How to enter the corporate world

In the current competitive world, you can’t wait until you are out of uni or school to think about the labour market. The reality is you need to get in there before you consider applying for your first corporate job (I’m not even calling the 9h to 17h because I don’t think that even exists anymore).

Be ready to think outside the box and rethink how you see yourself and any role you might apply to.

Just having an education isn’t enough, not even if it’s the cream of the cream, the top of the top.

Enter the world of skills. Whereas most generations still perceive a role mostly as a title and experience that comes with it, think of it as the unique skillset you will be building up and that makes you, well you!

If you don’t have any corporate experience yet, how can you grow yourself? Think about any part time or summer jobs you could do. Embrace your inner barista or run the finances for your local football club.

Do you have any hobbie you could monetize? Then go for it.

By the time it comes to send your first cv you need to be able to tell the story of who you are and what you can offer. Think about all of the skillsets you can aquire and will make the difference in an infinite list of cvs.

Focus on the soft skills and adaptability. The skills needed today won’t be the skills needed tomorrow. AI could replace a lot of the known jobs today. The ability to reinvent yourself will bring you the competitive edge that could save your butt tomorrow.

Let’s break this down with some examples

Any public facing role – And I’ll continue using the example of the local barista

You will be learning customer service. Your are dealing with people and having to prioritize work & dealing with pressure: do you clean those dirty tables or do you deal with all the orders right now. Don’t underestimate the bliding need for a coffee on a Monday morning. You need to get as many coffees out as possible. For this to happen, you will have looked into the end to end process of making your favourite brew from order until it’s ready. What can you prepare in advance to ensure the flow goes as smooth as possible and with the less steps needed. This would be process optimization. Handling all the many requests: (1 flat white, 2 sugars, oat milk, followed by a cortado no sugar to a capuccino with steaming hot milk and a customer that is afraid to miss the train while keeping a smile on your face, is dealing with pressure and acing it.

These are skills you will need anywhere you go.

Organizing a local event

This could well be, organizing a celebration for your local club, getting the community together. You will be dealing with many suppliers, negotiating prices (most likely you will be cost sensitive), and ensuring all the different components of the event come together on the day of the event. Drinks are served, people attending are happy, you rented the place, positioned all the bins in place so rubbish collection end of the event is as smooth as it can be.

Running the finances for your local club

You can even do this in a basic spreedsheet, by keeping note of all money coming in and coming out. You will need to be organized and ensuring every cash flow is kept on record so you think ahead of what the club might need – more sponsors? more events so you get further revenue coming in?

Creating a website or a small plugin

Are you good with programing? You can create apps, plugins and websites for other people and already monetize your work. When it comes to sending cvs later you will be able to showcase your portfolio.

These are just a few examples, I’m sure you already have other skills you don’t even realize you can have. Don’t worry about not having done something in a specific role. You will be holding a skillset that is unique to you and could add value on any given role.

Which skills will be key? Well, this is my own view:

• Emotional inteligence – In a world where everything can be replaced, automatized emotional inteligence will continue to be one of the most important skills you can have. If you are able to maintain a cold head and think though any given problem without letting your monkey mind run wild and loose the plot, you will be a step further than most. This is not something – unfortunately – that schools even will teach out and most of the parents won’t be focusing on this either. They both focus on what they can measure, and that will be school grades. Emotional inteligence takes time and patience. It’s keeping those foundational rocks that will eventually become part of who you are. You also need to be aware of the emotions others around you are holding and how certain words could trigger a chain reaction to those around you. (You can read more about it here). It’s one of the core leadership skills for a reason and I would say one which most “leaders” lack.
• Organization – You would be amazed to know how so many people completely lack basic organizational skills. Be it in terms of organizing your own agenda, your shopping list, your life, your calendar, whatever it might be. If you are unable to keep a clear track of what you need to do and where to find what you might need for a given task, you will lose valuable time finding it later. Your mind needs to know where to go instantely for any topic. If you find you are lacking, invest time to get there. Be it organizing your own 1 per 1 lego pieces by colours – so you can find the colour you need when you need it – to keep a diary of the things you are doing and where you are spending your time. Organization has never been at the highest as in recent years. You will be surprised how even home organization is such a thing now with the rise of Marie Kondo.
• Empathy – I wrote about it so many times, so I will keep it short. Those who lack empathy and are unable to read other’s emotions won’t go far. Empathy and emotional inteligence go hand in hand and are really powerful tools. If you want to read what I wrote before check here.
• Ability to learn & focus – This might seem obvious, but you need to have the foundational skills on how to learn anything. Most of us have the attention span of a fish and can’t focus on more than a few seconds on any given task without being distracted (yeah blame it on tik tok). If you are able to focus on your mind on something new and allocate time to keep on getting better and better means you will be able to learn anything. And you really need the ability to repivot and learn anything as new skills will keep on coming all the time. If you want to continue to be relevant, you can’t just rely on the fact you might be really good and some given skills. I do recommend a digital detox once in a while and you will find that you have tons more time than you thought you had to allocate to learning something new. Whatever rocks your boat. The what is even less relevant than the how or the why.

So no matter your age and where you are with life, just focus on the skills of tomorrow and bagging as many relevant one as you can.

Leaders of tomorrow

As the world evolves and younger generations enter the workforce, leaders also need to stay relevant if they aim to inspire and attract the best talent.

It’s amazing to see today’s leaders starting to bring diversity to the table and start to apply different facets of what it means to be a leader.

When we think of the leadership in the past it you can almost stereotype it:

• White male in his 50’s, drinks whiskey, likes to play golf and smoke cigars
• It was all about power and power circles
• Controls the team by fear and authoritarianism
• They know best / arrogant
• Workaholic
• Loves micromanagement

I’m not saying they were not good examples of leadership in the past, there were. But, the world has moved on quite a lot, and if you have any hope to attract talent, authority alone won’t do. New generations care about the vision, what they are contributing for, and they need to feel they are trusted and their voice matters.

So let’s jump in into what I think are the most important skills of today’s / tomorrow’s leaders.

Agile

Yes I know I love agile, and I really do. But more than just a tool for project management I see it as a mindset. As a leader you need to adapt really fast and be ready to repivot again your ideas. Fail fast, learn even faster! And it’s not even just about failure, you might be doing well right now, but you need to think about what will work tomorrow, and sometimes you might need to take 1 step back to be able to move 3 steps forward. Like parents with young children, what worked today might not work tomorrow. You can’t ever be stuck into ways of working. I’m sorry Mandalorian, but there is “no way”. The way is many ways that you don’t even know are there. You have to be willing to try and see what works.

Communication

Not only you need to have a vision of where you want to be (yourself as a leader and how you see the team / company), but you need to be able to communicate it. I just can’t see how a leader with a good vision can be a great leader if he’s unable to communicate it down the chain. It’s the troops on the ground that will make it or break it unless you’re a company of one. I see so many great ideas dying at the beach because they can’t be articulated in a way that everyone understands what it means for them. It might be obvious to the C-suite, but is it clear what it means to every single employee? As I’ve said, younger generations need to buy into the vision, if they don’t, they will jump out to where they will. (I wrote about it here).

Empathy

I’ve said it again and again and I will say it once more. Empathy is key. For the time being at least, we are dealing with humans, people with lives outside work (yes I know, it’s possible), and unless you have the ability to walk in someone’s shoes and try to understand what your employees might be feeling or how they might perceive your ideas, you won’t go far. The “just do as I say because I say so” era is gone. Yes gone. You need to show to them you are human if you want them to follow you and help you with your vision. (I wrote about it here)

Seeks diversity

In the past the “boss” had to be perceived as the most clever person in the room, and they would unconsciously surround themselves of people who thought like them and said yes to every idea – without any challenge. This was linked to the leading by fear, so there was no incentive of calling out a bad idea. Nether less to say this will jeopardize any ideas of growth. You want to surround yourself of people who are smarter than you and bring a completely different angle to the table, a different idea. You also want do avoid any “yes-sir”. You want to seek different views to then measure them up and understand what could work. Also, you want the surrounding people to challenge you if your idea has any flaws. If there are better ways of doing things, you want to have people around you that will point you in the right direction. If everyone thinks like you, you will just get ideas that you can reach on your own.

Active listeners

For some reason there is the perception that leaders have to be extrovert and talk a lot. But if coms are important, being active listeners is even more so. You need to be aware of what’s going on around you, at all levels of the organization. But unless you’re an Alexa, you can’t be everywhere and know everything, so you need to be able to listen to those you interact with. Not just being able to listen to what they are saying, but on why they are saying and what’s between the lines. The ability to pause and actively listening is one of the most powerful tools a leader can possess, for only then he will be able to have a wider view on anything impacting the company both internally and externally. Don’t forget, it’s the troops on the ground that ultimately interact with clients, that see what’s working and what’s a total failure. Only by listening and observing without judgment you’ll be able to gather insights on any steps that need to be taken next and re-pivot as per my point 1.

From http://quietandstrong.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/introverted-leader.jpg

Always learning, always thinking

My final point is about keeping an open mind and constantly be willing to learn. This is achieved by listening to others, by seeking formal training in any new technology / processes or by reading books. But in order to consolidate all these insights and knowledge, I would say it’s critical to have some thinking time. Not because you did something wrong like we tell the kids, but because the brain needs time to consolidate all the information. Blocking time to just sit down and absorb all the information you’ve collected on a daily basis is fundamental. It’s very easy to just get stuck on the busy-wheel, but you must carve out time to think and define what you need to learn next.

Accountability

Ok, I lied, there’s one more point. Accountability. It’s very easy to take accountability for success, but it’s crucial to take accountability for any failure. Great leaders will recognize what went wrong – as opposed to blame someone else or some other team – and will learn from it. Everyone should incorporate accountability in their ways of working, as it is a powerful tool to build trust. In fact, it was accountability that made me start this blog all these years ago (the one to be blamed), so couldn’t finish the list without it.

Are you still relevant tomorrow?

When we were growing up, most of us wanted to have known jobs like doctor, lawyer, fireman, vet, you name it. But then as we grew up and started to work (and pay taxes), quite a lot of us found it difficult to explain to our parents what we do. I can’t explain to the kids nor my parents what I do. I think my daughter would define it as “my mum works on her computer.”

Even from when I started working until now there’s a lot of new roles that have popped up, namely in AI, data scientists, etc. I even have a friend who works with drones, not for playing (and those are fun too), but that’s his job and a few others that do “social media content”.

This week my husband called the insurance company and it took them a while to figure out which of the options allowed would describe his job.

The roles are moving faster than we do, we might need things we didn’t even know we needed – mobile phone and Alexa I’m looking at you – but now we can’t live without them.

So how do you stay relevant?

• Always learning – There’s no way around it, you have to keep an open mind and continuous learning. If in the past it was all about continuous improvement (and that remains relevant), continuous learning is even more relevant. You need to think not just on the skills required for your role and how to develop in your role, but any skills you might need tomorrow. How to find what’s relevant for you? Well look around to the new hires, which skills are they bringing? What do you think it’s missing in your company, in your industry? Allow time to dedicate to learning and it can be anything from getting a certification from just reading a book or shadowing a colleague that does a different role than yours
• Skills, Skills, Skills – As I wrote here in this space, it’s all about skills. Forget job titles and see yourself as a walking basket of skills. Some you already have and might be an expert at it, others you need to improve (part of the learning bucket), others you might want to drop because they might not be as relevant anymore or you simply might not like them at all. You need to continuously assess what’s relevant for you and which skills you should develop. With the relevant skills you can flex around what’s next for you role wise. The more skills you have, the more flexible you can be. It will always be a dancing game of being an expert at something – which in some specific areas you really need to be – versus being very flexible.

• Be open minded – I have worked with people in the past that believe just because they have more experience they know it all. If you are not willing to listen to those around you and accept new ideas, no matter how radical they seem – you won’t evolve and stay relevant. A new grad will give you a brand new perspective on the world, same as someone from a completely different industry than yours. Be open to different views.
• Surround yourself with people that inspire you – Most people think that they have to search for really senior people because they will help them grow in their careers. Whereas that might indeed work, I would say it’s even more relevant to surround yourself of people that inspire you for whatever reason, could be the receptionist that is an amazing painter in her free time, to someone who is really good at seeing patterns in data, anything that pushes your boundaries and inspires you to think differently and improve yourself. Diversity is the key to it all. If you only mingle with those that think the same way you do, you will never learn anything new.
• Be authentic – In a world full of automation and where most people end up trying to be the same as someone who is successful, are to be authentic and bring your true self in everything that you do.

Some relevant articles

• Careers of the future
• Cool future jobs
• Jobs on the rise
• Forbes: How automation will impact future job markets

Don’t let your job define you

Let’s face it, we’ll spend most of our lives working. The way things are going, it’s quite likely we’ll have to work until we die. And then quite a another big portion was spent studying so you had the required qualifications to work. So yeah, it’s a lot. It’s then no wonder that our job becomes part of your identify.

Think how you would present yourself to a new person: My name is X and I’m Y (nurse, doctor, civil engineer, IT project manager… etc) – this excludes if you are presenting yourself to another parent, then your reduced to kid x mum or dad.

What we do day in day out on the clock becomes part of our we identify ourselves. Quite a lot of us will feel proud that’s your job (probably others no so much or they will have to use fancier words so you can feel a bit prouder). The job we have and the titles we hold end up being quite important for our ego.

Not even that long ago, your own surname would define a generation of people doing the same job and passing the knowledge from family member to another. I’m so happy that I was born in modern days so I had the freedom of choice.

But actually if you think about it, this is a big dangerous.

Unconsciously you will be tying your self-worth to your job. If you don’t get that promotion how do you think you’ll feel?

Also, what happens if you loose your job? In these turbulent times you could loose your job not because you’re not good at it, but because the company needs to downsize to keep afloat.

A lot of people will feel absolutely depressed, not just because of the financial aspect, but I would say mainly because they feel part of their identify is gone and they have to reinvent themselves. After years holding your job as you hold your name, that change can feel very daunting. It is!

Some people hate their names, so they wouldn’t mind a change, but assuming you like your name and what you do, that you felt proud about it, having to reinvent yourself or figure out how to find a similar job someplace else it’s a huge blow.

But here’s an idea, how about we start to leave the job title behind and focus on the skills?

A certain skillset can be adapted to many different jobs.

Here’s my own example:

• I’m really good at getting shit done – yap, I am (except household chores, not so good at those and I will procrastinate until I have no choice but get it done).

This can be applied to anything really, from a demanding a COO, to work in the next door bakery.

Another example

• I’m really good at thinking of creative solutions to address complex problems.

Wherever you go there will be problems that demand solutions.

So how about you take a few minutes to think about what you’re really good at, it can be something you’ve been doing a lot, and hence you have a lot of experience or it can be something you know you are good and with a bit of learning you can get even better.

Thinking of how to utilize your skillset will allow you to adapt even where you are, in your company. You can try other roles and leveraging what you already know, and if your dear company pulls the carpet beneath your feet you’ll be able to reinvent yourself more easily too.

Good article about it here: https://www.bbc.com/worklife/article/20210409-why-we-define-ourselves-by-our-jobs

Book about change:

This book seems to be so popular I have 2 of them, gifted by different companies