Future Work/Life is my newsletter in which I explore ideas focused on the future of work and how to design legendary careers. Every week, I share something I’ve written, a few things I’ve enjoyed reading, and something great to listen to. If you find it interesting, please share it!
The three-stage life is over
The time of carriage clocks rewarded to loyal company servants is over, and so is the way ‘lifers’ built their careers.
It’s not so long ago that your life path was laid out clearly for you. Study until a young adult, get a job, buy a house after working your way up the ladder and retiring in your sixties with a reasonable pension to help you see you through the last decade of your life.
Through the eyes of younger generations, this path seems fanciful, not least the idea of buying a house and retiring in your sixties. As Lynda Gratton wrote when reviewing my book:
“We all know that the old three-stage life course of full-time education, full-time work and full-time retirement is not fit for purpose. But we also know that to make the changes to a more flexible and adaptive multi-stage life, we need to be bold and courageous.”
While we’re chucking out the principle of a three-stage life, why not also consider ditching outdated concepts like:
Focusing a disproportionate amount of time and money studying at the beginning of our careers.
Dedicating vast chunks of our lives to businesses that don’t share the upside with those contributing towards growth.
A reluctance to proactively share our achievements, points of view and successes with the world.
Your authority and mastery of a subject should no longer be something only your team or manager sees. Whether it's GitHub for developers or social and blogging platforms for creators, you can now judge someone’s work for yourself out in the open. This has created an opportunity for businesses to screen for the best and for individuals to rise above the rest.
But if you’re not a developer or a creator, does this apply to you? What’s the benefit of sharing your progress in public?
Building a start-up in public
Consider the approach of many modern start-ups.
Once upon a time, revealing your monthly revenue, customer growth, and user numbers would have been inconceivable. After all, rare is the new business in which there’s a steady upwards trajectory with no kinks or serious malfunctions along the way. Better to keep these things hidden if you can, right? Not anymore. Because founders are becoming increasingly open to revealing the ins and outs of their fledgling businesses.
They’re building in public.
Let’s break down the benefits:
As organisations spout platitudes about open and honest cultures (while leaders’ behaviour often demonstrates the opposite), what’s more authentic than being completely transparent about your company's ups and downs?
Where there’s an upwards trajectory, you can ride the momentum it brings to attract the best talent, new investment and, crucially, customers influenced by social proof.
When things aren’t as good (which is an inevitability, by the way), sharing the lessons you’re learning and the challenges you’re facing creates goodwill and opens you up to crowdsourcing support and advice.
There’s a lot to be said for the spirit of reciprocity and community that this approach builds among businesses at a similar stage, in the same market or engaging a shared audience - why not learn from one another?
Building your career in public
How might that translate to building your career in public?
Allowing the world to discover your curated collection of highlights and insights creates new opportunities to build a community of like-minded folk.
No one expects every decision you make – whether it’s a new job, project or creative endeavour – to work perfectly, but they’ll be interested in your journey.
You might not nail every step, but when you do, people will recognise that you’ve made significant progress, and you’ll be able to show how you’ve developed new skills and experience.
As you become a recognised expert, you’ll be able to monetise your time better, whether through a new job, growing a business, or running a side project.
And there’s another huge benefit that’s worth mentioning.
Building in public forces you to take the critical step of pausing to reflect and celebrate your progress. As Dorie Clark explained on the podcast this week, it’s human nature to suffer from ‘shifting baseline syndrome’. What you may have considered a success when you envisioned it a few years ago may now seem routine unless you have a marker against which to measure it. Writing stuff down and sharing it gives you these milestones (and stops your memory playing tricks on you).
I’m obsessed with this idea at the moment, so over the next few weeks, I’ll share some of the insights I’ve gathered in my work/life portfolio over the past year and how I’ll be acting on them to create a plan for 2023.
Until then, have a lovely weekend.
Ollie
My book, Work/Life Flywheel: Harness the work revolution and reimagine your career without fear, will be published on 17th January 2023. You can pre-order your copy HERE. And here’s that Lynda Gratton quote in full:
“We all know that the old three-stage life course of full-time education, full-time work and full-time retirement is not fit for purpose. But we also know that to make the changes to a more flexible and adaptive multi-stage life, we need to be bold and courageous. In this inspiring book, Henderson shows the foundations for this courage and shares the stories of those who have created momentum and energy in their working life.”
I mentioned it above, but if you’re interested in learning from one of the best about developing a long-term approach to your career, check out my conversation with Dorie Clark on this week’s Future Work/Life podcast.
Dorie is a strategy consultant, executive coach, and keynote speaker. She has twice been named one of the Top 50 Business Thinkers in the World by Thinkers50, and the #1 Communication Coach in the World by the Marshall Goldsmith Leading Global Coaches Awards, as well as one of the Top 10 Communication Professionals in the World by Global Gurus. She's also the author of several books, including her most recent, the WSJ bestseller "The Long Game".
In other words, she knows what she’s talking about!
Stanford Professor Bob Sutton is a great follow if you’re interested in leadership and the current and future state of work. He’s also the author of The No Asshole Rule Rule, which is what he recalls in this LinkedIn article as he recounts a great story about legendary writer Kurt Vonnegut.
Few creators are as well-known as Mr Beast, who has 113 MILLION YouTube subscribers. As you might expect from a profile on the Shopify website, this article focuses on how he’s created his business empire.
And ok, this isn’t anything to do with work, but seriously, how did I never spot this?!
