There are a lot of books out there on how to achieve job satisfaction and get ahead in the business world, but few are from the viewpoint of someone with a front row seat in the always-elusive entertainment industry. That’s what I found interesting about Danielle Weinstock’s Can This Elephant Curtsy on Cue?.
A Hollywood producer, Danielle has worked on thirty television shows or feature films such as Weeds, 24, The Agency, White Fang, Crossing Jordan, and Fantasy Island. She also wrote the documentary A Song's Best Friend: John Denver Remembered, which aired on PBS, and is a member of the Producer's Guild of America (PGA) and the Director's Guild of America (DGA).
Can This Elephant Curtsy on Cue? is a fascinating look at life on a film set, where producers must daily contend with temperamental wildlife, unattainable demands, and stringent budgets. Weinstock provides an insider’s view on how movies and television shows are made, and uses her hilarious and sometimes cringe-worthy anecdotes to extend the entertainment world’s lessons to other fields. The book offers guidance for working with difficult people, coping with sexual harassment, managing complicated scenarios, and making appropriate financial decisions.
Given that Weinstock survived the Hollywood jungle and was able to claim a successful, two-decade career in it, her perspective is intriguing and invaluable.
I’ve been getting a lot of e-mails from desperate folks who are short on cash and are hoping against hope that they can get a raise at work. But just in case they can’t, over at Brazen Careerist, Alex Fisher has some great ideas for saving money during the current economic downturn. Among my favorites:
Replace your light bulbs with CFLs: For the time when you legitimately need the lights on, you should be using light bulbs that don’t waste the majority of their energy on heat instead of light. Compact Fluorescent Lights, or CFLs, use an electrical charge and gas to produce light instead of a heating element like incandescent lights.
Use Linux: Chances are you don’t need to spend money on a Microsoft or Macintosh operating system if you find yourself doing simple things like web browsing, word processing, and listening to music. Check-\ out Ubuntu Linux. It’s helped bring Linux closer to the average computer user in its ease of use and clean looking user interface.
Buy rechargeable batteries: These are great for things like digital cameras, Xbox controllers, and mp3 players especially.
Check your tires for correct inflation: You’ll use more gas if your tires are improperly inflated. The extra friction and heat caused by low tires require greater work from your engine and will require you to buy more tires more frequently.
Drop subscription TV altogether: Replace it with an HDTV antenna or watch online at ABC, Fox, ESPN360, and other sites that offer the same and even extra content online. Dine at home on your next date: Hit the store, bond while making pasta, get a bottle of wine, and put on some great music.
Drink office coffee: If you load it up with cream and sugar anyway, it might not make any difference at all what kind of coffee you’re drinking.
Revise your insurance policies: Things like keeping a fire extinguisher in your home, a blinking light on your car dash, and a safe driving record can save you money on your insurance policies, but only if you let your insurer know!
According to USA Today, this summer Utah will become what experts say is the first state to institute a mandatory four-day work week for most state employees. Gov. Jon Huntsman, a first-term Republican, says he's making the change to reduce the state's carbon footprint, increase energy efficiency, improve customer service and provide workers more flexibility.
The change will apply to about 17,000 employees, roughly 80% of the state workforce, Huntsman says. Public universities, the state court system, prisons and other critical services will be exempt. Residents still will have sufficient access to state offices, many staying open from 7 a.m.- 6 p.m., and more than 800 state services are available online, he says.
The four-day work week is surprisingly common among city and county governments. Rex Facer, an assistant professor at Brigham Young University whose research team is studying the four-day work week concept, estimates that about one-sixth of U.S. cities with populations above 25,000 offer employees a four-day work week. His projection is based on the team's continuing survey of 150 city human resource directors. Facer expects more cities to begin shuttering offices on Fridays. "The increasing pressures the American is facing around gas prices is certainly a significant factor, and the overall fiscal pressures governments are facing in general," he says.
An interesting development, though I don’t see the private sector following suit anytime soon. Companies are just now getting their arms around flextime. Cutting out an entire day out of the business week seems rather drastic. Good for Utah, though. State and local governments generally aren’t known for being revolutionary, and this certainly demonstrates otherwise.
Have you ever noticed that when you spend too much time dwelling on the past, you get depressed about how certain situations played out and what you could have done differently? And when you are always looking ahead to the future, you get anxious about the unknown?
Although I find it hard to do, I am going to try and listen to the career advice I’ve been given by a few friends and colleagues – to try to live in the present moment as often as I can. I want to take time to reflect on the speaking engagement that went well today, instead of worrying about the one I have to do next week. I want to celebrate the fact that the new book sold a bunch of copies this week, instead of lamenting that we had a slow period in June.
I think that one way I can practice my present-moment focus is by interacting with my 4 month-old son. Sometimes, when I play with him and read to him, and he looks up at me and smiles, I feel like we’re the only two people in the universe. I can’t picture being anywhere else at that moment. If I could extend this to the rest of my life, I would be golden.
You know who’s good at zeroing in on the present moment? Fiction authors. They have to be – otherwise they wouldn’t notice the everyday details, as in how the stranger who came to the door was wearing a mumu like Mrs. Roper from Three’s Company, or the way the porch flowers craned their necks a particular way to catch the sunlight, that make a novel come to life.
Our lives are made up of billions of individual moments, and unless we pay attention to them, are we really living at all?
In his bestsellers Brand Warfare and Career Warfare, author David D'Alessandro offered sharp advice for building a brand and building a career. His new book, Executive Warfare is the advanced class for the truly ambitious. The book covers what it takes to rise to the top-and to do the even harder thing, which is survive there. In anticipation of the book’s release, David provided some exclusive suggestions to Water Cooler Wisdom readers regarding on how can survive a merger:
David says: “Mergers and acquisitions are always a time of angst and anxiety for just about everyone involved. Trying to keep your job or even get a better one should be the goal. The easiest way to almost assure that you will at least keep your job for the immediate future is to volunteer to join the inevitable transition teams that are created company-wide and often in departments. People from both firms participate and often determine the course of action for merging departments, people, budgets, projects etc. During this period the people on the transition teams are very powerful and can usually preserve and sometimes enhance their careers. They are in the great position to see and hear all that goes on. It is less likely others on the team will recommend a transition player be eliminated. It happens, but your odds are much better if you are in the tent.”
“Also remember,” says David, “that there are no mergers of equals as announcement press releases often state. One culture will win. Identify which one early and get closer to the people driving that culture in your area. You will be seen as one of them and not the dreaded one of those.”
I’ll be honest. I always thought that going to a temp agency was a waste of time. This perception comes from the fact that when I was in college in the late 90s, I visited a few firms, filled out reams of paperwork, took a few computer tests, did several interviews, and never got a single job out of the process.
According to CareerBuilder’s Kate Lorenz, though, there is a time and a place for seeking a temp job, and in this economy, you might be well-served with this approach. A temp position can be beneficial, for example, if you’re testing the waters of a career change, or if you’ve been laid off and need income while you search for long-term employment.
The American Staffing Association says that 88 percent of staffing employees say temporary or project work made them more employable and 80 percent of staffing clients say staffing firms offer a good way to find people who can become long-term employees. Project work frequently leads to full-time roles, says Max Messmer, chairman of Accountemps and author of Human Resources Kit for Dummies. "Increasingly, organizations are realizing the value of using temporary assignments as a means of evaluating candidates for full-time positions. This provides a low-risk opportunity for managers to determine how an individual will perform on the job." The American Staffing Association reports that staffing companies employ 2.96 million people each day and 11.4 million people over the course of a year. Here are a few staffing companies that hire and place temp workers. Check them out!
I love the show Jon and Kate Plus 8. For those of you who might not be familiar with it, it’s a reality program on TLC that follows thirtysomething Pennsylvania parents Jon and Kate as they raise seven year-old twins and four year-old sextuplets. I like watching it because it provides harmless entertainment while I’m feeding the baby, and reminds me of how easy it is to take care of just ONE baby.
I’ve now seen about 30 episodes (don’t snipe – they’re only 20 minutes long) and something has been nagging at me about Kate. The woman is absolutely obsessed with keeping the kids clean and their activities monitored at all times. She scrubs the kitchen floor, on her hands and knees, three times a day. I guess there’s nothing wrong with this if it helps her maintain her sanity, but one has to wonder why a person who is so hypervigilant about controlling her children would proceed with the high-risk engagement of gestating sextuplets in the first place. With the exception of having to use some breathing equipment a few times a day until around age three, Kate’s kids seem fine, but it easily could have gone the other way. They were born very premature, weighing only a few pounds each, and doctors said that it was miraculous that they all survived.
The lesson here is that Kate, like most people, is inconsistent some of her beliefs and behavior. When we go through life expecting our bosses or colleagues not to contradict themselves, or not to be hypocritical, we’re setting ourselves up for frustration and disappointment. If you want to have good relationships, accept people for who they are and move on.
My friend Pam Slim over at Escape from Cubicle Nation has a great post on how to tread the fine line between expressing admiration for someone and fan worship. Straight from the ECN blog are 4 “fan traps” to avoid. I’ve been known to do some of these things in my interactions with bestselling authors, and people who haven’t yet broken into publishing have done them with me. Also included for your reference are helpful alternatives.
Kudos to Pam for bringing up a rarely-discussed but critical facet of successful networking!
I love this post from Michael McKinney at Leading Blog. It’s based on a new book from Alvin Felzenberg, The Leaders We Deserved (and a Few We Didn't): Rethinking the Presidential Rating Game. Felzenberg devised six criteria to best describe various U.S. presidents’ contribution to history. Based on this exercise, he presents a list of what we should look for in presidential candidates.
Sense of Purpose. Nearly all presidents who earned a rating of great or near great articulated specific goals that they wanted to achieve as president. Adversity. All of the great and near great presidents emerged from conflicts and disappointments they encountered stronger and more resilient ten they had before. This is what made their previous ordeals transformative. All regarded these adversities as learning experiences, however painful. None emerged from such setbacks regarding themselves as victims. None were known to complain or whine—at least out loud or in public—about their private misfortunes. Broad Life Experiences. Most great and near great presidents had multiple occupations, not all of them in politics, before coming president. Through the depth and breadth of their experiences, successful presidents learned how to relate to people in all walks of life. Natural Curiosity. Great of near great presidents remained curious all their lives about the world around them and about the cause of the problems they were called upon to solve. Well-Developed Sense of Integrity. Look for honesty (doing what one said he would do, or explaining why unforeseen circumstances necessitated a different course), courage (meeting adversity head-on, often at political or personal risk), and integrity (placing the interests of one’s office and one’s country ahead of personal convenience or interests, or those of one’s associates). Humility. Although confident in their abilities, successful presidents held their egos in check. All great and near great presidents understood that they would receive the credit for the achievements of their subordinates. For this reason they strove to find outstanding ones…including on occasion, former rivals and members of the opposition party.
I’m including this on Water Cooler Wisdom because I think these characteristics are appropriate for good leaders in all types of organizations, and, for that matter, employees at all levels.
So Bill Gates is preparing to retire as CEO of Microsoft. Gates and his childhood friend Paul Allen founded Microsoft on April 4, 1975, in Albuquerque, New Mexico, to make and sell BASIC interpreters for the Altair 8800, an early computer that was sold to hobbyists. Gates dropped out of Harvard University in his third year to focus on Microsoft, and the rest, as they say, his history. For an upcoming Forbes article, I was asked to consider lessons that can be learned from Gates’ amazing career, and here are a few I came up with:
I was recently interviewed for Yahoo! Hot Jobs for a story on how the continuing upward pressure on gas prices is forcing many workers to change how they get to their jobs and to seek added benefits that offset commuting costs. In a recent survey by the staffing firm Robert Half International (RHI), almost half of U.S. professionals (44%) said higher gas prices are affecting their commutes, up from 34% two years ago. The top three changes cited by the group are increased carpooling, driving a more fuel-efficient car, and telecommuting more frequently. Three in 10 respondents said they are looking for a new job closer to home. Some advice for commuters that I and other experts offered included:
Check with Human Resources. Ask your HR rep if there are existing [commuter assistance] policies, because there may well be, even if they aren't widely recognized," I said. “Your request may also prompt HR to take action, as the business case for such incentives is strong.
Highlight the upside for the company. "You should put a positive spin on your request to the boss or to HR," said Liz Bywater, president of the Bywater Consulting Group, which helps improve organizational performance. "Companies that offer such incentives may be seen as environmentally conscious and employee-friendly."
Check with your city. Local agencies may offer transportation incentive programs that employers can tap, according to Terry Pile, president of Career Advisors and author of Working in Your Slippers: Is Telecommuting Right for You? “Some cities require large employers to reduce the number of cars on their campuses by a certain percentage and provide them with assistance in putting together an alternative commuting program," she says.
Make a proposal. "You could put together a cost analysis in support of telecommuting one or two days a week," Pile said, adding that studies have shown that telecommuting saves employers on parking and office space, productivity, and absentee costs. "If the employer can see a positive impact on the bottom line, you'll get better reception for a telecommuting program."
Control what you can. Even if your employer is not receptive to changing, find ways to increase your savings and efficiency. "Look at how you might save on gas outside of work by planning your errands efficiently, and walking or taking public transit when you can," said Pile. "You must find a way to live with the situation without anxiety," I added. "If you're strapped for cash, balance things out by taking away one expense you can tolerate -- such as dining out one meal per week. The increase in fuel costs is a hardship, no doubt, but it's not the same dire scenario as being unemployed or facing bankruptcy."
Admittedly, staying on HR’s good side is probably not at the top of your list of managerial priorities, but HR has the power to make your life easier…or very difficult. Over at HR Capitalist, Kris Dunn has five great tips for how managers can make HR love them.
You clearly communicate expectations. Your employees understand their objectives, and they also understand performance you consider to be not meeting, meeting and exceeding your expectations in each micro area. Not a lot of surprises in your group when it comes to performance management. Nice...
Talent is important to you, but you are a realist. You want the best talent, but you seem to have a knack regarding what type of talent you can get for your open slot. With that in mind, you'll hold out for a better candidate, but you know when to cut to the chase and close the deal.
You have a sense of urgency in Employee Relations issues. You know if you let employee relations issues fester in your group, it's only going to get worse. With that in mind, you're proactive, and always looking to talk about where you need to go with a certain situation to ensure it doesn't blow up.
You have a situation-specific sense of humor. Face it, we talk about a lot of sticky stuff, including your own plight, and you mix humor with seriousness like a champ. Thanks for understanding we're going to work through it and laughing with me/at me.
You have the ability to anticipate outcomes and reactions to your actions. You see the game. If you are thinking about taking a specific action, you proactively talk about what that will mean to others, how others will perceive it, the political landscape, etc.
Kris claims that he didn’t put anything administrative in the list, like “you get the forms to me”, or “your reviews are always done on time”. Those things are apparently easily fixable, whereas if a manager doesn’t do the things above, all the administrative excellence in the world won’t matter. Thanks, Kris!
Did you know that the most accurate predictor of earning power is literacy? Literacy does not just mean being able to read, but also refers to your command of written language. I recently read an article by Steve Kaufmann at LingQ, a company that provides web-based language tutoring, you can improve your skills by copying a sample page from a source or article that interests you and pasting it into Google Documents. You can find several readability indicators under File/Word Count, including the Automated Reader Index, which indicates the number of years of schooling required to understand a text. Keep challenging yourself with harder and harder material until you are comfortable with content that is at an index of 12 or 15 or higher.
You should also measure the richness of your vocabulary. Cut and paste a sample article into a web-based Vocabulary Profiler. Using such a tool, you can see how many of the piece’s words are within the first 1000 most frequent words, how many are "academic" (AWL), and how many are “off-list.” Kaufmann recommends getting to the point where you are comfortable reading material that has 10 percent or more words in the AWL and the off-list categories. And don’t forget that you can use online dictionaries and word learning programs to increase your vocabulary. When you come across a word that you don’t know, get into the habit of looking it up immediately. I was doing this for a while, but then I got lazy. Thanks to Kaufman’s article, though, I think I’ll try to pick it up again!
Lately, I’ve been thinking a lot about success at work, and how it means different things to different people. When I first graduated college, I thought success was setting and then achieving a goal to reach a certain level. But for someone who is naturally ambitious, this doesn’t really work. Because once you reach that level, you want to go higher. Eventually, you will rise as high as it’s reasonable to expect, and then what? Do you feel like a failure because you aren’t at the tippy, tippy top? Making success about being the best in your field is bound to lead to disappointment, because even if you’re the president of your country, there will be another world leader who is more accomplished and more popular with the people.
Another definition says that you are successful if lots of other people think and/or tell you that you are. Except how do you decide whose opinion counts, and whose doesn’t? Are the people in your life really equipped to make an objective judgment about such things? Plus, it’s always dangerous to base your self-esteem on what other people think. Then there’s the people who say that you’re successful if you’ve gotten rich doing what you do. This makes a degree of sense, although if your windfall was mostly luck or being in the right place at the right time, of if your wealthy in laws loaned you the money to get a leg up, how successful are you really?
For me, I think success is enjoying your work enough so that you’re energized at the start of each business day. It’s having the respect and admiration of your colleagues. It’s earning enough so that you’re in a position to pursue the lifestyle you want, with enough time to spend with the people who are most important to you. It’s making a contribution to society so that you know in your heart that the world is a better place with you in it.
What do you think?
Have you ever wondered how super-successful business owners with millions of customers get started? Surprisingly, many don’t spend years toiling in Fortune 500 brand powerhouses, some had no money or no connections going in, and some weren’t even trained in marketing. NYU marketing professor David Vinjamuri, in his new book Accidental Branding, set out to explore what makes these founders of "accidental brands" tick and came out with a wonderfully engaging portrait of well-known entrepreneurs like Gary Erickson, creator of the Clif Bar, Craig Newmark of the online classifieds powerhouse Craig’s List, Roxanne Quimby, creator of the Burt’s Bees product line, and Myriam Zaoui and Eric Malka, founders of The Art of Shaving line. Vinjamuri illustrates how his accidental branders personally experienced a problem that the new brand in turn solved. For example, long-distance cyclist Erickson was disgusted with foul-tasting energy bars, Newmark needed a way to quickly and easily communicate the latest San Francisco happenings to his friends, and Malka was plagued by terrible razor burn. Vinjamuri, who had the unique opportunity to go into these individuals’ homes and places of business and get to know them one-on-one, brings the success stories to life and renders his characters so appealing and believable that you’d want to go out and have a beer with each and every one of them.
While the book readers more like an extended human interest story rather than a nuts and bolts business tutorial, Vinjamuri does offer insights on common characteristics of accidental branders – like obsessive attention to detail, being your own customer, and building a memorable brand myth, and tutors the reader on how his subjects’ decisions led to their eventual outcomes. What inspired me the most was the fact that these now-icons were once ordinary people who all experienced setbacks and hardships along the path to their dreams. Because that’s what the American dream is all about.