest to your superiors. This is maybe not the 100% honorable thing to do, but it’s smart.

When you make a choice and see results – celebrate it! I know it sounds silly, but compare this with being unsatisfied for years with political regime in power. Are you going to cry for decades? Are you going to feel like a loser due to that? You can, but you shouldn’t. The same goes with getting the job done. Is it fantastic and ideal? Not. But can you live with it? Yes, and you can live quite a good life actually.

Analyze why you are in such a situation. But again, be very pragmatic. Do not analyze why such situation happened. Analyze only why are you in it and how to avoid it next time. If we go back to politics again, in many cases the only solution is immigration. That might be the case in business as well. But be aware that you might not be able to find an environment without those decisions. So, it’s better to learn how to avoid it.

And in the end, imagine your ideal situation. For me, that is comparable to fashion and style choices. Can you set up your working environment and your mindset the way shopping works? A lot of choices, but none of them are good or bad per se. They either suit you well or they don’t. Can you work toward such an attitude?

If you can – cheers! You will live a happy life.
Just Because You Can Do It, Doesn’t Mean You Have To

January 22, 2017

The toughest thing for me is to stop doing things no one expects me to do – just because I’m capable of doing them. You know those people who can’t resist saving poor animals from the streets when they see them? Well, in my case, poor animals are various business challenges.

Work less – earn more mantra sounds a bit silly, but I take it as my key mantra for years to come.

Why? Not because I’m lazy or because I don’t want to do my job properly, but simply because often doing things which are not your job simply because you can, gives you additional stress even if you feel good while doing it. It also gives you good reputation, better career progress opportunities, makes you more important in the company etc. But still, a lot of additional stress. And we want to prevent stress, not heal it later.

Let’s now move a bit from egocentric approach I usually take in my posts and let’s discuss what is your omnipresence doing to people around you:

Frustration.

Some people are frustrated because they think you are taking over their jobs, minimizing their efforts and successes, jeopardizing their career progress… All of this is not your intention. But, they have the right to see it that way. At the end of the day, it may happen that some of their fears come true and their frustrations get even bigger. If you are a part of a bigger organization, you can also set up a new standard for a peer group that they can’t reach. Then they start sabotaging, gossiping, not cooperating… All of that without logical reasons. Or at least logical to you.

Indolence.

When people see that there is someone around who will jump on every situation, either to fix a problem or to contribute with ideas and solutions, they start being a bit lazy. Maybe they will continue doing their basic jobs, but soon they will start looking for you. For quite some time this setup will work without any major upsets but in mid-term it will show its deficiency in a very brutal way.

Organizational Lapse.

Hardly any organization is flawless. Mistakes in organizational setup can be more or less visible and impactful. But sooner or later you pay the piper. It’s good to realize your organizational lapses as soon as possible. It’s like a boat with small cracks that are becoming bigger. And if there is one person capable of clogging those cracks for a while, it looks as if you can continue that cruise safely forever. But then, this person cracks down and the ship starts sinking.

Wrong Resources Management.

People capable of doing many different things successfully at the same time can give a totally wrong impression of the resources needed for a project or even for running the business in general. And if you are saving company’s resources too much, know that you and the people around you will have to spend quite some personal resources to compensate. So, think twice.

What to do then with this urge to save all poor animals form the street when it’s cold and raining outside? Well, try refocusing this energy on building a shelter for them, or raising awareness on the importance of responsible behavior with pets.

More on this topic in future posts. It’s complex and it bothers me a lot!

I would also like to hear your opinion on this.

Cheers!
Career Stages – My Version, Part 2

January 19, 2017

Let’s continue… (in case you saw this article first click HERE)

Stage Four – Weekend Home Tourist

And it’s time to build your base and find your safe harbor where you will be able to feel very comfortable and to give the best of you. It’s time for your most fruitful business years and best results.

At this stage you should be capable to create efficient teams, leading teams that have more than one layer below you, and make difficult decisions without too much stress. You work a lot, more than you would like to, but you are having an impression that you are building something big and important. It’s the peak of your career.

What is the most important to learn at this stage: more people will try to damage you rather to help you; you should know how to build strong relationships with loyal associates because you can’t manage alone at this stage, you should master all timing issues and stress management. You should learn how to recognize and support innovation and talent. You should learn how to kill what is not good in a fast and efficient way.

At this career stage, you should leave when you feel you are on the very top. It’s cold on the top so don’t stay there too long. There are more important things in life.

Stage Five – Japanese Tourist

You are coming at this career stage a bit tired. You know a lot, you have seen many things, did a lot of good and bad projects, met hundreds of people… It was all exciting, but also tiring. Now it’s time to leverage all that.

To access situations and business challenges very fast. Snapshots should be enough for you. And just move, move, move… Don’t get stuck with one project or one company at this phase. This is maybe your final chance to try things you didn’t manage in the past. New industry, new role, new experience… But not as a fresh start that asks for a lot of investments. More like an experiment. You are not making your legacy at this stage. But you can have quite some fun!

What is the most important to learn at this stage: making quick decisions without over-analyzing them, advising instead of working hands-on, ignoring (people, in most of the cases), saying NO. Polish your political skills in order to secure some good consultancy opportunities in the future.

Stage Six – Cruise Ship Tourist

At this stage others should do everything for you.

What is the most important to learn at this stage: Nothing. If you haven’t learnt everything you need until now, it’s simply too late. You can, maybe, start learning painting, cooking or another foreign language.

Open a bottle of Don Matias Cabernet Sauvignon from Chile and congratulate yourself on everything you’ve done well, and forgive yourself for everything you’ve failed. Cheers!
Career Stages – My Version, Part 1

January 19, 2017

One of the best things I had a chance to learn in my previous company is Lominger system of competences and career development approach. It includes career stages classification.

It’s not that I think that this system is fantastic for career development – it has its own flaws, but working with it and having a chance to practice it triggered a lot of thinking and contemplating on this topic. When you have to perform over 100 job interviews based on competences and work with your team member on 50+ career development plans, you definitely build some muscles in this area. Of course, that is if you honestly dedicate your time and energy to this topic.

But, of course I will not tell you about Lominger. I will give you my classification of career stages and what you should develop in each stage from my view. This is not scientifically based, of course. I don’t have any studies to support it. I only have 15 years of working with people, developing myself and others and thinking about this topic more than one person should.

Most of my categories contain name “tourist” in line with the concept that you should not be a tourist in your life, but preferably in your office.

Stage One – Happy Backpacker

Landing to your first job. Everything is new and exciting. Great expectations, interesting people, good or not-so-good bosses. But you should not care too much! Did you care how hotel looked like when you were 16?

Enjoy this stage as much as possible. Try everything! But most importantly: establish good connections with your peers. This is the best you can do at this stage. Several people from my first serious job are still part of my closest network and my big support. There is something emotional about the first job. Almost like with first love or first drunk night out.

What is the most important to learn at this stage: take feedback and criticism, establish working relationships, fight for your ideas and have fun in the office.

Don’t stay at this job too long. One to two years maximum.

Stage Two – Accidental Tourist

You’ll probably get your second job by accident. You are still not brave enough to start looking for other options and still inexperienced enough so headhunters are not going to call. So, this second stage will run into you when you don’t expect it. What should you do?

Raise your profile not for one but for two stages! Instead of coming to a new environment as a modest person with limited experience (which might be true), try pushing yourself in a way that people get maximum respect for you and perceive you as someone more important than you actually are.

And work your ass off! Now is the time. You are not an absolute beginner so your learning curve can be very fast.

What is the most important to learn at this stage: Sell! Sell what you do, sell to clients, sell yourself! Also, start developing your leadership skills: motivating people, leading teams, developing projects by yourself… It’s very important to do something on your own at this stage. Feel how it looks when you are fully responsible for something.

When to leave this stage? In many cases, it’s not just your decision. But definitely it’s easier to do it before you get too attached to a certain working environment and people.

Stage Three – Business Globetrotter

When you learn how to sell, and you get some experience, expertise and hopefully some success, it’s time to find a bigger and different stage. Ideally, it would mean to go somewhere abroad to work: have a lot of business travels, conferences, meetings all over the region/world… I have never fully done it. I did some international projects, spend two years traveling around central and eastern Europe but never moved somewhere to live.

This is important because you can test yourself on this new beginning. You are not inexperienced anymore, but the new market will cut your benefits of the network you have built, your knowledge of the market, one phone call solutions… This is a great test for you as professional – to benchmark yourself and see how far you can go.

What is the most important to learn at this stage: managing complex projects in different cultures, assessing people quickly based on what you see and not what you know about them, presenting in front of important audiences in a foreign language, balancing personal and professional life – it’s very easy in expat role to destroy your personal life, no matter how old you are or what your family status is. Polishing communications skills here is essential.

Stay in this role until you run out of energy for it, because it’s fun but it’s also exhausting. Unless you have this in your blood – then you don’t have to read the rest of the post. You will stay business globetrotter forever.

Ready to see what is next? You will find Part 2 of this article HERE!
I’m Sorry, I’m Talented

January 15, 2017

The biggest problem with talented people is the fact that during most of their lives they listen that they should behave as if they’re equal to others. I can imagine that those sophisticated educational systems like the one in Finland have a solution for this, but the rest of the world is a nightmare for talents.

I grew up in a post-communist – socialist – pre-war Yugoslavia. And I had actually quite a good teacher. She was very interested in working with talented kids and developing their talents. Of course, she didn’t have time or resources because she had to handle at least 15 problematic students with hard-core family situations. It was a dodgy neighborhood. She sent me once to an audition for a school choir. Which was a surprise because I was not known as a kid that can sing. The music teacher sent me back immediately. A few months later my teacher went to a major ear surgery. But she did her best! And I’m grateful. Because in most situations even if you are talented in something you will get signals that you should tone it down a bit and try not to upset those less talented around you.

Twenty years fast forward and you are in the business. International business. And you would say, of course, all companies want and support talented people. Do they? They only say they want and support talented people. In reality, they will do everything not to upset the mediocre majority by pushing forward the talented minority. Mostly due to the fact that people on top are in most cases nothing but average but extremely hardworking. Rarely are they very talented. So, they are confused and scared of anything different. They want to support what is similar to them and to maintain the system that made it possible for them to succeed.

As always, I like to illustrate this with a couple of real life examples.

Situation 1. A young, extremely talented student arrives for an interview. HR professional recognizes her amazing talent. But, mid-managers who should take her in their teams have doubts. Why do they have doubts? She asked them some tough questions. Obviously, many years have passed since some of their reports asked them some challenging questions. Because most of their reports are average and at the years go by, they became zombies. They don’t question anything. They just do.

Some people ask me for advice what to ask during their job interview. Because there is always this stupid part when the interviewer asks: Do you have some questions for us? My advice would be: ask something simple and not very smart – if you want to get the job. (Do you provide any learning opportunities is always a fantastic stupid question). Ask smart questions only if you are 100% sure that the person across the table is someone very smart and talented.

Situation 2. An extraordinary beginner is hired for a pretty basic position. After literary few weeks it’s obvious that this guy is 10x more talented than anyone else in the team and all his first line superiors. It’s also obvious that the job is ridiculous for him. But he has good working ethics. First talent review: a proposal to move this guy up and give him a better job. No! It’s too early. What would the others say? Some of them have been waiting for ages for a promotion opportunity. But they are not talented! Simple as that.

I still consider fast promotions of young and talented people, people that I have pushed for, to be some of my biggest successes. Most of them have brilliant careers today but what I consider even more important is the promotion of the principle that same rules should not be applied to everyone. And you would be surprised how big enterprises that stand as symbols of capitalism in many occasions react as communist’s systems of mid-20^th century.

Of course, the logical conclusion is that talented people should not fit into big systems with mediocre standards. They should found their own ventures. And of course, many extraordinary people did exactly that. But I’m not writing this to reinvent the wheel or change the world. I’m writing it just to bring some ideas to my fellow colleagues from the business scene about different topics. So, can you imagine how much you can improve performance by treating talent in a different way? But not in the HR Talent Acquisition role that I see is very popular. I’m talking about pushing mid-management professionals to see talent in a different way.

Well, you will ask: How can they see talent in a different way when some of them can’t recognize it even if it bites them in the ass? It’s easy. Give them goals and targets to achieve. Sometimes not targets what to do but targets what not to do. In order to make space for those more talented.

If the concept is not clear, let’s discuss it. It’s not 100% clear to me as well. But I think there is something about it.

Cheers to talent!
Let People Dream

January 7, 2017

Even if dreams look stupid. To you.

A few weeks ago I had the pleasure of meeting one interesting and entertaining lady who gave us a presentation about stress and connection between negative thinking and hormones, stress and health troubles, love and happiness… She is a medical doctor. And a researcher. And many more things.

Among other things, she told us about many occasions when we give feedback to someone and we tell them something good, but we follow it with the infamous “but“. And she said that this “but” kills all hormones of happiness produced during the previous positive comment. We should wait at least one day before we tell someone about areas for their improvement or before we criticize them.

And I decided to apply this knowledge immediately. With one of my associates. When she delivered a document to me, it was good but not perfect. But I only said it was very good. Three days later I gave her additional comments on what she can improve. Another project that she delivered in between was even better than the first one. Again, I just said – fantastic! Great job! This had very positive influence on her performance and our relationship.

Then I remembered that I worked for the company where people felt obliged to add this famous “but” while giving feedback to their team members or direct reports. Somehow, it was promoted as very healthy and good – you give someone positive, but also negative feedback so that he/she can improve. Over time, one honest intention became a farce – people started inventing negative things for perfectly executed jobs just to give someone “space for improvement”. Sometimes it was so ridiculous that you felt ashamed just to be present there and listen to it.

Oh dear… Can you imagine how many liters of happiness hormone was thrown away through those many years and among so many hundreds of people working there? Isn’t that one unhappy place to be?

As you can see I’m reflecting a bit too much lately. And of course, immediately I started thinking about some of the hardest feedback sessions I had. And I have to admit – I wish I knew this thing about happiness hormones 15 years ago.

It’s not that I was especially tough in giving feedback or that I was a “but” person. On many occasions, I was ready to praise people’s achievements, giving them all possible accolades. I had a different issue: I was always very realistic, down to earth and pragmatic. I thought I should be like that in business because otherwise people will always think I’m just a creative writer pretending that he can do some serious business as well. Because of that I had an issue with people who had some strange wishes, ways of doing things and a bit ridiculous dreams. This was, of course, especially present while I was working in the ad agency and publishing industry.

To those people I was probably very often a “but” person. Or I should say a “butt” person. Not because I thought they were bad or because their ideas were bad, but simply because they were often unrealistic, unnecessary and not very relevant for the business. What I was not always ready to see is that some of those dreams were important to those people no matter what my opinion was or what the reality and opinion of all others involved was. Or that of our clients and audience. By letting them dream, it might have happened that nothing good came out on that particular occasion, but maybe it would have had a positive influence to some future events.

Just to be clear – some of those dreams were diabolic and hazardous to many people around. You might face people with dreams that involve dishonest intentions, humiliation of others or causing trouble and pain to all people involved. In those cases, I’m proud to be a “dream killer”.

Otherwise, let people dream… If you say too many “buts” and kill too many dreams, you will kill your own as well.

Cheers to honest and beautiful dreams! Even the funny, weird and irrelevant ones. Because they might make someone happy. And it will not make you unhappy, just because.
Trends I Will Be Supporting in 2017

January 5, 2017

Relaxed Weekend Reading

My second dream job, beside the one of entertainment director in a Las Vegas hotel is actually the one of a trend watcher. Since the chances that I will ever start my career in Las Vegas are slim and I might be successful in watching and predicting trends, I will start this 2017 by listing 3 trends that I see happening and that I will heavily support in the following year.

Trend no. 1

The Death of Workaholics

For many years, it was promoted in many different cultures that being a workaholic is a good thing. You know when you meet acquaintances, not too close friends or business partners and your conversation goes like this:

You: How are you?

Friend: Oh, don’t ask… I’m working 20 hours per day. The office is crazy at the moment.

You: Yeah, I know. Same here. We are working on some important projects. Last night we left the office at 2AM.

Friend: Lucky you! I left in the morning just to take a shower and came back to give a presentation!

Both of you are complaining, but you are also kinda proud because you feel important and special because you have to work so hard and so long.

Crap!

I was both of those persons I admit. But this only goes to show the fact that something is deeply wrong with your workplace and the culture you are promoting. So if you meet me in 2017 or later and I tell you that I’m staying in the office until midnight feel free to slap me in the face.

I’m slowly turning into a heavy supporter of higher productivity instead of a higher number of working hours. And I will consider all self-claimed workaholics to be so last century. Get real, it’s not cool anymore. Look at Scandinavia. They always know the right thing to do.

Trend no. 2

Supporting Talent and Entrepreneurship

This is not new, of course. But I see more and more people starting their own small ventures based either on their skills and talents or market demands they recognize. This can be something in the digital world but also something very “old fashioned”. I have written about this in my post about niches.

I think that talent and entrepreneurship are the only two things that can save the world from another huge economic crisis.

That’s why I will support every honest small business and each talented person in any way I can – either by buying their products, promoting them, giving them some money or just telling them I like what they do. This is a trend that must grow! For the benefit of our children.

Trend no. 3

Building Amazing Teams

More than ever, during the last couple of years, I have realized that instead of picking the industry, salary, boss, company or market – it’s important to be able to pick your team. The power of good team is so amazing. What 3 or 5 people who fit good together can achieve is beyond any organizational engineering or project management.

I was often comparing this with movie castings. Most professionals in the film industry will tell you that good casting is the key of making a good movie. If we know this, why are all team-making systems in big companies so bad? Why is it that internal politics, procedures and small interests are more important than setting the foundation for amazing results?

I will dedicate the following year to crack this and to offer some solutions and ideas. Not an easy one, but I would say a key one for successful business ventures in coming years.

The most exciting thing regarding the 3^rd one is the fact that good casting is not the most obvious one. So, take some time to watch those two movies where unexpected casting actually made them some of the most interesting movies in the last decade of the last century. First one is L.A. Confidential (1997) by Curtis Hanson and the second one is Boogie Nights (1997) by Paul Thomas Anderson.

Enjoy the weekend and cheers to all the trends that we want to support!
Quick Post 2: What Have I Learned in 2016?

December 23, 2016

Although it’s a bit silly, we all summarize things in December and make a couple of lists of all the good and bad that happened in the year that is staying behind us. Or lists of what we are going to achieve or change in the year to come.

The first thing I’ve learned in 2016 is that I’m not going to plan the year 2017 at all! I know it sounds strange, but in 2016 I had so many plans, and they all changed so many times, and the only thing I got from planning was frustration and stress. So, in order to decrease the stress, I will decrease the planning. I will try to go with the flow. (I’m lying about this and I’m aware of it, but I hope that if I write it down and publish it, that I will have to put more effort in actually making it happen. I still believe in the power of a written word)

The second thing I’ve learned is that you can’t run away from your character and personality, no matter how hard you try. Yes, I know I’m a bit old to learn this now, but for several years I have tried to prove it’s possible. I was trying so hard I almost “killed myself”. It’s only possible to try to make smart choices and pick the environments that will fit your character. An equally important issue I’ve learned is that this is also applicable to other people. They can’t run away from their characters either. We can be stupid and sit and wait, and hope. It’s not going to happen.

The third thing I’ve learned is that I should trust my instincts about people much more than I have before. After having a year that was more turbulent than usual, I can conclude that my first judgment about someone is much better and more correct then my second or third one. Because the latter two are “contaminated” by justification, interest, wishful thinking, hope, anger… Why go through difficult times and a roller-coaster of emotions in relationships with others when you can simply put the right coordinates at the very beginning.

The last and most important thing I’ve learned in 2016 is that I can still write. After many years of running away from writing, I faced my biggest fear and exposed myself to the audience via this blog and via one theater play that I wrote. The blog is alive, the play will be published soon. Neither the blog, nor the play are the best in the whole world. But I’m learning all the time. Again. And I enjoy it! Cheers to that!
Letting Go: Killing Your Vertical Ambition

December 20, 2016
When someone who was very ambitious and who was very keen on vertical progress in his/her career decides it’s time to let it go – in a way it’s comparable with a top athlete losing a leg or suffering a major career stopping injury.

I’m aware it’s not completely comparable because health is more important, but mental health also counts, and personal impression on levels of pain and suffering are the only ones that count.

First of all, let’s discuss why someone would decide to leave hierarchical career progress behind. I’m going to list 3 main reason that I have witnessed so far:
1. Change of personal priorities – family vs. job. Unfortunately, still much more present among women and in this Eastern region compared to, for example, Benelux or Scandinavia.
2. When one’s career is not developing according to their plans for a long period of time. It becomes more and more obvious it’s not going to work out.
3. When one is facing big disappointments related to ethics, company culture and values needed for progress. Their illusions start falling apart.
To make it clear – I’m not discussing here situations of people being backstabbed, making major mistakes that ruin their career or having unrealistic ambitions that simply can’t be accomplished. I’m referring only to conscious decisions of professionals to take a different path or to change the focus of their efforts toward different direction.

The fact that the decision was conscious and not directly forced, doesn’t undermine the anxiety, stress and pain that is caused by amputating one important aspect of your ego and your self-perception such as ambition to reach very high levels in your career.

Two major lines of thoughts are dominant in that situation: Did I waste so many years of my life, sacrifice so much, and in the end, get nothing out of it? AND the second one: What’s next? Is this the end of the world? At least the world that I know. And, to a certain extent, love. .

My experience is that it’s not very easy to get out of this situation and way of thinking. It’s a vicious closed cycle that can drive you crazy in a very short period of time.

But let’s elaborate the first doubt: yes, you can see it as a waste of time, but you can also make a list of positive things that you are taking with you and that are staying with you forever: great people that you’ve met, skills you got, valuable life and business experience that you can apply in some other aspects of life, travels to some fantastic locations and at the end of the day, money that provided you with some important things in your life, including self-confidence, pride and dignity.

What is next? If you are not chasing new achievement and new title, maybe you should consider chasing new experiences, fulfilling some small dreams that were on hold due to your busy agenda for many years and finding new focus that can help you build new reality that fits much better into your new mindset and setup of your life.

What happens very often is that people are forced into ambitious behavior. Companies stimulate ambition because they believe that if they have ambitious employees they will work more and better. But this is not true. People who are ambitious but who streamline it into a wrong direction or set their goals too high, actually become unproductive, dangerous and toxic for the organization.

During the course of my career I rarely have had any issues with people who were not smart enough, not experienced enough or even not very nice characters. The biggest problem you’ll face is with people who have a discrepancy between abilities, their intimate visions and (sometimes forced) ambitions. So, do a double check. Maybe this was not your playground in the first place.

But if it was, and if now you feel like an elite runner at the peak of your career who ended up in a wheelchair you basically have two options. To sit and cry, feel sorry for yourself, and wait for a miracle. Or you can start working on strengthening your upper body and becoming a champion in bench press or work on the recovery of your legs – not with a goal to run on the Olympics again, but to dance at your friend’s wedding at least.

Sometimes it’s easier if some things just happen to you. If you don’t have to make any hard decisions. If you can blame someone else. But when you figure out that, during the biggest part of your life, this will actually be the case, then you can start to value much more the opportunity to be a master of your own destiny, even if it looks scary and simply too hard.

Cheers to courage to quit. Cheers to courage to face your biggest fears. And cheers to opportunity to redefine yourself and still be happy. Or even happier than before.
Business Surfing: Riding the Right Wave

December 11, 2016

Nowadays, if you spend 4-5 years in any kind of business environment you will figure out that almost everything happens in cycles.

Certain industries grow and then, they stagnate or go into decline. Companies grow or expand geographically, and then they decide to reduce their footprint and reduce the number of people. Some roles in the company are very much wanted at certain times, and then a few years later the companies say goodbye to all the talented professionals they previously wanted. This has probably always been the case, but in today’s business it goes very fast. And it accelerates, making those cycles shorter and shorter.

During my 15-year long career I have seen and experienced several interesting cycles. Huge growth of media industry for example, and then deep dive after 2008 when some markets lost up to 50% of their revenues. Joining huge organizations that decided to reduce the number of employees by 20 or 30%. At the same time, they were employing new people of a different profile. Markets being hungry for CFOs, later moving toward markets that want to have only controllers. It’s about business needs, but also global trends, global economy and politics.

One of my favorite examples is the amazing concept of shared service centers. Many big companies introduced this concept. First, they started working on it and planning it. Spending a lot of money on consultants and project teams. Then they introduced it with major redundancies on local markets. Only to realize, after a few years, that it’s not really working and that a number of people in the shared center became the same as previous total number of people on the markets… So, the company decides to dismantle the shared service center… Just until they decide in a few more years to create the new one with a new brilliant concept!

It’s a wave after wave. Sometimes even a tsunami. Rarely can we see a peaceful sea nowadays. But you know the words – no waves – no glory!

So, what can we do about it?

If you are not a powerful and influential game changer, a CEO of a major international company or an innovator that can change the world (I would like to believe that people of that kind read my blog, but I’m also quite realistic J), if you are not the one making the waves – then you have only one option: to ride the right wave!

I believe that people can have more than one career today. In business, we can change companies, even industries and roles that we play. I know many examples of people who relocated geographically, completely changed their environment and still made fantastic careers by using their strong skills and previous experience. Some of them did it more than once. I respect people spend most of their careers in one company, one industry and one country. That’s totally fine. They might be loyal to their companies, dedicated to certain topics where they became experts or simply scared of a big change. They survive many changes, new organizational setups, several ups and an equal number of downs, and sometimes a lot of stress that did not have to be implied. Instead of this approach maybe it’s smarter to feel the right moment and to move on to another beach, another wave that is giving you a full speed and joy of good time, growth and development.

Without arguing that this approach is better than any other I would just like to put into the center of our attention the personal development, work-life balance and professional growth. You can achieve much more in those areas if you are on the right wave, a wave going in full swing toward the coast.

And then, just before this wave breaks, look around and try to find the next one that will bring you new joy and new opportunities for an amazing surf.

Just to make it clear – I’m not saying that you should run away from challenging situations and problems. Especially during younger years, while you are still learning how to surf it’s very beneficial that you hit the cold water a couple of times or even break your surfboard. That will make you stronger as a person and a professional. I’m also not promoting the idea of leaving certain environment when things become tough.

But always ask yourself these two questions:

I’m I happy here and will I be happy in a year or two from today?

Can I do anything to change big movements in my working environment?

If the answer is NO, look around. Read some trend watching reports, start acquiring new skills… Because it may be time for a change. And while you are looking, consider your personal preferences and career and life stage goals. It might happen that you find exactly the right place for yourself on the side of a bigger stream or a newest trend. It’s not necessary to ride the biggest one!

The good news is that you can go back to your old job, industry, market at some point if you want. As I said, in most of the cases things are moving in cycles. Maybe in 4 or 10 years from now the timing will be perfect to ride your board on that beautiful beach back from when you were young, once again.

Cheers to good waves and amazing surfing! Enjoy it! Just don’t forget to put some sun cream on your skin. SPF 50 plus. And beware of sharks.