Ways To Survive: Practical Advice In An Impractical World

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I've noticed that most of the commonly read posts on LinkedIn focus on how beautiful everything in the work place can be, and that life is filled with candy, popcorn, unicorns, sunshine, and rainbows.  These posts relate how wonderful it is to work with people who are wonderful, and how glorious it is to be alive and what you should do to make your life equally magical, just like the author.

They offer advice about how to tactfully confront your boss and get that promotion you've sought for years.  How to ask for a raise, or what successful people do every single day, and how you can be just as successful as Steve Jobs. Seriously?  How you can increase your bottom line 30% if you just do this one thing the author recommends. Really? Well unless you live in a vacuum, it's not all sunshine and rainbows out there in the business world.  And if someone is preaching that if you do what they suggest, your life will be sunshine and rainbows, well they're full of sh#t.

The business world is cold, dark, damp, and it's wrought with terrors.  It is like a lifelong trip to the NCAA basketball tournament, the FA Cup, the NFL playoffs, or a never ending episode of "Game Of Thrones". Survive and advance.

The most practical advice which anyone can really offer to you is "stay in the game".  Don't let your peers, your manager, or your friends take you out of the game, unless that's what you want. Listed below are 5 ways to keep your head above water and how to survive and with luck, thrive, in today's competitive business climate.

1. Trust No One - People have their own interests at heart.  Gandhi or Jesus are not working alongside of you, so don't think that anyone will support you and sacrifice their own career. If a friend or coworker screws up and asks you to cover for them, don't do it.  Chances are that when management tries to find out what happened, your coworker will blame the mistake on you. If your boss asks you to do something that you know is wrong, you're better off reporting it to HR. Most likely, he/she will point a finger at you if their career is in jeopardy...just read my last post.

2. Avoid Gossip - It is really easy to get drawn into a conversation about people in and around the office, warehouse, station, shop, or any business enterprise.  Listen but don't add fuel to the fire.  No one can get mad at you if you say nothing.  The only thing they can say is you're boring.  I once made an off hand remark at Happy Hour about how my boss was managing the team and what a surprise the next day he called me in to his office and threatened to fire me.  If I had kept my mouth shut, none of that would have happened.

3. Be Prepared...For Anything - I know that people always say be prepared. However I'm saying don't limit yourself to just your job functions. Be aware of all that is going on around you and with your company.  I had a friend who worked for a medical device company for years, and once she found out the company's patents were running out, she prepared herself for the worst; unemployment. She contacted recruiters and fortunately she landed another job before the company laid off 300 people. 

4. Create Allies - It's hard for anyone to be successful by themselves.  Even brilliant inventors like Thomas Edison and Steve Wozniak, needed allies to help them survive.  Choose wisely who you ally yourself with and you may not only survive, but advance in today's competitive marketplace.  Where would Steve Jobs have been with out Steve Wozniak, or Thomas Edison without Edward Hibberd Johnson? Most of you at this point are wondering who the heck is Edward Hibberd Johnson, but that's not the point. Align yourself accordingly to ensure your survival.  

5. Be Invaluable - I once had an employee who took on so much responsibility that my branch couldn't function without her.  I realized immediately that she was not only loyal, but she took on all this extra work for a reason. She could never be fired.  She knew, that if she were irreplaceable than I could never get rid of her. Whether she was a pain in the ass or not, and she was a major pain in the ass.  She did a wonderful job, but she was grumpy all the time, and she clashed with a lot of the employees. Yet she was an integral part of our business and so she survived despite her unruly temper. We address the anger issue and she became well liked and more important, invaluable.

These are just a few tips to help you along the way, but there are many more to come in future posts.  A few of you, might have some of your own to offer.  Experience is a great teacher, and any advice to help all of us along the way will help.  Remember, the road ahead is not always paved with gold, and we all need help to avoid the potholes. 

Have a good day. And stay in the game...

What's Wrong With Me?

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My first job out of college, after a year,  I was fired.  I remember it vividly, because it left an emotional scar on me for the rest of my life. I felt like a complete loser, even though I was fired by the manager because our branch had been audited, she had done something against company policy, and then she had laid the blame on me. I didn't steal any money.  I didn't swindle our customers.  What I did was follow her order, and I held off returning a bounced check from a customer just to make our branch loan numbers and collection numbers look good. She told me it wasn't really wrong, but rather...untimely.

"If they audit us, tell them you left it in your brief case. We won't get into trouble for being absent minded."

She knew this was wrong, and I knew it was wrong, but I wanted to show her I was loyal.  And for my loyalty, she fired me.  The only real thing I had done wrong was trust in her. A common mistake by a new college graduate who assumed everyone in business will do the right thing.  WRONG!

The truth is everyone in business does try to do the right thing...the right thing for themselves, but not necessarily for everyone else. People will serve their own interest because this is what comes naturally.  When confronted with a choice between letting another person go, to save her own butt, she did the right thing...for her.  And she left me with a big professional and emotional scar which obviously I still have, since I'm writing about the incident years later. 

After being fired, I kept thinking, "what's wrong with me? Why did I listen to her when I knew damn well that what she was asking me to do was against policy?  Why did I let myself get pulled into her little scheme to fix the numbers for our branch in order to make her look good." Heck, I was an idealist at the time.  I should have turned her in to corporate immediately.  But I didn't.  Why?

Because what was wrong with me, what is still sometimes wrong with me, is that I acted out of fear.  I did what she asked, because I was afraid she would fire me if I didn't.  Although I protested a few times that I didn't think it was within policy guidelines, I still let her convince me to follow her plan.  I was afraid that I would get fired and yet I was still fired.  But what's even more interesting is that I didn't realize that I was acting out of fear.  I thought I was being loyal.  I wasn't.  I was being a wimp.

Fear is what was wrong with me, and is still wrong with me.  When I let fear influence any decision, I find that my judgment is not always sound.  It is clouded by thoughts of failure, loss, or pain.  Most of the worst business and personal decisions I have made were influenced by fear.  Here's just a few:

• I took a job I hated because I was worried that I wouldn't find a better one, and I would run through my savings.  That was two of the worst years of my life. 
• I stayed with a business partner too long because I was afraid I couldn't run the business on my own.  That partner embezzled money from the business and me.  The business went bankrupt.
• I sold a business that had a lot of potential only to realize later that I was afraid I would not get a sound return on my investment. I missed out on a big opportunity.
• I kept an employee around for too long because I was afraid she would sue the company, and in the end she sued us anyway.  But by then the rest of the staff was upset we hadn't acted earlier.
• I stayed in a relationship too long because I was afraid of being alone.  In the end, I ended up alone anyway.
• I was afraid to get married to someone because I didn't think she was the right person.  Instead, she went and found the person right for her and for years I regretted not marrying her.
• I took a long term lease for way too much money because it was a prime spot in Los Angeles and I was afraid the landlord would lease it to someone else.  That cut into my company's profits for years.

Fear has dictated a lot of my life decisions, but it doesn't have to dictate yours.  When you're faced with a tough decision, take a step back, be objective, and make the best decision even if it hurts.  The pain will be temporary, but your happiness may last a lifetime. 

There may be something wrong with me, but at least I know it's repairable. Have a great day!