“The thing is, Bob, it’s not that I’m lazy, it’s that I just don’t care.” – Office Space
I’m glad cats don’t run corporations. They like to play with their prey before they kill it.
The economy is changing. That’s a newsflash from every decade since Sunday in 12,241 BC, when Chieftain Brad Von Thundernose (he snored) invented bacon-wrapped shrimp. Unfortunately, Brad was allergic to shellfish, and puffed up like Elvis on carbohydrates. Brad aside, if you look back in the distant past to the year 2000 (which, for some of us, used to sound futuristic) you’d see that the largest five companies were:
- Exxon-Mobil®
- General Electric™
- Ford©
- General Motors®
- Wal-Mart™
What were the largest five companies in 2018?
- Apple™
- Amazon©
- Google®
- Microsoft™
- Facebook©
They’ve all changed. And these are the five biggest!
I’ve been fortunate to (so far) to be able do the same thing for most of my career, admittedly not with the same company. I’ve generally been okay doing it – in at least one place I’ve worked some things I set up literally saved the company a few years after I left. That’s nice – the thought that hundreds of folks still have a job because of something I did.
And at a different company, I saved a career. Pay attention and it might help yours, too.
Let me explain:
A friend of mine was offered a chance to move out of our department and move into recruiting. She took the opportunity. Then the economy took a downturn. And she didn’t get along with her boss. And was close to getting fired. I told her she was over thinking it – no way that they would fire her.
This particular person was smart, talented, and personable – not smelly, irritable, and brooding like your humble author. I checked around and found out how close she was to getting fired. The answer was very close to being fired – they’d started the 90 day clock before the final paycheck.
As a department head, I knew that she was better than many folks everyone that I had in my department. Her boss, however, “didn’t want to transfer a problem” and “this person isn’t a good fit with the company’s values.” That’s HR speak for “it’s personal.”
Thankfully, I managed to drag my boss into the idea that she’d be perfect for our department, and he was able to go up three levels of management to convince his great-grand boss that she’d be a great fit.
Today? She’s an executive VP, hauling in the big bucks (seriously big bucks), but she had to change career focus after leaving my group. Essentially now she’s a corporate ninja-nun who goes around the company smacking people’s knuckles with a metaphorical ruler
Do not make my friend angry.
Lessons:
- Have friends that can help you.
In a big corporation if your intent is to move up the ladder, you need friends. Let’s face it, we all screw up. If someone higher up in the company can vouch for you when they’re looking for a designated victim, a highly-placed mentor (or sponsor, or friend) can tip the scales in your favor. That being said, if your role has put you in a spot where you were the designated bad guy (“no, you can’t spend that money for elephant rides, PEZ®, and pantyhose for the welders in the assembly line”) then sometimes you won’t be able to survive after your sponsor is gone.
Why do I put this one first? Despite how good you might be, having someone to cover your back is huge – it’s sometimes the difference between unemployment and the executive suite.
The reason they say, “it’s not what you know, it’s who you know”? It’s true.
When you look above you in the org chart and don’t see anyone who would go to bat for you? Your time at that job might be short, my friend.
- Be able to change what you do.
Chances are you have skills, unless you’re at the DMV, and heck, they have skills, too, if you count seething rage and the ability to take literally the worst possible picture of a human being. Understand that during your career you might have to take those skills and transfer them from making people who are attempting to get a driver’s license miserable to, say, making people who need a new license plate miserable. If I could write one thing on a billboard, the idea that “What you’re doing today might have no value in the future” would be second on my list. Sadly, “Do you know where my car keys are?” would be number one.
But it’s true. Just as Exxon-Mobile® has been replaced by Apple™ in valuation (and in my gas tank – sadly my car only gets four miles per iPhone®), the idea that you’ll spend your career doing the same thing is becoming less common. How many people started their career in nuclear engineering and ended up running a carpet installation company staffed entirely by nude circus clowns? More than I can count!
- Be able to create value.
At one place I worked, there was an employee that watered and dusted plants. That’s all she did. The company had a huge office, and it had plants on every floor. I had no idea that you had to dust plants, but, apparently if the plants live only by the dull fluorescent light of corporate America, you do. One day (when profits dropped from enormous to merely massive) the plant lady (and the plants) were gone. I think someone figured out that plants in the office building didn’t add a single dollar to the company profitability, so they let the plants (and the plant lady) become free-range.
One person in the company was notoriously difficult to work for and with, made business decisions like a drunken leper in a fish factory (I have no idea what that means, but it can’t be good), and smelled vaguely of gin and regret. I asked my boss, “Why don’t they fire him? He stands against literally every value that management says they’re in favor of.”
My boss: “But he makes SOOOOO much money for the company. Millions.”
That’s a huge defense. If you make piles of money for the company and can prove it? They’ll never fire you until the Grand Jury indicts.
In the end, my friend met all three of the criteria up above – had friends, had a flexible skill set, and could demonstrate how she made money, which is why she flies around on the corporate jet to eat bacon-wrapped shrimp. Thankfully, I was able to help her avoid being a free-range plant lady . . .
