Friday, January 6, 2012

Why does your mom, dad, friends, and teachers give you bad advice?

Why does your mom, dad, friends, and teachers give you bad advice?  

They just don't know any better . . .




Your mom, dad, friends, teachers, professors all think that you should work hard, go to school, and get a job at a major corporation so your job would be stable and secure - right? Well that made a lot of sense for the older generations, but I would argue that someone just getting started in their career might want to think long and hard about following that path. Times have changed, business and technology change dramatically and rapidly. Job functions are being eliminated on a regular basis, jobs that don't exist yet, will be obsolete sometimes within 10 years of their creation, so on and so forth. I may be bias, but I will share with you my career story, how it shaped my decisions to get me where I'm at now, and why your parents and teachers advice may be the worst career advice you ever got.



I started out like most blue collar, middle class people - (hovering above poverty). I worked part time at KFC cooking chicken after my school day was finished at the age of 16. It was my first job. It was also the hardest I ever worked for the least amount of money I might add. On my feet all night after a full day at school, getting burned by hot grease splatters, smelling like chicken, go home, go to sleep, repeat. It taught me work ethic, it taught me discipline, it taught me how to be part of a team.



When I finished high-school, I began looking for more of a full-time gig. The concept of job vs career really wasn't on my mind. I was programmed to look and work for a paycheck. (This is a fundamental reason the poor and middle class, stay poor and middle class). I got a job at a large machine shop (manufacturing). I started off changing oily mop water and cleaning machines. I was so excited, I had my first full-time job, 40 hours a week (min wage at that time was $5.75 an hour I think). I thought I had finally made it. I worked hard, and I stayed with the company for about 5 years. Throughout my tenure there, I moved up the ranks pretty quickly for a young ambitious go-getter. I took all of the additional training available, I learned how to become a tool and dye maker, a machinist, and I also learned CNC programming. My hard work and commitment did not go un-noticed. I was promoted to my first leadership position. I was in charge of a handfull of people and responsible for meeting production deadlines, budgets, stock/inventory, and quality control. I even got a big raise, a 50% raise! So I basically went from $6/Hr to $9/Hr - Whoo hooo! ($18,000 yr - I thought I was rollin in the cash!). Shortly after that something dramatic happened. 1999/2000 a huge recession and business slowdown hit the US economy, primarily the technology sector.



The 1999/2000 economic slowdown had a huge impact on the company I was working for. Their major clientele for the most part were technology companies and their orders stopped coming in, they started reneging on contracts, and stopped paying for parts we had already invested labor and capital into producing (TYCO being one of them, separate blog post coming later on why I HATE TYCO!). The company I was working for almost went under (saved by government contracts for the war shortly after 9/11/2001 separate story all together). I watched a booming, solid company lay off over 50% of it's workforce over a 12 month period. When they couldn't lay off anymore peole, they cut all of hours down to 30 hours per week. It was very scary. One thing I observed was people who held the same position title as me, had been there longer some 20+ years were being let go, and I kept my job. Was it because they liked me? Was it because I was awesome? Maybe . . . but probably not. Logical deduction would say it's because I was young, and cheap labor compared to the people being let go, my skill level and awesomeness was just icing on that cake. At that moment I had an ahah moment! The industry I was in was cyclical (expansion, then contraction, then repeat) How stable is that? We were losing a lot of contracts to places like Taiwan, China, and Vietnam; that trend would probably continue reducing the need for the type of job I had. Outsourcing would be an ongoing concern if I stayed here and in this industry. Do I want that stress throughout my entire career, especially down the road when I have a family to care for? Not only that I watched a guy named Alan who had given that company over a decade of loyalty and hardwork be let go in the first round of layoffs and a noob like me keep my job (essentially take his). I realized that 10-20 years down the road or in the next economic downturn, I was going to be Alan; being laid off while some young punk took my job. I didn't want that. I knew it was time to think long and hard about how I wanted to set up my future, and what industry I wanted to have a career in.



I had the opportunity to be a part of a small start up construction brokerage. I was hired on to be an assistant to the owner who was growing his business but was spread to thin. I also had experience in creating systems and procedures (through multiple times of "Company Restructuring" at my last position). I was the perfect mix for exactly what he needed. I played my cards right, I wanted to know about my long term growth prospects.  I wanted to be taken under his wing and learn all about business from the ground up. All of the fundamentals and especially wanted to develop a sales and negotiation skill set. He became my boss, mentor, and lifelong friend. Over 5 years we grew that company into something magnificent, a place I thought I would work for, for the rest of my life. I networked, I learned sales, I learned how to run a business; I learned how to manage projects, lead teams and lead a company - a priceless experience!



2005/2006 - The real estate / construction / finance economic meltdown began. Our company had branched out from our niche of maintenance and was involved in some very large new construction developments. Major developers were filing for bankruptcy left and right and we had hundreds of thousands of dollars invested in these projects between labor and materials. The swift downturn and non paying customers caused the company to downsize dramatically and nearly go under. I had another ahah moment! I had placed myself in another cyclical industry; boom then bust!



I was extremely stressed out. No job, no money, economy in disarray what was I going to do? I wanted to find an industry that was new or had a lot of growth potential. I wanted to find something fun, something challenging, something I could apply the skills that I had acquired; oh yeah, I also wanted to make some cheddar! =). I went on a series of interviews, not because I was necessarily interested in every company or every position I applied for, but mainly because I wanted to research, investigate, and gather information before I headed down my next path.



In my hunt, I stumbled upon a small start up marketing firm in Los Angeles, CA that had only been open for a few months. They had some contracts with some large companies, Verizon in particular. They had some huge goals, almost sounded too big, or too good to be true. I did some research on the industry "outsourced sales & marketing" my research intrigued me even more. The industry had grown at no less than 10% year over year for the past decade. Outsourcing was a growing trend in business. In an economic downturn, companies look to outsource and cut costs even more so than in an economic expansion. Ding, Ding, Ding; I found my winner; a fast growing, stable industry. A company that was a small upstart (I loved my previous experience with a small upstart from the valuable experience and skill sets I got). They had ambitious growth plans and an entrepreneurial culture (I always was intrigued by entrepreneurship and running my own company) they had a clearly laid out path to management based on my performance, not timeframes or politics which I liked. The icing on the cake was that the culture was fun and exciting. The office was full of young, eager, people with huge goals and a determination to become something, a determination to go above and beyond the typical 9-5 corporate america culture and lifestyle. I jumped in with 2 feet.



I worked my way through the company from the ground up. I started off like everyone else. My primary role was to prove my competency in communication and basic business-to-business sales. From there I was promoted into a leadership role where I began the management training program. My role shifted from sales to team leadership, campaign management, learning more about the marketing side of the business, eventually worked my way up to branch manger. The branch management role gave me the opportunity to take on my own campaign and open up and expansion market. It took me 18 months from my hire to date to work from the bottom to getting my own campaign and my own market. I chose to take on Salt Lake City. It was a decent size metro area, it was growing, had low unemployment, and a college educated population who was looking for opportunity so I knew it would be an awesome place to grow the business.



Here I am 2 years later in Salt Lake City. Not only are we on track to have our best quarter and year ever i n 2012, we are looking to promote an additional manager and take on an additional campaign here int he Salt Lake Metro area for a large telecom company selling the iphone, tablets, and other cell and smart phones. I've established a career in a stable & fast growing industry, I'm making a great living, I LOVE what I do, it's fun, it's challenging. I would urge all those who are starting a career or looking for a career change to seriously consider the opportunities that are present in the direct sales and outsourced sales & marketing industry. We are aggressively recruiting the right type of people to help us with our ambitious growth plans. For more information on our industry and starting a career with our company, please visit our website at http://www.newrevgroup.com and please be sure to visit the career center for more specific career details.



Working for a major corporation where you are just a number, or working for a company who is in a cyclical (boom and bust) industry is like playing Russian Roulette with your career and your family's future. Don't take my word for it; below are just some of the major corporation employment opportunities in 2011/2012. LOL





2011 Major Corporation Layoffs:

·         BNY Mellon – 1,500

·         Merk -30,000 (2009-2015)

·         HSBC – 30,000

·         Credit Suisse – 6,500

·         Morgan Stanley – 1,000

·         Goldman Sachs – 1,000

·         Research In Motion (RIMM) – 10,000

·         CISCO – 6,500

·         Barclays – 3,000

·         Sears-700

·         Lockheed Martin – 8,000

·         Delta Airlines – 2,000

·         Bank of America – 10,000

·         Borders – 10,000

·         Boston Scientific – 1,400

·         UBS – 2,500

·         Myspace – 500

·         Boeing – 900

·         JC Penny – 370

·         Goodyear – 1,900

·         HP – 500

·         Nokia – 1,800

·         AMD – 1,400

·         The list goes on and on and on and on . . .

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