20
The Benefit Of A
Quick Backward Glance
Your career. No matter how long you’ve been at it, your career has a memory and a history that deserves recognition. Now before that idea goes way over all of our heads, let me say it a different way. There is a benefit to looking back.
Some say “don’t look back” and “the past is the past”. Hogwash.
I believe there is tremendous learning to be done not only in retrospect but, more importantly, in watching how you changed as a result of each experience. As a result of each boss. As a result of each company. And as a result of each co-worker.
I have always told people that I learned something great from every boss or mentor I’ve had in my career. Sometimes it was learning what not to do, however. Here are some examples of both:
Thanks - I had a boss early in my career (when I was still wearing fancy suspenders) who, having noticed the commitment I was making to the company, invited me to his offce and handed me $100. He wanted me to take my wife out for a nice dinner since he knew my quality time was being spent at the offce. I will never forget the impact of that gesture.
Punctuality - My frst sales trainer chewed me up one side and down the other when I arrived with a clean car, a perfectly organized sales book and a nice suit. Problem is I arrived on time - not 15 minutes early (his view of on-time).
Pressure - Thefrst time I (at age 22) worked with my region manager to show him my new territory it was a cold and snowy day in Denver. He gets in my company car, puts a cup of coffee (no lid) on the dash and says “Let’s go. Don’t spill the coffee”. I think this was his version of my walking on rice paper. Guess what? It spilled.
Common Sense - In the old days of entertainment budgets and getaway sales meetings, our region’s finance guy decided to have a few extra drinks during dinner, brought an extra beer on the bus for the ride back to the hotel and proceeded to pour the beer over my head. He later was seen crawling through the hotel lobby with no shirt and no shoes. It reminded me of The Shining (Jack Nicholson).
Feedback - A prior supervisor was not good at reviews. Check that. She didn’t give them. For two years. Needless to say, I was under whelmed and always vowed to make reviews an important part of the relationship with my teams.
Theam - I worked for a VP/GM who created a very powerful and effcient team. We succeeded in ways that I had never seen before and we did it through teamwork. There were no sales or marketing boundaries, no arguments between quality assurance and product development. This team had a clear mission and, by the way, we spent a lot of time together having fun and winning.
So this is one way to look back. To review the people and your experiences with them. Especially those that shaped you in your young career.
So how does this relate back to job search?
Well, as I look back, I:
Were these examples good or bad for my career and life? Not sure. Although a few of them seem very short sighted now. Regardless, each decision I made back then, along with the resulting experience, prepared me for the future. And, in their own unique way, each experience and decision make me who I am today.
The other value of looking back is to see patterns and to see (as only hindsight will allow) the logic in decisions that did not seem so logical at the time. For example, I interviewed ferociously for jobs that seemed perfect at the time. Now looking back I see the reasons why I was not hired and I realize that the company made the right decision for us both. Had I only known then!
If we could only see the patterns forming before us, we could be so much more confident and directed in our job search efforts, right? So since we can’t see forward we must use our memory of what it is like to look backward. And seeing those patterns, try to realize that actions by a recruiter, hiring manager or company that did not benefit you will likely be made reasonable and correct once the right context is added a few years down the road.
What are the practical lessons for this?
Every one of these small decisions will form into a larger pattern. Confidently approach your job search but don’t fght the results. You’ll likely see the wisdom someday and can begin to see your own pattern.
Young in your career? Don’t worry, we’ve trampled a path for you.