How French Anthropology Can Help Your Career

The term Bricoleur was coined in 1962 by the French anthropologist and sociologist Claude Levi-Strauss to describe someone who is adept at many tasks and can use the materials and resources around them to create something.

A Bricoleur is pragmatic, strategic and self-reflective.

I think these terms succinctly describe a successful modern career. Career today is pragmatic – we can’t be off with the fairies. We need to provide the basic necessities to live and take concrete, tangible action.

A successful career, however, is also strategic. Making careful decisions to position our self for the future.

Finally, without self-reflection, we risk becoming irrelevant with skills no longer required in the market place.

So, 50 years after it was first coined, perhaps being a Bricoleur may come back into vogue.

Office Politics: Breaking Down the Barriers to Your Career

Think of your career journey to date. How many times have you heard your inner monologue commenting on day-to-day issues at work that increase your stress and anxiety levels? Or have you ever outwardly engaged others in confrontation over situations you can no longer remain silent about? Even worse, have you ever been the perpetrator of instigating outward negativity in colleagues, bearing the brunt of negativity you may have helped create?

The point is, office politics are real and destructive. They put at risk your ability to effectively manage your work activities, motivation, passion and productivity, whether you’re caught up in other people’s issues or from time-to-time, even create your own office politics. My comments on this issue were recently published in Marie Claire. Think of these themes as somebody who’s at the receiving end, but also remember we can all slip into negative work patterns that perpetrate office politics.

1. Don’t take sides in office conflicts…But don’t appear insensitive. Most of the time people just want to be heard, although they’d love for you to take their side by dragging you into their conflict.

2. It takes two to tango: Don’t engage in office gossip. If gossiping is a favoured daily activity for a colleague, they’ll get bored if you don’t encourage them with adding your morsels of opinion or judgment.

3. Somebody steals your thunder: Stand up for your work. Sometimes others may seek to undermine you by claiming positive outcomes as a result of their own creation.

More here on this issue that affects us all from time-to-time.

A Model of Career Change: Part 3

This week is the final post around the Do-Meet-Be model of career change. The initial discussion looked at taking action (“Do”) to broaden your perspective and increase your knowledge about the huge range of careers that people pursue. Next, I looked at how networking (“Meet”) enables you to generate potential career leads, creating engagement with people and groups you would otherwise not have access to. While these two topics focussed on taking action, the final stage causes you to look within. What occurs within you once you’ve started to take action? And ultimately, what path will you take to actualise your career dreams?

Step 3: Be. Through taking different actions and meeting different people you’ll start to think of yourself differently. You’ll no longer think of yourself just a school teacher but also as a horticulturalist, or interior designer or technical trainer or whatever you may want to become. The shift is tangible. You’ll notice yourself giving a different answer to the ubiquitous BBQ question: “So what do you do..?”

If your chosen career involves up-skilling, then think before enrolling in study including how you best learn, what support you’ll need and a realistic view of employment prospects. Study and skills are integral to life-long learning in a career, but so is possessing insight into why you’re learning it. Addressing these types of questions will help you realise what your end goal is.

I hope this blog series has triggered some valuable introspection, generating ideas for you pursue to ultimately enable you to make informed decisions about your career journey.

Above all, don’t think your career to death. Take action.

A Model of Career Change: Part 2

Last week I discussed a different take on traditional approaches to career planning. Viewing an individual’s career aspirations through the lens of self-understanding, planning and implementation is a tough-ask when you are stuck in a career rut. So, I raised the idea of our Do-Meet-Be model of career planning, which focusses on taking action. The first step looked at the “Do” part of the model. This week, I introduce the second component.

Step 2: Meet. The biggest single hurdle to shifting career is not having any networks in areas outside your past experience. Many people stay in their ‘rut’ because they don’t have the networks - and therefore the information, leads and ideas – that will help them find other opportunities.

By doing different activities you’ll meet different people. These people will expose you to new ideas and new possibilities that you hadn’t previously considered. Attending events or having a one-on-one coffee with someone outside your normal sphere of friends is a great way to meet different people. Think about someone who you’ve met only once or twice through a mutual friend – acquaintances are a great start. Give them a call and ask about their career story or organise a more formalised setting to undertake an informational interview.

Increasing your exposure to new ideas through exploring other people’s ideas and garnering knowledge means you will be more equipped to start formulating your goals. You’ll also get the heads up about possible opportunities.

I’ll discuss next week Step 3: Be in the final part of this blog series.

Do. Meet. Be: A model of career change

Taking action is the secret to a successful career and to getting out of a career rut. This three part blog series looks at how people can shift gears to stop thinking their careers to death when stuck in a rut. Too often we see people dream of possibilities and dream of changing, but don’t take any action.

Traditional career planning doesn’t work if you feel stuck in a rut. The traditional approach is: understand your strengths and interests; make a plan; then implement the plan. The problem is that the shift is too difficult – it’s too much of a leap to go from current rut to utopian goal.

Instead, I recommend a three step approach called the Do-Meet-Be model of career change.

Step 1: Do. Go out and start doing things differently. If you’re interested in shifting to a different profession, go and volunteer in their industry association or get involved at the grassroots level. “Do” is about taking action, like speaking to people to broaden your horizons and becoming inquisitive to find out what careers are out there. Often we don’t know what it is family members or friends actually do, so that’s a great starting point. People get stuck because they don’t know what’s out there or what the possibilities are. At a practical level, get involved with activities outside your normal realms of career focus and related in some way to what you are curious about.

Next week, Step 2: Meet will come into focus.

Why Job Search is Hard

Adaptation occurs in nature when the outcome of something is predictable. For example, take plants of the savannah areas of Northern Australia, where the main source of water is deep underground. The eucalyptus trees and hardy grasses synonymous with these regions adapt because of the predictable nature of the environment where the water table exists in perpetuity. With long tap roots, this predictability allows plant life to survive in the savannah, providing food and shade to its fauna.

But adapting to a job search, that is, becoming comfortable with it, is almost impossible because the process is unpredictable. A typical job search involves waking up in the morning to a phone call asking you to come in for an interview only to receive a rejection email that same afternoon. Adaptation is difficult as we never know what the outcome of our next activity will be. Will that next phone call land an interview? Will the next coffee meeting uncover your dream job? Will the next job from seek.com be a tedious one with selection criteria?

The uncertainty of not knowing what will happen makes it impossible to ever be fully comfortable with the process. It’s not that finding a job is impossible (yes, yours is out there), it's just that the “finding” part isn't always easy.

Why Referees aren't important

The traditional recruitment process has gone something like this:

1. Advertise
2. Cull resumes
3. Interview 5-10 people
4. Shortlist 3
5. Second round interviews
6. Psychometric Assessment
7. Reference Check
8. Make offer.

The reference check stage has always intrigued me. The purpose has traditionally been to investigate any areas of concern which may have arisen from the interview or psychometric assessment stage, for example, are they as diligent as they say? Do they really deliver on time?

Two trends, however, have reduced the power of reference checking. First, do you know anyone who gives a bad referee? Second, our litigious society means that referees are far more circumspect and careful in what they say. Recruiters have learnt to make a subjective opinion about someone on the length of the silence after asking "Would you hire this person again?".

Social media is turning this process on its head.

Many recruitment processes, especially for specialist roles, now begin with a search through the net to see who is the best workplace lawyer or sustainability engineer. Recruiters look to see who is regarded as the best in the industry by reading recommendations, blog posts, articles and anything they can find about you. They may also find who they know who knows you. Then give them a call and subtly ask questions about how good you are.
They're doing their reference checking first.
And most likely, you have no idea who they are speaking to.

This means that you have to be proactive in managing your online profile. Contribute regular to online discussions (eg Linkedin Answers) and submit articles to magazines in your field. Occasionally Google yourself (no its not just for ego maniacs!) to see what others see about you.

But the best career advice of all: Do Your Job Well. Then your profile will only be positive.