Not Amenable to Coaching...

Writing well (sort of)

Note:  This post has been a struggle.  As a result I've left all my pointless words as strikouts  strikeouts.

This blog's intent is to document is supposed to be about not having a dumb job, really and the effort and challenge of finding a new job.  but I've lost my way on that discourse. Is a blog really a discourse?

Earlier today I was involved In a discussion earlier today I and mentioned that I simply was not interested in reading self-help books.  This came up in a discussion conversation with a customer with parent of young children.  My children are 27 and 30.  I said that As a young parent I made an effort was made to read a few parenting books since I'd not ever been around young children.  Actually I might have read two.  In  corporate speak, the 'how to raise a child' books simply did not 'resonate.'  Having lost the commitment to read more of that type I've wondered how I did.  Neither of my adult children will respond to that question with a response other than "drop the drama."

Over the years I did read, at least start or browse, most of the business best sellers and consumed mass quantities of information technology material, perhaps to no avail.  I have this notion that time was spent reading the wrong stuff.  Of course I'm fully qualified to step right back into a position like the one recently departed.  It's good or bad that all that business book reading left me so well qualified for something that might not be at all close to the best solution.

Snake under wood pile...has nothing to do
with this post.

Later today I found that I'm on the fringes of social media., not that I'm not an overactive user but that Apparently few people my age participate.  It makes me an anomaly, a frequent synonym for which is 'oddity.'

This evening, which two minutes ago became a new day, I followed a link to Inc. Magazine (inc-link?) on to an article about people who are not coachable.  Some people want validation of their perceived organizational 'wronging.' Buried within that paragraph was the point that was sort of 'so what,'  the rules change all the time in employment. Shame on you for not seeing the train coming with a full load of rule changes. (that's a really bad metaphor for me to use but that's a topic for a later post).   I have to repeat thatThe rules changed dramatically during the recession, far more than most anticipated.  We need to add to our list of potential changes in employment the recession repeating.  Most changes are much smaller but one is not immune to changes in 

So, one should learn from these things.  During my tenure with the outplacement firm they talked about all sorts of transitions, from job to job, from career to career, from job to retirement, to delayed enjoyment (e.g. travel)  , etc.  Early in this transition I crossed paths with a number of good writings on envisioning this 'next' phase of your life.  The road bump in the process was that I was having a pretty good time working creatively in my former world.  I've not come to the point where I need to leverage the full potential of this very large, blank (but shimmering) palette.  

The loss of your position in your former space  typically pairs the loss of good with the loss of bad.  I lost my critics of my strategies (my creative work) who annoyingly helped me refine my strategies (creative work).  The outplacement services were all positive with conversations and supporting activities focused on the world ahead, correctly the envisioning of the future experiences. I missed an important point:  rather than jamming your resume about they encouraged a 'marketing statement to share with people and to ask 'what do you think?' That was a good idea but I believe two oversights occurred on my part.  

 In hindsight it might have been helpful for them to say 'you screwed up either 1) because your performance eroded or 2) changes were raining down and you failed to see them or react to them or 3) focus a bit more on how you might better frame yourself.  Perhaps that's negative and their forward-looking approach is the nicer version of the same.   The second oversight was missing the importance of the critics.  What was not an oversight was the fact that I could be successful in many venues and the one that I'd happened to have success in is probably not the venue moving forward.

The Inuit have something like 50 words for ice or snow because their survival is dependent on the subtleties.  We need more words for the full scope of changes that an employee might need to be ready for, more scenarios: 

• supervision changes
• economy changes
• technology changes
• health changes (good & bad)
• lifestyle
• family obligations
• mission/vision
• competition

Being this age and active in social media and pounding out a few blog posts seems pretty hip.  It's possible that it's entirely the wrong stuff, once again.

I need to work on scenarios for the next stage.