TransformingYourCareerTransformingYourself

  The challenge posted all over the internet used to be: How to work for a younger boss. Whether that's full-time or on a contract basis.  Smirk. That became standard and we all got to know the drill. In 2013, my client and the administrative assistant were 30-something. Only once did I make the mistake of referring to a 1950s popular television show. Now the reality setting in is how to be hired when the gatekeepers are in their early 20s. Yes, they are the ones doing the interviews. Even the 35ish can, as the Reddit headline reads, feel like a dino. And, of course, wind up not being let in. Here's a snippet from that post: "The actual interview was conducted by two guys who could not have been older than twenty-three. One of them spent the first five minutes explaining their 'vibe check' process while leaning back in a bean bag chair." (For some reason the Reddit moderator has removed the post.) Sure, not all the promising work situations are startups or AI...

In Today's Opinion section of The New York Times  Matthew Wollin has lots negative to say about the power and politics of large law firms.  The usual word count for such op-eds ranges 1,200 to 1,800. His stretches to 2,230. Obviously his five years as a lawyer at WilmerHale didn't train him to be concise. It might, though, have entitled him to more than the typical space to present a point of view. Wollin is now a writer and filmmaker. But, and this is cute, he leverages the prestige of his former line of work to attack the prestige and more of Big Law.  However, more to the point.  Those I speak with about this oped wonder: How skilled was he as a lawyer if in this lengthy piece his arguments come across as absolutist, simplistic, reductive and even contradictory. For instance. he confuses the role of representing clients - even the very wealthy - with a capitulation to their particular values. Being entitled to the best defense - and Big Law is known for delivering...

  The laments by the jobless on tech anonymous professional network Blind, as well as more general platforms such as Reddit, might shift to this: advice on the exploding opportunities at smaller companies. BusinessInsider captures that disruption in this one sentence: "Smaller companies can often offer employees more ownership, faster decision-making and promotions , and the chance to work directly on cutting-edge AI products."  In this situation BI is referring to AI Swedish startup Lovable . It employs 149. Yet, it will be hiring 400 in the near future.  In contrast Google employs almost 191,000 and Meta about 79,000. But both, as with much of Big Tech, have become corridors of pain. Yes, all the layoffs, with those jobs probably not coming back.  The same employment pull force toward smaller is happening in the broader employment market. Financial media CNBC  documents:  "In an increasingly challenging labor market , small businesses may offer newly min...

  What constitutes "verbal abuse" as well as "bullying?" It's reported that apparently BP chairman Alpert Manifold met the criteria. Those alleged behaviors, along with alleged mishandling of confidential information, are cited as what triggered his abrupt dismissal. Could this open the door for "victims" of such treatment throughout business, including the tense corridors of professional services, to lobby the leadership to also take action?  Large law firms, from what I hear as an intuitive coach/tarot reader, are notorious for those with power indulging in yelling, throwing objects and blackballing subordinates. However, unless that crosses the line to various interpretations of sexual misconduct, no one jaw-jaws to authority. The fear is too great for being shut out of a system which can withhold the assignments which result in billable hours. Without enough of those there is no carrot (bonuses) and soon enough the stick (termination). Usually I ...

 A big part of the euphoria over Work From Home (WFH) was being liberated from the in-person social aspects of the office. You know, how everyone watches each other, the fear about the poison in the grapevines and the oversharing by colleagues. Yes, the office pests. So, the outcry in BusinessInsider about how getting tasks done with AI tools is reducing that human interaction might represent the opinions of outliers. The rhetoric reads: " AI  is unraveling the social fabric of work." Essentially that fabric had been woven by necessity through the technology of the Industrial Revolution. Labor moved to the factories where the machines were. And out of the home where craftspeople had operated for centuries in isolation.  COVID brought back the opportunity to again earn a living at home. Those I coached were unhinged by Return to the Office (RTO). For one thing, they experienced a falloff in creativity and productivity. After all, back again were all those interruptions b...

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