Don't kettlebell your career

Swing….exhale….swing…avoid sever injury…swing...exhale… remember to inhale....swing...



Such have been my mornings this past week, swinging a kettle bell to try and supplement my post-January health kick. Tim Ferriss and the Four Hour Body are the inspiration for the choice of exercise, though I am not sure whether it is the wanting to have an efficient exercise or the fear of having some delicate parts of my anatomy crushed which mean that I am keeping a close eye on my form. Either way take care with your exercise, it can hurt otherwise.


With the 'bell moving in the air it can be a real delicate balance of getting the right action so you do get the benefit of it, whilst at the same time not losing control of circumstances. In some ways it is a near metaphor for a lot of us who are wondering about how best we can refocus our efforts on our career whilst at the same time not losing track of friends, family, sanity, etc.


Worried about not having the right balance with your own professional/personal kettle bell? Here are some ideas to get your grip in gear:


1. Wheel of Life
Ok it is in every book going and most of you will have heard of it before but I always think it is worthy of mention. I remember the first time a mentor presented it to me it blew my mind - not only about the possibilities that lay ahead for development in a variety of areas but also realising that I did not have to get everything right at once but that I was succeeding in other areas. I like this Mind Tools version which has a guide and one you can complete online.


2. Call on council
Napoleon Hill talked about creating his ‘Master Mind’ group or council, an imaginary group of real life luminaries in different fields who he would draw upon to get ideas when he was in a quandary.


Have a blast at imagining your own (it can be quite fun) but feel fortunate that we live in an age where it is easier than it has ever been to try and create your own council to draw from. Use your own networks to get second opinions and strategies of how to cope better. No one in your immediate or peers networks able to advice about the path you want to walk? Then fall at the altar of social media and scream hallelujah! With sites like Twitter and LinkedIn it is now easier than ever to find peoples contact information and find out how they got in to the position where they are today.


Furthermore it gives you a chance to add a personal touch when you first get in contact (“I notice from your information that prior to school teaching you were once a member of Bros – I loved you guys!”).


3. Purpose, Learning, Enjoyment
Still a little lost? Get back to basics. I often find if you are able to get two out of the three above correct then the third has a habit of presenting itself.


Enjoyment – examine what it is you are doing day to day. On first sight it might not be clear but upon further examination you might find there is a lot of what you do that you enjoy. Now you just need to see how it is that you can maximise this in your time and what you do. You owe it to yourself to try and do right by you, no?


Learning – if you feel you are on a path of development this will help a great deal with any feelings of anxiety about progression, as well as that guilt we all get sometimes when we look at peers and think “why am I not where they are at?” Furthermore, when you enter in to a programme of training/education you often find that…

Purpose - …. reveals itself, as you have been shown a means of progression, perhaps not in the field you first thought but a path that is worthy of further exploration nevertheless.


The alternative? Well perhaps you just drift and then one day realise that you have self sabotaged yourself. And then I imagine you would feel like this.

Talent Mismanagement?

Well, well that was quite a 24 hours in the British football transfer Market.

This past week the Premier League in England had its January transfer window come to a close,In amongst all this were two transfers that caught the attention for their combined value being in the region of £85 million. There was the £50M sale of Fernando ‘El Nino’ Torres to Chelsea and Liverpool replacing him with Andy ‘El Geordie Ponytail’ Carroll at a cool £35 million.

Putting aside the Carroll transfer for one moment, I was fascinated about what sort of insight the Torres deal gave to the ethos of Chelsea and how these seemed to run counter to their previous communications that they wanted to invest in youth development.
What I imagine the initial aim was to produce individuals of the calibre of La Masia (as described in previous posts on this blog) but it does not seem to have been the case.

Approaching the matter from a HR Talent Management perspective, what can we learn from what occurred?

1. Have a clear assessment of potential star performers and how they met your requirements
If you are going to implement a talent management process, you need to have a clear idea of the competencies required moving forward and any skills gap you can envisage. In some ways sports organisations are very sensitive to rapid change in this regard – Jonah Lomu’s career in Rugby Union is testament to how fragile some careers can be.

The sad fate that awaits all former Rugby players - they are magiced in to chairs when they hang up their boots! Image by Velvet Android via Flickr

However there is some room for manoeuvre. Outflows from the organisation can be identified . Using retirees as an example, we all have prospective ones on our books that are only more likely to be allowed more time in roles given the trend current legislation (and the longer we are all living) but that is not to say you cannot prepare for them leaving. Likewise, footballers do well to last beyond their late thirties, meaning you can identify those areas that might prove problematic and when they might start being an issue.

Didier Drogba at 28 is not an issue – Drogba four or five years older? Might be time to start to start drafting a succession plan, no? Examine the skills and experience that this individual brought to a role and then see how your culture can foster the development of this.

2 . Accept when priorities compromise your values - but admit it
What is interesting is Chelsea made a point of letting a collection of experienced employees with a record of previous seasons of success (Ballack, Carvalho, Shevchenko – ok I am pushing it with that last example!) stating they were going to rely on their youth set up to provide squad support over the coming season; with Daniel Sturridge, Gael Kakuta and Josh McEachran were held up as being standard bearers for this policy moving forward.

Following the latest transfer window the first two have been loaned out to other clubs to gain experience, with McEachran looking as though he might be given a chance in coming months. The last instance aside, what does it say about the value the club place on these employees ability that they are not willing to let them fill positions that are vacant? And, more pointedly, does it suggest that they need to have a rethink of their talent pipelines?

If the problem is identifying the talent at source (i.e. at academies etc) then examine this and how this can be addressed. Would most organisations accept under performing staff coming through their graduate recruitment programme? Unlikely – they would address the sources or nature of the programme to see why they were not being equipped with the necessary competencies and how this could be rectified.

If the issue is that you do not think the policy will generate a return soon enough (i.e. youth team players of enough ability for sustained success) then react, as Chelsea did, by making changes – but don’t suggest that there are not issues that need to be addressed in how you manage your recruitment and selection. It sends confusing messages to those staff you attracted under the previous policy - ask Sturridge whether he knows where he stands and how it has affected his motivation.

It is not something unique to football clubs, or sports for that matter. Shawn Murphy talks on the matter quite eloquently in this blog post - imbedding culture and accepted practices (expecations, performance management etc) starts from your induction and on boarding. Hell some might even say it starts when you advertise to prospective recruits!

Finding it all a bit dispiriting? Don’t worry, I am sure the individuals concerned in this post received in one weeks worth of salary more than most of us might see in a life time, so no danger of being below the poverty line yet. Not sure about what sort of state it has left their long term career goals and development mind.

Still down? Well, there is always the 6 Nations…

n

With dead man's shoes one size fits all

I met with a colleague recently who was having some thoughts about their career and used the phrase 'dead man's shoes' to describe their promotion prospects - no place to go in the organisation they are in, hoping for the person above to move on/get promoted/pass away.

Well you would like to think they would be hoping for two out of those three, but you catch my drift.

So what can you do in the meantime? Move with a purpose - make sure that you are working on the assumption that the next promotion is going to become available, either inside or outside your organisation, and think of what skills and experience you might need. The results could be two fold.

Firstly were you to apply for role elsewhere you are showing, at a minimum, a commitment to continuing your professional development -it shows this is not just a job for you, it really is your chosen career. A mindset like this and the good habits it creates will look after you acting as a psychic defence if you will.

Ring once for job security, promotion opportunities and a sense of well being in the context of self actualisation. Ring twice for Steve (found via Flickr)

Secondly you never know when that opportunity might occur where you are currently based- life has a funny way of throwing up instances where people are called up to take on more responsibility at the least notice. Would you not be kicking yourself if you were to miss out on something that would have been a shoe-in for you had you kept up the good habits mentioned above?

Seem an impossible prospect? Well check out the video below. Don't know about you but I really miss Behind the Music, and really enjoyed their profile of Metallica - though at points it is a bit Spinal Tap.

Fast forward to about 7 minutes in and then tell me that the roadie who stepped up for lead singer James Hetfield was not living the definition of dead man's shoes. Despite that, when the time  came, he was ready to help make sure the tour did not go off the rails - I bet you when it came to end of year bonuses he cleaned up!

io

a