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Combat Age Discrimination with Strategic Relationships [Updated]

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Combat Age DiscriminationCombat Age Discrimination with Strategic Relationships?

Have you used a strategic relationship to combat age discrimination?

We first want to look at what we mean by age discrimination.

Most of you reading this are over fifty years old and probably have had to combat age discrimination.

I have heard it many times where someone has said, “I walked in the door for the interview, the expression on the face of the interviewer said it all. He/She is old!”

They are probably thinking one of the following:

  • They will never be able to keep up!
  • Their skills are out of date!
  • They will not be able to get along in an office filled with younger people!
  • They are out of date in this world of Social Media!

Why do they think that way?

I want you to go back to your first memories of your grandparents. Over the years, did they slow down? Did they not understand the younger generation?

Many of our biases are based on our own experiences. Could you see your grandfather working next to you? My guess is probably not.

If the hiring manager is in his thirties and sixty-year-old walks in, his thoughts will be shaped by his life’s experiences.

Strategic Relationships

How do you combat age discrimination? You take the fact that you are older out of the equation. It all comes down to having strategic relationships. This is how you combat age discrimination!

If you walk into the interview, and this is the first time the interviewer forms an opinion of you, well… you are in trouble.

I have previously written about a Targeted Job Search. This is where you target the company and not the position. You develop strategic relationships with the target company with the idea that they call you when a position is available.

I had a discussion recently with a friend, Tom, who is over sixty years old. He had his own business for the last twenty years, but the recession had wiped out his customer base. He was now looking for a job, and it was not going well. He had a few interviews, but everyone told him he was overqualified.

I told him his next job would probably be based on a strategic relationship. His eyes lit up as he had just completed a six-month contract that came through a lifelong contact, a small business owner.  The small business owner had hired some twenty-somethings to do a project. He was very unhappy with their work and he called Tom and said are you interested?

That small business owner did not think of Tom as his grandfather. He was not concerned Tom would not be able to keep up. He knew Tom!

Weak Ties

When I left the high-tech world the first time and got certified to be a high school math teacher, my strategic relationship was with my chiropractor! My chiropractor knew me well and knew my values. More importantly, she knew a lot of people. Strategic relationships can come from anywhere in your life.

My chiropractor is a weak tie. A weak tie is a relationship that could have been dormant or someone that you have a loose connection with. I saw my chiropractor every few weeks but would I call her a close friend? No. The advantage of weak ties is they know people that you do not know. If you want to learn more about weak ties check out my post — Discover the Power of Weak Ties After 50.

Has Your Network Aged Out?

A common theme with many of us in the 2nd half of life is our network has supported us throughout our careers. Many of our career moves were presented to us by mentors or peers. As we grow older so do our mentor and peers.

What happens when those people retire, leave positions of responsibility or worse die? Our network withers and the strategic relationships that supported us through the years disappear.

If you want to combat age discrimination you need to be ever vigilant on building relationships. More importantly, you will want to build those relationships strategically at your target companies. You can read more about this topic in my post — Search Aged Has Your Network Aged Out and Abandoned You?

Strategic Relationships are Nothing New

Most of us have been building strategic relationships throughout our career. We did not think about it, we just did it. Now that we are in the 2nd half of life, we can no longer let it just happen. We need to be purposeful in building relationships if we want to propel our careers into our 60s and 70s.

Every interview I have had in the last ten years has been acquired through a strategic relationship. When I walked into the room their initial opinions had already been formed. This is nothing new.

Are you ready to be strategic in developing relationships to combat age discrimination?

Let me know what you think with a comment below!

Marc Miller  

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‘Playing it Safe’ in Your Career is the New Risky [Updated]

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Are you Playing it Safe? If so, that is pretty risky!Playing it safe with your career

Are you ‘Playing it Safe’ with your Career? We live in a world where creative destruction has accelerated. If you are not aware of creative destruction then I suggest you read my post: Surviving Creative Destruction in the 2nd Half of Life first.

We live in a time where automation, artificial intelligence (AI), and robotics are capable of eliminating your job. The recent article 375 million jobs may be automated by 2030, study suggests states:

The McKinsey Global Institute cautions that as many as 375 million workers will need to switch occupational categories by 2030 due to automation.

The work most at risk of automation includes physical jobs in predictable environments, such as operating machinery or preparing fast food. Data collection and processing are also in the crosshairs, with implications for mortgage origination, paralegals, accounts and back-office processing.

This will have a ripple effect throughout many industries.

‘Playing it Safe’ is now the new risky!

If you think that your employer plans on keeping you for more than three years or expects you to hang around more than three years you are ‘playing it safe’ and that is pretty risky!

I started taking risks in my career around the turn of the century.  When I have made those career decisions that were actually pretty safe, they felt very risky.

I started the planning process for Career Pivot in early 2009. Incorporation occurred in late 2010 and the Career Pivot brand was launched in February of 2012. I had thought things through, gotten advice from many trusted advisers, and hired a coach.

In 2012, on a Sunday afternoon, I had a phone conversation with my coach.

I told her that I was feeling very anxious about a variety of things going on at the time.  Logically, I knew everything was going according to plan but, emotionally, I was a wreck. She reminded me that I had re-made myself many times before. (This was the seventh career change of some sort in 35 years.)  Why was this any different? I told her it was not. Every time I go through these changes, it is very anxiety-provoking. I perceived emotionally that I was taking a big risk. It was my perception and, therefore, it was my reality. I was not playing it safe!!

Now Comes the Emotional Side.

I am a pretty unemotional guy as I am a recovering engineer. What I discounted was the emotional side of starting Career Pivot. For the first 18 months in business, I would wake up in a sweat at 4 AM and think I do not have a paycheck! This is the ‘I do not have a paycheck syndrome.’ No one is there to take care of me.

The days of having an employer, company, government … who will take care of you are gone.

Nonetheless, I feel far more safe in my career decisions because I am not relying on an employer.

Is Your Industry Safe?

If you think your job and industry are immune to automation, AI, and robotics then you are smoking something and you are inhaling.

Do not listen to our esteemed Treasury Secretary, Steven Mnuchin when he was quoted as saying:

“Technology has made the American worker more productive. In terms of artificial intelligence taking American jobs, I think we’re, like, so far away from that – not even on my radar screen,” Mnuchin said. “I think it’s 50 or 100 more years.”

Our esteemed treasury secretary must be smoking something because virtually none of the experts agree with him. I guess it helps to be a billionaire and have no financial worries.

Industries are Morphing at a Rapid Rate.

I am working on a blog post and survey based on a Pew Research study called News Use Across Social Media Platforms 2017. The study states:

As of August 2017, two-thirds (67%) of Americans report that they get at least some of their news on social media – with two-in-ten doing so often.

Even those of us who are in the 2nd half of life are getting news from social media as the study states:

For the first time in the Center’s surveys, more than half (55%) of Americans ages 50 or older report getting news on social media sites.

Remember reading a newspaper and watching the evening news? I sure do! But, now, I never watch the evening news. I read the local Austin American Statesman newspaper on my iPad on Sunday mornings, and get most of my news from the Apple News app.

The news industry is just one example of where change is occurring at lightning speed. I have written multiple posts on this topic:

Even professions like Information Technology (IT), which everyone thought would be safe, are no longer.

Career Safety is the New Risk.

When I left my last corporate employer I swore I would never work for anyone again as an employee. My wife and I have downsized. We have greatly simplified our lives. We have lived for the longest time mostly on savings. It took 2 years before I started paying myself and I am still drawing some money from saving after 5 years in business.

We even plan to move to Mexico in 2018. Check out the podcast where I explain how and why. Why The Millers are Moving to Mexico and How They Will Do It! [Podcast]

I am not taking the safe route but it is safer than being an employee!

Are you ‘playing it safe’ with your career?

Marc Miller  

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“Advice” – The Magic Word in Managing Your Career

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Advice“Advice” is the Magic Word

When someone comes to you and asks for some advice, do you ever turn them down?

Probably not.

In fact, you probably take it as a compliment!

What is the best way to approach a contact for help with your career?

Ask for advice?

I use this in a larger strategy called Asking for A-I-R.

  • Advice
  • Insights
  • Recommendations

(More: The Key to a Successful Shift: Asking for Help)

First Ask for Advice

Let’s say you are looking to network into one of your target companies. You get one of your contacts to make an introduction. When you reach out to the targeted individual you immediately ask; “Can I have a few minutes of your time to ask some advice?”

Might they ignore your request? Sure.

Might they simply say no? Sure.

If they refuse to help you then they are probably a jerk. In that case, you do not want to talk to them anyway. Move on to the next person on your target list.

When you get some time with this individual you might ask for advice about getting hired at the company.

Secondly, Ask for Their Insights

  • How do you like working there?
  • Can you describe the culture?
  • What is the management style in general in the company?
  • What is the management style of your immediate boss?
  • How is hiring done – referral, posting on a website, headhunters …?

If you think of any other questions please share them in the comment box below.

Ask for Their Recommendations

The step that many forget is to ask for recommendations!

  • What should I do next?
  • Who do you recommend that I talk to next?
  • Can you introduce me to anyone that might help me in reaching my goal?

When you get a recommendation, you need to follow up, follow up and follow up. You keep the person making the introduction in the loop at every step!

I like to think of this as “sales closing.” As a sales person, you want to close each meeting. It is not necessarily to make the sale but to move to the next step.

(More: Strategic Networking Playbook – Who, How and When!)

What Can I Do For You?

The last step in this process is to always ask what can I do for you? 

When I network, my philosophy is to be as helpful as possible and never expect anything in return. It is all about creating good karma. You do this enough and good things will come to you. The issue is you never know when good things will come back to you. They usually come back to you when you least expect it.

Asking for Advice Story #1

I like to tell the story of my son, who after graduating from college in 2006 was having difficulty landing his first job. He applied with a large employer in Sacramento, California. I instructed him to get on the Sacramento chapter website of the professional association where he belonged and to e-mail all of the Sacramento officers and ask for 15 minutes on the phone to ask some advice.

My son expected that this was a bunch of hogwash. No one will reply.

Much to his surprise every last one of them gave him at least 30 minutes, and he got a lot of great advice. He did not get the job, but he learned that when you ask for advice…. people will respond positively.

Asking for Advice Story #2

Recently, I had a client who was working on penetrating the headquarters of a large company in the Austin job market. She was introduced to the head of human resources through a contact. The next step was to pull out the magic word and ask for advice.

The head of human resources could have easily blown off the request but instead was asked if she wanted to come in for a cup of coffee. That coffee meeting led to a whole series of introductions that have not led to a position just yet but she now has a whole set of valuable contacts.

All because she used the magic word of “advice”.

Advice is the magic word in managing your career!

Do you ask for advice?

Marc Miller  

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What If Your Dream Job Does Not Exist? Does That Scare You?

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Does Your Dream Job Exist?Dream Job

Does our dream job really exist? If we have our dream job, does that mean we are following our passions?

There are several articles lately, and a personal observation, that makes me think we are chasing something that does not exist for many of us.

I was sent an article from the Wall Street Journal – Scott Adams Secret to Success: Failure!

Scott writes:

For most people, it’s easy to be passionate about things that are working out, and that distorts our impression of the importance of passion. I’ve been involved in several dozen business ventures over the course of my life, and each one made me excited at the start. You might even call it passion.

The ones that didn’t work out—and that would be most of them—slowly drained my passion as they failed. The few that worked became more exciting as they succeeded. For example, when I invested in a restaurant with an operating partner, my passion was sky high. And on day one, when there was a line of customers down the block, I was even more passionate. In later years, as the business got pummeled, my passion evolved into frustration and annoyance.

On the other hand, Dilbert started out as just one of many get-rich schemes I was willing to try. When it started to look as if it might be a success, my passion for cartooning increased because I realized it could be my golden ticket. In hindsight, it looks as if the projects that I was most passionate about were also the ones that worked. But objectively, my passion level moved with my success. Success caused passion more than passion caused success.

Are you passionate because you are successful or successful because you are passionate?

The Myth of the Dream Job

A few months ago The Myth of the Dream Job appeared on the AARP Life Reimagined website.

Bassam Tarazi writes:

Consider this: a job is a way to pay the bills, a career is a path toward increasingly better work, and a calling is work that’s an important part of your life and a vital part of your identity. In Cal Newport’s  So Good They Can’t Ignore You, Amy Wrzensniewski, a professor of organizational behavior at Yale University, shares research revealing that“the happiest, most passionate employees [who see their jobs as a calling] are not those who followed their passion into a position, but instead those who have been around long enough to become good at what they do.”

So yes, you can learn to love a job that no third grader ever dream’t about. That job can feel like your calling. The more years of experience you have at any task, the more effective you feel. You’ve built relationships with coworkers and seen the results of your work helping others.

Did you learn to love your job?

What if you are not passionate about anything?

The most read blog post on this website is What if you are not passionate about anything?

I wrote this post based on my Birkman Assessment where I had many interests but nothing totally drives. Believe it or not, this post is found by online searches 50-100 times a day! I am not alone.

I usually last 3-5 years in a job before I get bored and want to move on to the next. My coach taught me that I will probably have to change my business a little every year to keep things interesting.

You might call me a multipotentialite, as I am someone who has many interests.

Do I have a dream job or do I have many?

Does this sound like you?

What if you cannot make a living from your passion?

I have since learned from analyzing well over 300 Birkman assessments for clients that a lot of you who are driven by the arts or music. As you might have guessed by now, most of you will never make a living in the arts or music.

What I have done with multiple clients is to re-ignite this love for the arts and music outside of their career.

A classical example is Sharon Birkman Fink. Sharon is president of Birkman International but is a classically trained singer and musician with a masters degree from the University of Texas in Music. She runs the family business that is the center of my business. She knows she needs to get her musical fix or she will not be happy.

Sharon is very successfully and happily running the family business but is it her dream job?

Is there a balance?

There has to be a balance between what society needs and is willing to pay for, and what you want to do. There may not be a cross-section of these two things.

What if you are a multipotentialite like myself? I know I have lots of things that drive me and there is no one real dream job.

What about you? Do you know what your dream job might be? Does your dream job exist?

Marc Miller  

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Do you suffer from “Skills Burn-Out Syndrome” (SBS)?

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Do you suffer from “Skills Burn-Out Syndrome” (SBS)?

You are probably going hmm … “Skills Burn-Out Syndrome” (SBS). This sounds serious!

In one of my more popular posts,  I talked about the differeskills burn-outnces between talents and skills. We acquire skills throughout our careers, usually because they are required for our jobs, by our employers OR because they make us more valuable in the marketplace. Only occasionally, do we acquire skills because we want the skills.

If you have been working for more than ten years you have acquired multiple skills in that time. If you have been working for over thirty years like myself, you have acquired a whole lot more.

Your Skills

Some of these skills we are really good at!

Many of these skills paid the mortgage, put food on the table and put our kids through college.

Do you have skills valued in the market that you no longer want to use?

Do you suffer from “Skills Burn-Out Syndrome” The TLA (Three Letter Acronym) is “SBS.”

I am finding SBS increasingly common among baby boomers.

How many unhappy lawyers do you know? There are a lot of unhappy lawyers out there who suffer from SBS!  They have valued skills that … many would choose to stop using, but do not for a lot of reasons:  money, prestige, student loans …

In my post, Talents versus Skills – Do you know the difference, I talked about my talent for being a storyteller.  I have spent most of my career in the computer and networking industries as a trainer and communicator. I developed the skill to inhale technologies and then spit them back out in stories, analogies, and pictures that anyone could understand.

My skill to inhale technologies was acquired over a very long period of time. It did not come naturally and when I overused it I would burn-out.

After my bicycle accident in 2002, where I should have died, I just did not want to do work in technology any longer. After teaching high school math and working for a non-profit for three years, I went back to using my old skills.

Why? I was lost and did not know what else to do. I relapsed back to what was familiar.

Falling Back to What is Familiar

After working for three years almost non-stop from 2007-2010, I said, “enough is enough.” I did not want to use those skills anymore. If I had to inhale yet another complex technology I was going to BARF! I loved the story-telling,  but the inhaling of complex technologies that provided little value to our day-to-day life … well … BARF!

Could I do this? YES!

Would people pay me a lot of money to do this? YES!

Did I want to do this? NO!

Very often when we become directionless we fall back to what is familiar. That is what I did. What is familiar is not always what is good for us.

Does this sound familiar?

I have multiple clients who have used the same skills for years. Frankly, they would rather set their hair on fire than to keep on using them.

What happens when they tell friends and colleagues that they do want to use them anymore?

OHHH … you are so … good at it. Why would you want to stop?

I bet this sounds very familiar to a lot of you!  I am sure when you hear this you start to doubt your thinking.

“Skills Burn-Out Syndrome” is when you overuse skills that are not connected to an innate talent.

Do you suffer from “Skills Burn-Out Syndrome” (SBS)? 

Are you using skills that are not connected to an innate talent?

What skills do you possess that you do not want to use?

What is stopping you from doing something different?

Marc Miller  

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