Tag: jobs

Do you know the pivotal days of your career?

In the story of your life, some days matter more than others. A lot more. In fact, in most careers, there are ten days that make all the difference. The actions you take on those 10 pivotal days not only have an outsized impact on your career, but they also have a transformational impact on your life. These are the days that songs, books and movies are written about. These are the days that will help the actor playing you in the movie about your life win the big awards. So make sure to take good notes for them.

If you take a little time to reflect on your career it is not hard to find your 10 pivotal days. The days that changed the trajectory or accelerated the velocity of your career. The days that earned you new respect, new responsibility and made you more money. The days that you didn’t have vomit on your sweater. (Mom’s spaghetti.)

Here are my 10 Pivotal Days.

  1. The day I got off the couch and called Paul Counsell, The CEO of Cramer Krasselt, and asked for an informational interview. This was the first domino to fall in my career. I got an interview. It lasted 5 hours. I made people laugh. I got a job. Everything else happened because of this call.
  2. The first new business pitch I was in. The client started the meeting by telling our agency we had no chance of winning the account. But I had seen the movie The Secret of My Success. I knew I was the Michael J Fox character. And I had prepared as if this was the biggest moment of my career. Which it was. We won the account. Boom goes the dynamite.
  3. The day I met my wife Dawn. We met at work. The impact she has had on my career growth and entrepreneurial journey can’t be overstated. She is my greatest cheerleader. Like the Toni Basil to my Mickey.
  4. The day I accepted the job as the Creative Director at Engauge. Taking on a new job with new responsibilities in a new jack city with all new coworkers and clients turbocharged my growth and development. It changed my family’s lives too.
  5. The day of my first Nationwide TV commercial shoot. We filmed a Corvette doing donuts in a cul-de-sac in Charlotte, North Carolina, in 100-degree heat. The new clients that I met that day, the challenges of the shoot that we overcame together and the strong friendships I developed with them had a huge influence on me both professionally and personally. But this day was as important for what I didn’t do as it was for what I did do. (Which I know sounds like a lot of do-do.) I wrote a story about that day here.
  6. The day I became Chief Creative Officer of Engauge. The new level of responsibility and opportunity to impact an organization was monumental. My learning, exposure and influence increased tremendously. I was ready to leave Engauge for this kind of opportunity. So when it came to me, it felt like the end of the book The Alchemist. (Which you should read if you haven’t.)
  7. The day I was picked to be part of the pitch team when Engauge was being sold. Being part of the 4-person leadership team that met with all of our potential buyers offered me an advanced degree in business. That process taught me critical lessons that prepared me for my entrepreneurial journey. Like Jamal Malik in Slumdog Millionaire.
  8. The day I was encouraged to start my own agency. I got 2 calls the same day in August of 2015 from former clients. In both conversations, the callers talked about wanting to work with me, but not wanting to work with my current agency. Which led to a discussion of starting my own agency. All the other dominoes had led to this. (Except for the Domino’s that delivers pizza.)
  9. The day I left my job at Moxie to start The Weaponry. It is one thing to think about or talk about starting your own agency. It’s another thing to do it. I had been ramping up The Weaponry by doing night and weekend side work for 5 months. But jumping made everything different. Like Camp Randall Stadium before the 4th Quarter.
  10. The day that The Weaponry signed its first retainer client. The Weaponry had generated significant cash flow over its first year and a half. But it wasn’t predictable. Once we landed our first retainer client we had the stability to hire staff and lease an office. It was when we Pinocchioed from a startup to a real business. 

Key Takeaway

Know your pivotal days. They are valuable to identify. Because they provide clues to your success. They show you what mattered most along your career journey and your story. By knowing your pivotal days, you are also able to recognize when the next pivotal days come along. When you understand how situations and opportunities lead to transformation you better prepare to make sure those opportunities go your way.

*If you know someone who could benefit from this message, please share it with them.

+For more of the best life lessons I have learned check out my book, What Does Your Fortune Cookie Say? from Ripples Media.

Is this your thing or is it leading you to your thing?

I want you to stop for a moment and think.

Think about where you are in life right now.

Think about your work, your school, or your primary non-cinnamon role.

Ask yourself:

  • ‘Is this the thing I am destined to do?’
  • ‘Is this what I have been working towards?’
  • ‘Have I arrived?’
  • ‘Or is this simply leading me to where I am going?’

It is easy to think that where you are right now is your story, role, or great achievement.

But if you are growing, there is always more. Like the sizes at a Big and Tall clothing store.

There are new chapters. New challenges. New knowledge. New capabilities. And new identities. And if you are Mork from Ork, there is Nanu Nanu.

I have been surprised by how many doors I have passed through at the back of wardrobes. But instead of finding lions, and witches, I keep finding new opportunities and perspectives.

These doors have led me to great new experiences that I didn’t realize were coming. But now I expect more incredible things ahead. Which is probably how Dave Grohl feels.

It is a beautiful place to be in your life, career, or avocation when you expect more and better roles in your future because growth and transformation have become the rule, not the exception.

Key Takeaway

Keep going. Keep Growing. There is more and better ahead.

*If you know someone who could benefit from this message, please share it with them.

+For more of the best life lessons I have learned check out my book, What Does Your Fortune Cookie Say? from Ripples Media.

A reminder of the business leader’s primary responsibility.

We’re all experiencing some crazy right now. But if your biggest challenge is that your kids are home from school, demanding fruit snacks, and TikTok-ing around the clock, you are dealing with a great kind of crazy. Enjoy it.

Business Crazy

Unfortunately, many business owners and leaders are dealing with a more challenging kind of crazy right now. For many, everything has gone off script. And now they have to figure out what to do next. Kind of like the fake wrestler who gets hit in their real face, with a real medal folding chair, and it really hurts. But the show must go on.

Right now leadership is all improv, all the time. In many industries business and revenue have been shut off like a water faucet. In times like this, entrepreneurship feels a lot less sexy, and I know it.

Decision Making

If you own a business, or are part of an organization’s leadership team, you are likely facing some very challenging decisions in the immediate future, or as part of your early planning for worst case scenarios (not to be confused with wurst casing scenarios at the sausage factory).

In your war room you will weigh the pros and cons of various decisions. You will model and remodel. You will debate and disagree. And none of it will be easy.

But before you make any final decisions, remember this:

A business leader’s primary responsibility is to make sure the business survives forever.

Key Takeaway

Do what you have to do to keep the business going. The difficult decisions you make now will ensure that once the current climate changes you will once again be able to provide great opportunities for great people and great partners.

*If you know a business leader facing difficult decisions right now, please share this with them.