“I think I don’t have the right reference groups for what I want to be doing in my life,” shared a Focus Group participant. We were discussing the support structures necessary to navigate transition. Another woman shared, “I think people who have been through it before and for me sometimes it’s people who are actually new to me.” Wow. On balance these ladies sought new, more objective supporting casts as they made their way through transition. Best friends. Mothers. Siblings. Many came up short. Who constitutes your support structure in transition? Continue reading…
Adding more….
“We’ve arrived at this process in an additive way,” offered an articulate woman at a dinner I attended earlier this week. We were talking about a key process for a finance organization while perched high above New York’s East River in a gorgeously appointed pre-war apartment. “We started with a good focus but kept adding items as people joined. Each ‘add’ was in response to an issue raised by a new participant.” The result? An unwieldy thirty step process that arguably undermined the original goals. Have you ever experienced something like this? Additive. Continue reading…
The courage of questions…
“What are you getting out of it?” asked a Focus Group participant rhetorically. “It’s like….you got a paycheck, you got investments or whatever it was. But in the big scheme of things you just look at what matters. And that shifts over time. Based on where you are in your life.” Eight ladies were discussing their transitions. Each person at the table was at a different place. Kids. No kids. Recently married. Divorced. Budding entrepreneur. Teetering financial stability. Regardless of their personal circumstances everyone had gotten to the same spot. Questions. About themselves, their passions. What questions are you asking yourself? Continue reading…
Transition’s Enabler….
As you look forward into the New Year have you been considering transition? Maybe you’re rebounding from a 2013 job loss but you’re questioning if you want to get back into the same thing. Maybe you’re someone who has prioritized other’s needs over your own and now find yourself ready to re-prioritize. Maybe you are realizing that you need to regroup because your long sought after career choice isn’t all that you thought it might be. Whatever the drivers transition simply represents a point in time when we’re faced with a decision: to change or to transition. Which path will you choose?
Transition’s Pre-work….
“At the beginning of the year I was looking for a job,” shared a woman who was kind enough to talk with me about her transition. “I was in a miserable situation where I cried and hoped I’d get into a car accident on the way to work so I wouldn’t have to go that day.” What was going on? By her description she was in a highly charged, negative work environment. She felt irrelevant there despite a master’s degree and a heart ready-to-engage. These work conditions affected everything. Her job. Her relationship with her husband. Every facet of her life. Ever been there?
Another friend shared with me the particulars about her three transitions. “I just can’t do what I am doing anymore,” she said as a replay of the self-talk that characterized her feelings when she decided to begin.
While these stories are greatly excerpted I wonder if you sense any similarities? From my perch I hear each woman talking about getting to an end, a breaking point, before initiating a transition.
What are the prerequisites for transition? Should we adopt the model set out by these ladies? Full sprint until we reach a breaking point?
I hope not. My transition has taught me that at least two factors are worth keeping at the ready always…
Stay in touch with your ‘possible’ in whatever fashion you define possible. I remember an incredibly buoyant woman, a tenured marketing professional, who attended one of my Focus Groups. In her transition she was looking for work but her objective was broader than a paycheck. She sought re-alignment between her passions and her daily pursuits.
“I’ve been doing marketing forever. I like what I do. Am I passionate about it? No. And I need to rediscover that passion and align that with my skills. And it could be that I reaffirm that I want to stay in what I’m doing. That’s OK. But I have to find that again in myself in order to really be successful at job searching and ultimately at whatever position I get. And that’s a very uncomfortable place to be in. What am I going to do next?”
This woman committed full-time to her discovery. Terrific but not required. Can you give one hour a month to rekindle the sightlines to your passions? The real risk lies in extinguishing our passion’s voice. One hour?
Fail a little, often. “I wouldn’t do that,” remarked a friend as I detailed for her a rocky last few weeks. I was telling her about my grueling month leading up to the holidays. During that time I’d received a string of ‘no’s’ on one of my favorite projects. It was punishing and heartbreaking and oddly motivational.
Her remark? I took it to mean that rejection and failure just weren’t her bailiwick. Lucky for her she isn’t currently in transition.
Failure is a constant companion of transition. My new definition of transition is a decision to re-assess our underlying assumptions when faced with the need to change. The assumptions include our identity, our values, our capacity and our sense of purpose. At its core transition requires us to test out these new assumptions again and again. By its very nature, iterative.
Why fail a little? It builds up our capacity to reach. In the late 90’s I started a tech company that received venture capital financing. It was awesome. The less told story is that it wasn’t my first start-up. The start-up that preceded this swanky tech company failed. The earlier one had to shut down after two years. I think I cried for an entire weekend once the decision was made. Despondent? An understatement.
It took a while to regroup after that event but my ability to manage risk and failure was greatly expanded the next time I stepped to the plate. Can you find small ways to increase your fail tolerance?
In this season of resolutions and great beginnings can you commit yourself to these two guidelines? Search for your passion’s voice and fail, a little. My guess is that this is the only investment you’ll make in 2014 which is guaranteed to earn you exponential returns.
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Beginnings…..
“What is transition?” asked a woman who was giving me feedback on one of my project’s just prior to the end of last year. Her question was sincere. It’s a question that I get often. It always gives me pause. Transition. How would you define it? Continue reading…
A gift for you this holiday…
“What will be the fullest expression of your greatness?” Sounds jarring, doesn’t it? It isn’t meant to be. The New Yorker’s Philip Gourevitch stated in a Postscript piece eulogizing Nelson Mandela, “It was in the negotiations of apartheid’s end that Mandela’s greatness found its fullest expression.” The instant I read the sentence I loved it. Why? I believe that every person, no exception, has a greatness quotient. Our toughest work? Bringing it forth. Continue reading…
Conjuring our humanity…..
“We love you! We love you!” recalled Audrey Zabin in an interview on WBUR’s Kind World Series, “Remembering Karim: A Lifetime of Kindness.” She was summoning the words of a Lebanese gentleman, Karim, who was an attendant at a nondescript gas station in Cambridge, MA. Karim was an incredible man – part attendant, part therapist, part chef. A deep listener. Patrons at the gas station offered to help when Karim faced what would be a losing a battle with cancer. A rent-free apartment soon appeared, one that was more accessible to the station. So too, the funds required to return his body to Lebanon where his wife and children still remained. Are there many people you know who would garner such support from relative strangers? Continue reading…
Holiday gifts….
“What are you getting out of it?” offered a Focus Group participant. She was describing her rubric, the screening technique that she’d adopted to view her options. This slant was a new non-negotiable for her, designed specifically for her transition. “There was a time,” she said, “when I was getting divorced. I had a serious financial situation. I needed to keep the job.” Now, years later, she described her quick decision to take a ‘package,’ ending a multi-decade marketing career inside a large employer. Her adult siblings became thoroughly unglued by her decision. To her it was an obvious choice. The only choice. Does her calculus hold true for you? What are you getting – or giving this season? Continue reading…
A Beginner’s Mind
“Katie’s Chinese?” said my nine-year old in a quizzical tone. Total disbelief hung in the air. “Adopted? Are you sure?” He and my daughter were discussing a neighborhood playmate, a child that they’ve known for close to a decade. Their exchange humbled me. Could these two really have not seen any differences as they laughed & played with this beautiful little girl? Their conversation got me thinking about the impact of what we see, and don’t see, in transition. Continue reading…