TransformingYourCareerTransformingYourself

  A silver lining in this brutal entry-level job market and AI: No longer will new college graduates have to endure that complex, soul-wrenching rite of passage of adjusting to the real world. A Boomer, I recall how the laddie and young women's magazines briefed us on the transition from college to whatever.  Everything from get a haircut to be fitted for a good suit.  CNBC documents how the higher-education industry is making the shift from education-for-the-sake-of-education to education-as-platform-for-earning-a-good-living. Here's a snippet: "CUNY’s chancellor, Félix Matos Rodríguez [said] 'It’s not enough for students to graduate with a degree ... they must leave with direction, preparation, experience and connections.'" That changes so much about those four years. Some institutions such as Seton Hill University have developed three-year programs to be more cost-efficient.  For example, frats may no longer be for fun. They will be reset as a key strateg...

  The last bit of humane seems to have gone out of laying off workers. That had been the massaged rhetoric of how difficult the decision has been to do this, with a mea culpa tagged on.  In its latest round of rolling RIFs - 8,000 this time - Meta makes no apology, reports CNBC . The message is totally delivered in capitalistic terminology. That is, the language of efficiency. Also, there's no softening that this will be the last of the massive RIFs. There could be more in August. So, here is the worker in America. The state of being is as raw and as uncertain as the Industrial Age depicted by Charles Dickens in his novels such as "David Copperfield."  In coaching, I hammer that careers no longer exist. The professional objective is no longer for climbing the ladder.  Work has mutated into the need to make a living, hopefully a good living. The ranting on Blind or Reddit about how it used to be showcases how many are locking themselves out of the current reality. Ext...

America, the land of optimism about improving ourselves, was a sitting duck for the businesses of psychotherapy, becoming educated at college and more to take off. And that they did. The therapy sector  is almost at $100 billion. Higher education  is at almost $218 billion. And, BTW, another category of self-improvement, that is,  managing our weight that's at about $90 billion. So, it's predictable there is an outcry about the overuse, misuse and abuse of both psychotherapy and what had been heading to be the universal rite of passage of going to college. After all, they are businesses. And most nations, including the US, had to establish a regulatory framework to oversee business. Consumer beware.  This week psychotherapist Jonathan Alpert is blowing the whistle on other players in his line of work. Published on May 19th is "Therapy Nation." Alpert's beef: Essentially therapists not only side with their clients' perception of grievance. They reinforce it. ...

  Reputation management is the core of public relations.  But there is a but. In the process those doing that managing could wind up requiring their own reputation rehab. In the past, examples of things going very wrong for public relations firms doing fixes include Bell Pottiner, Burson - Marsteller and Hill & Knowlton.  Most recently it's Terakett which just took a major hit. On its website Terakett describes its mission as: "Securing, protecting, and supporting your reputation in search and AI chat experiences." In great detail today  The New York Times  describes the fixes Terakett has done for clients such as Goldman Sachs' head David Solomon and investment expert/philanthropist Robert F. Smith. And how it does them. However, as the old saying goes, no one likes to know how the sausages are made. The "making" seems to involve lots of technological manipulation, plus aggressive positioning and packaging of positive narratives. Obviously, readers can ...

"The Caesars Palace Coup" and "Servants of the Damned" probably will be the last exposes on the big-money law firms. Likely there will never be another smash hit like "Boston Legal." Arguing in front of the US Supreme Court? Just a client assignment. The cultural fascination with elite law firms and brilliant lawyers is over. Poof. Attention and aspirational whatevers have shifted to entrepreneurs and the AI crowd. The lawyers representing them have lost their glam. Come on, you'd rather imagine yourself being Dario Amodei than part of the legal teams representing Anthropic.  Of course, there are exceptions.  The gov's insider trading probe triggered a bit of tsk-tsk. The kind of way too ambitious types you bump into law school are being fingered for organizing a ring of intel on proposed mergers and acquisitions. One has turned cooperative so we know this isn't some kind of witch hunt. Bits and pieces to rant about have popped up on social and...

  It used to be that if your employer was holding up financially, you didn't worry about your job security. Now, that doesn't matter. The emerging dynamic is that, like Cisco, LinkedIn, Paul, Weiss and more, the ax swings even in the best of financial times. TechCrunch reports: "Technology giant Cisco is cutting fewer than 4,000 jobs, or around 5% of its workforce, despite reporting better-than-expected profit and revenue in its fiscal third quarter."  In addition, LinkedIn cut even with 12% increase in revenue. And Paul, Weiss has been riding high in Profits Per Equity Partner and still terminated litigation associates.  What else is becoming common is that help may not be on the way. Sure there are policy proposals to cope with the impact of cost-efficiency, AI and offshoring. But very little real experimentation.  Sure, you're told to network. But with fewer and fewer opportunities all that may get you is a decent-paying work situation, for a while. Then you ...