I hate waiting.

I’m a planner and a doer, but I’m horrible at being patient. I need activity; tangible movement towards my goal. I’m fine with a goal taking ten years to accomplish, as long as I’m actively doing something every day of those ten years.

I am really, really bad at stopping to smell the roses.

When I was a young man, somewhere between ten and twelve years old, my father taught me how to mow the lawn, trim the edges, pull the weeds and just generally do the landscaping in the summer. A vital part of the process, according to him, was pulling out a lawn chair when you were done, and sitting in it with a glass of lemonade and looking at the lawn for a while. I asked him why it was so important to do that. His initial joking answer was “so you can see all the spots you missed,” but his more serious answer was that it was important to take time to reward yourself for the hard work you did by enjoying what you worked for.

That was the part I was worst at. I enjoyed mowing the lawn; I could put headphones in, listen to music and let my mind wander while I did the relatively simple task more or less on auto-pilot. But when it was over, I wanted to be on to something else. I didn’t want to linger.

I’m the kind of person that always has something cooking. There’s always a dozen project ideas eager to fill in any spare gaps in my schedule. I have children that it’s easy (and fun!) to lose hours with as they laugh and climb on me. I put a lot of hours into work ambitions. I honestly can’t remember a time in the past twenty years when I didn’t have anything to do. I don’t remember the last time I was bored.

But I also don’t remember the last time I stood still for more than five minutes. I tried meditating recently and failed miserably. I don’t relax well. If you need a more clear picture, just know that I feel deeply and personally attacked by the following comic:

Hahahaaaaaaaaaa.

Anyway, I haven’t given up. I always try to maintain a student mentality; I live to learn. I’m very open to suggestions and ideas on how to better enable myself to step back and relax now and then. So if you’ve got them, please share!

Don’t you disrespect me little girl!
Don’t you make me scowl or sneer or frown!
You’re in my world now,
Not your world!
And I got friends in the Upside Down!
(He’s got friends in the Upside Down!)

That’s an echo, kids.
Just a little something we have here in
Indiana, a little advanced lesson. Don’t worry…

I cruise in my Camaro
To see Ted Wheeler’s wife
But if you run around the pool then you will get banned for life.
Then I got my mind flayed,
I can flay some others’, too
I’ll help build a monster out of meat,
(you know I can see you, right Eleven?)
‘Cause he built this all for you!

Rats pop – juicy!
I got Busey!
I got slaves all over this town!
And I got friends in the Upside Down!

(I am so, so sorry. Once this idea popped into my head I couldn’t get it out, and the only way to alleviate my suffering was to inflict it on you.)

You can see a lot of love and care in how someone argues with you.

Let’s say you just had a birthday, and your significant other didn’t do anything for it. Maybe they forgot entirely; maybe they just didn’t think birthdays are a big deal. Not important. So you approach your significant other and say, “Hey, my birthday came and went without you really acknowledging it, and that made me feel upset and neglected.”

Now, let’s say your significant other doesn’t take this well, and it starts an argument. They go immediately into “fight mode” and emotions get hot. Surely not ideal; you’d rather they respond in a calm way, but hey – we’re humans. That doesn’t always happen. But even so, HOW the heated argument begins can tell you a lot. Consider these two potential responses:

A: “Well, you forgot to celebrate my work anniversary earlier this year, and that really meant a lot to me because it represented an actual accomplishment, and you didn’t even acknowledge it. So you’re the jerk here, not me.”

B: “I did so acknowledge it! I made you your favorite dinner and then I did the dishes myself, even though we always do I cook/you clean. I didn’t get you balloons and a cake because I didn’t realize you’re a child, but that’s not the same as me ignoring it.”

These are both argumentative responses, obviously. And some people might look at them and not see much difference. But honestly, I see a world of difference between the two, and I’d always rather be on the receiving end of “B.”

Why? In the “A” response, the other person is immediately dismissive of my reason for being upset. They don’t even hear it. The just immediately launch into a separate thing that I’ve done that was worse. That’s a terrible way to bridge a gap. That’s what a negative emotion is – a gap between two people. Responding like “A” is aiming a north pole of a magnet at another north pole of a magnet: it pushes them away from one another. That line of argument just leads to a game of one-upsmanship where you’re each trying to call the other person a bigger and bigger jerk so you can be the one to justifiably be mad. It doesn’t show respect for the other person or their concerns.

Now, look at “B.” Yes, it’s argumentative. But at least the argument implicitly respects the other person’s concerns as valid. “A” says “I perfectly admit that I did the bad thing, but I don’t apologize or care.” “B” says “I agree that you’d be right to be upset if I did that thing; that’s a valid concern and a valid emotion to feel about it. Rather, I dispute the facts of the specific case.” There’s a line there that leads to closing the gap and bonding rather than pushing away.

If you’re holding old slights to use as fodder for “A”-style arguments, I encourage you to resolve them independently. Either let them go (if they’re minor) or talk them out (if they’re not). But don’t sit on them until the next time you make a mistake (which we all, all, ALL do). Because when someone you care about comes to you with a pain in their heart, you want yours to be clear, so you can really hear them. Sometimes things may get heated or emotional, but let that heat and that emotion come from a place of love, from pulling together and working on things, rather than having it be ammunition. We’re only human.

(Very geeky post incoming.)

There’s a brilliant episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation called Darmok. The crew of the Enterprise meets a species that they can’t communicate with. The Universal Translator works fine – they can understand the literal words the aliens are saying, but the aliens’ speech is so riddled with cultural references that the crew of the Enterprise are just totally lost, since they have no shared cultural references to rely on.

One of the characters says it would be like referring to a woman as looking like “Juliet on the balcony.” In a culture that has pervasive knowledge of Romeo and Juliet, you’d get what they were saying. But if you didn’t know that reference, you’d be confused even if you understood the words.

Shared culture does a lot to facilitate communication. It can seem silly, but we constantly make references to our culture when we communicate, and the more of that culture you share with someone else, the better the communication can be. We often scoff and roll our eyes at corporate-style “team building” exercises, but the concept is sound – the execution is just off. Want to do some real team-building? Everyone in the office should watch the same movie.

I worked in an office recently where a lot of my co-workers hadn’t seen the brilliant comedy Office Space. As soon as I realized this, I made everyone watch it, and sure enough, there were references a-plenty afterward. Many of them are just jokes (not that some shared laughter ever hurt a team culture), but sometimes you’d be able to communicate an idea faster or more efficiently by making a reference. It can help someone grok your idea or message.

My favorite thing about this whole phenomenon of shared-culture-as-communication-grease is that the best word I can think of for it is “Darmok.” That word could summarize this whole blog post – if you got the reference.

Projects need leaders.

In order for any endeavor to be successful, someone has to be in charge of it. If you’re doing something by yourself, then it’s easy – it’s you. But what happens when you tackle something as a team?

This isn’t just for work-related projects, either. In literally any activity where 2 or more people have to work together, you’re wildly more likely to be successful if one person has final authority.

You can (and should!) invest that authority with whatever restrictions the team feels is necessary. The person in charge might have conditions under which they’re no longer in charge – like an election or something of that nature. But as long as they are in charge, they need to be the final deciding vote.

Because sometimes, you’re just going to have to break a tie. Sometimes the normal collaboration process is just going to take so long that you need a decision within a particular window and you can’t get it otherwise. Even Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak hired a third guy when they were first starting out for exactly that reason – you need a tie-breaking vote sometimes in order to get things done.

Of course, Ronald Wayne wasn’t their leader – so you can create a structure for decision-making that doesn’t necessarily require one ultimate person making every decision. But what you do need, is that kind of structure. A setup that tells you exactly who the final decider is under every circumstance.

If you get four people together and say “We’re going to build a house together,” you can see the problem when one of them wants bay windows and another wants French doors. Especially if they’ve all already sunk money into the project and can’t easily walk away. That’s a lack of foresight, sure. But the easiest way to avoid the problem is to say “We’re going to build a house, and since Susan has the most experience with this, we’re all agreeing to defer to her in final decision-making if there’s a disagreement. If you don’t trust Susan’s ability to lead or her design expertise, don’t sign onto this project.”

Clearly defined leadership from the start is also much preferable to assumed leadership mid-project. If a team is assembled for a project at a company and no one is defined as the leader, it’s very likely that one person will assume that role. It’s also very likely that that person won’t be the ideal choice for it, because they’ll take the leadership position on strength of personality rather than on expertise. Other people might become bitter and the project will suffer. But if right from the start you say “Okay, I’m assigning you six to the new marketing initiative, and I’m putting Randy in charge,” then you can get any objections up front, clearly lay out expectations, and avoid as much power-jockeying as possible.

When you have the opportunity, assign a leader clearly. When you are one, take all responsibility. When you aren’t one, respect the person who is until it’s time to walk, but don’t straddle the fence. It’s the only way things get done.

Sometimes you declare it from tyrannical governments. Sometimes just from little habits holding you back. It’s always good to be a little more independent than you were yesterday. Find your tiny victory today, and take it.

If you had to explain each social media platform you use to someone who had never heard of social media before, how would you differentiate?

Why do you use the ones you do? Why DON’T you use the ones you don’t?

Is the UX important? The culture? Who is and isn’t on with you?

How do you feel about the tradeoffs between size and specialization?

I’d love to hear. Tell me on any platform you like.

I like tattoos.

Tattoos jive very well with my two most firm beliefs about the human body:

1. The human body is not some sacred thing; it’s a life-support system for your brain, and its only purpose is to carry you around on adventures for 80 or so years until it wears out, and
2. You own it.

I don’t think you should disrespect your body, but that’s because replacement parts are very expensive, and it’s a sound investment to do regular maintenance. Plus, the generally healthier you are, the more adventures you’ll get to go on.

But you don’t have the slightest obligation to keep it unmodified in its original condition. Your body isn’t a John Deere tractor; you’re not leasing it. It’s 100% yours. And that means you can modify it, decorate it, or operate it any way you please.

I particularly like this quote: “You don’t have a soul. You are a soul. You have a body.”

Now, all this comes with the same caveats any choices come with – choices have consequences and every action you take tells a story about you. If you choose to operate your body by filling the tank with alcohol all the time, you’re within your rights to do so, but you might regret it later. And of course you have a responsibility to operate your body in such a way as to not harm anyone else. As long as you’re doing all that, though, I say have fun. Dye your hair. Get your nose pierced. Get that tattoo.

I always laugh when someone says “Don’t you know those things are permanent?” Permanent? Ha ha ha! All we are is dust in the wind, dude.

Like in all things, I give the advice to always be aware of what messages you’re sending with your actions, and to make sure they’re the messages you want to be sending. But that’s not any more true of tattoos than anything else you do. Go through life consciously and deliberately, and your other choices will be fine.

Oh, but please, for the love of all that is holy: Spell check.

I’ve written in various places before about how there’s an arms race between recruiters and job seekers, and it hurts the market as a whole.

One of the weapons in that war is something I call “resume language,” which I’m absolutely sure you’ve encountered, or perhaps even used. In fact, you’ve probably gotten a lot of advice that you should use it, which is a symptom of the aforementioned arms race.

What is “resume language?” It’s words and phrases you’d never use in any other writing, professional or otherwise, made to inflate the appearance of your accomplishments and responsibilities.

I’m a career coach. I could say “I leverage cross-industry actionables, utilizing best practices and focused metrics to spearhead personal career development initiatives.” Here’s my real deal: I’ve been around the block a bunch, and I was a recruiter for a long time, so I know this game well and can help you beat it. That’s “resume language.”

Now, don’t get me wrong. You should absolutely describe your duties in detail, and focus on what actual skills you learned and what things you accomplished. If you’re putting your job as a cashier on a resume, you shouldn’t put “I was just a cashier.” You weren’t “just” anything. You should put that you learned the importance of combining accuracy, speed and friendliness. You should put that having to account for your own cash drawer made you focus on personal responsibility. And it’s fine to describe how those skills and traits will translate well into the job you want. But what you shouldn’t do is say you “pro-activated end-client fiscal transaction process.” Stuff like that sounds absurd and everyone sees through it immediately.

Now, anyone who has listened to me give career advice for more than 30 seconds has probably heard me say just how… freakin’… POORLY almost all job ads are written. They’re terrible. That’s because they have their own version of the “resume language” problem, where they’re trying to make the job sound much more complex or interesting than it really is. Some jobs are just simple and not exciting, and that’s okay. But recruiters, as part of the continuing arms race, are trying to both filter out lots and lots of candidates, while simultaneously trying to attract specific high-end candidates. As a result, they doctor their job ads with endless repetition, additional absurd requirements for skills, experience and credentials, and even their own version of “resume language.” For instance, check out this little snippet of a recent job ad I found:

The primary responsibility is to call people. It’s a telemarketing role.

Why don’t they just put that? Well, because telemarketing has a bad rap (mostly deserved) and they won’t get as many applicants if they just say it’s a telemarketing job. But this ruse only works until… about the first 5 minutes of the interview. I guarantee you their conversion rate is horrible, not to mention their turnover rate for people they do manage to hire. If you think your job is so bad that you have to fake people out to even apply, you should probably look at why. Figure out why people don’t want to be telemarketers, then make it different at your place of employment, and then say so!

“This is a telemarketing role! ‘Oh no, no way,’ you’re saying. But we’re not like that soul-numbing job you had selling vacation packages to mid-West senior citizens on the Do Not Call list. First, 100% of our outbound calls are in response to a request made on our website within the last 24 hours, so it’s all people that have specifically requested a call for more info. Second, we’re not a scripted boiler room – we train you to be a subject matter expert, and then you interact with our customers like a human, answering their questions in normal conversation. We’re here to help people! If that’s the kind of team you would do great work with, we want you to outreach telephonically… I mean call us!”

That’s the sort of job ad I’ve written for companies when I do the hiring. Spoiler: It works really well. Skipping the arms race always does, regardless of which side of the hiring desk you’re on.

I’ll close out this post by telling you what I think the biggest, most central problem with the current state of the job market is. The arms race is horrible, but I think it’s a symptom. I think the central cause is this: Job seekers are expected to reach out to employers, instead of the other way around.

Before the era of the internet, there wasn’t really a better way to do it. If a person wanted a job, they had no choice but to “hit the pavement” and bring their resume to every employer in town, or start dialing down the phone book. An employer that wanted to hire someone had no good way of reaching out to specific candidates, so they had to just advertise that they were hiring, cast a wide net, and hope the best fish leaped into it.

Then the internet took over a lot of industries, including the old function of the “classifieds.” The replacement technology appeared, but out of habit we simply used it the same way as we’d used the old methods, instead of realizing the potential it had to change the game entirely.

I think job boards should work in the reverse of the way they do now. I think a board like Indeed should be all posts from job-seekers, to which employers respond. If I was a recruiter looking to fill an opening for a marketing specialist, I’d start filling in my keyword searches based on the expertise I wanted, and start looking through the postings from potential employees. Then I’d send out requests to interview to them.

Why do I think this would be a better method? Because a very small number of smart employers already do this, and it’s wildly successful. It takes a bit of effort, but it saves a lot of time and money in your search costs. As a recruiter, when I had to fill a particular vacancy, the first thing I did – way before posting job ads – was just search for people with the skills I wanted. You know… I recruited. Those people aren’t invisible anymore. They have blogs, websites, LinkedIn accounts, Twitter accounts. They’re active on Quora or StackExchange or any number of other places, and they’re already showing their work in an honest way, devoid of confusing “resume language.”

They’re ready to have an honest conversation about work. If you are as well, you’ll get them.