In two earlier articles about “The Future of Careers,” we focused on the need for removing “climbing ladders” as a cognitive framework for career management. A better conceptual framework revolves around the ski term “traversing” down slopes of different terrain. Learn to “ski with your edge.”
The key in successful career management in the 21st Century is not necessarily the rank on the organizational hierarchy you achieve but your ability to identify your “edge” and apply that edge in novel circumstances.
In a world that is best described as "elongnated middle age but short job tenure," this skill of "ski with your edge" is of more value than the ladder climbing.
In the final article of The Future of Career we will focus on other lessons learned through our interview of masters of career management in the 21st Century.
This article will focus on managing affiliation needs through professional associations. We will discuss traversing between provincial and cosmopolitan knowledge. Finally we will argue that feelings of exhilaration/terror might as well be embraced because it is a sign that you are doing the right thing.
Manage Your Affiliation Needs Through Associations:
Affiliation is the desire to be an integral part of something larger than you. It could be as small as being part of a work team that will finish a project this month or as large as being a member of an institution whose mission will make the world a better place.
In the W-2 phase of a career, moderate degrees of Affiliation are helpful: you are part of a team. But when you are in the 1099 phase, you are not part of a client’s team. You are helping a team for a period of time and then your job is to leave the team.
How do you manage your Affiliation needs when you no longer can really be part of a team?
The answer is to focus your Affiliation needs on professional associations. Professional associations are work-related reference groups outside the corporation. These reference groups can focus on function/profession (American Psychological Association, Financial Executives International, American Marketing Association), industry (American Bar Association, Massachusetts Biotech Council), or geographic (Chicago Chamber of Commerce; Downtown Crossing Association of Boston).
Successful careerists take their association membership seriously as a way of meeting their affiliation needs. This is an important but difficult statement to make, given the time pressure of work and home. But it is important to understand how important associations are for your future. In the 21st Century, associations have the same role that guilds played in the Middle Ages: a source of stable affiliation in an unstable project-oriented world.
The connections you make in such associations will form the core professional network to help you traverse between 1099 and W-2 roles. It is important not to just join an association. You need to become known within that association. You need to be a committee member and not just someone who sometimes shows up for the occasional cocktail party.
Traverse Between Provincial and Cosmopolitan Knowledge:
In the W-2 phase of a career, leaders are often hired to manage the work of others. Moving up the corporate career ladder means leaving behind technical mastery of “doing” to managing others whose technical mastery allows them to do what you are unable to do. For example, a hospital CEO may have management responsibility over a surgeon yet not know how to perform surgery. In addition to leadership skills, strategic vision is increasingly of greater value as one moves up the hierarchy. We call these "cosmopolitan skills" because strategic perspective and leadership can be of value in any industry and any organization. Lou Gerstner took over IBM without skills as an electronics engineer or even an appropriate background in IBM’s technology foundation. George Marshall moved from being a soldier to running the Department of Defense to being Secretary of State to being the President of the American Red Cross. Both were masters of the cosmopolitan skills of strategy and leadership.
In the W-2 phase of a career, on the other hand, you will be retained to help solve specific problems. You must know how to “do.” Your technical skills are critical. We call this provincial knowledge because it is highly focused on specialized knowledge.
Being wise in mastering cosmopolitan versus provincial knowledge is critical in effective career management in the 21st Century.
Bill Fallon was Chief Information Officer for a financial services organization. The organization was going to be acquired and Bill was thinking about his next assignment. He was anticipating that he would move from CIO to technical consultant:
“I am already thinking ahead to the next move in my career. And that will probably be a consulting position. It is important to keep my technical skills sharp. I am planning to take a course in a technical area at a local community college. I'll probably be the oldest student in the class. I don’t' care. You’ve got to stay sharp. Taking the courses also helps shape the external perception others have of me. I want to be flexible. I am 54. It is important to build a perception that I am not stuck in a mold. Taking courses is one way to do that. Two years ago I was taking strategy courses at Harvard Business School Advanced Management Program. It is important to do both."
Bill understands that his current W-2 assignment will set the stage for his next 1099 assignment. He is at ease moving from a course on strategy at a world class institution of higher education to a course on the new programming language at his local community college.
Exhilaration and Terror:
In our work with our clients, we need to take into account short job tenure/long middle age framework discussed in Section 1 of this series on the Future of Careers. One of the implications is that our clients may have begun their careers as employees. They will most certainly end their careers as consultants or interim employees. Between the beginning and end of their professional lives, they will constantly traverse from W-2 to 1099 work and back again. Our mission in helping leaders manage their careers is to help them traverse elegance.
The three articles in this series have argued for a specific mixture of flexibility and discipline. That mixture of flexibility and discipline is not unlike traversing down a mountain as you navigate through different snow and different terrain. The thrill of skiing is the simultaneous emotions of exhilaration and terror.
Managing careers in the 21st Century is about embracing the twin emotions of exhilaration and terror. Anyone offering “security” or “fool proof” solutions is selling the career management version of “snake oil.”
The closest thing to job security most of our clients will ever know in the 21st Century is the security of knowing know how to successful generate income under different conditions.
Meet Larry Gibson:
Consider the case of Larry Gibson. Larry Gibson was Chief HR Officer with Harvard Pilgrim Health Plan. Prior to that he was head of HR for a division of Motorola. For the past three years he has been earning an income as a consultant Below is what Larry says about his career:
“My life as a consultant has broadened my professional perspective and given me a broader industry expertise. This makes me more marketable. I enjoy consulting. I know how to make a living at it. If a full-time job opportunity came, I’d certainly look at the opportunity. But it would have to go over a higher hurdle before I would sign on.”
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