Michele Woodward

Powerful Coaching. Powerful Results.

Career Coaching

The Thing About 3.6% Unemployment

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News broke this week that US unemployment reached a new low in April, falling to 3.6 percent. Who would have thought, in October of 2009 when unemployment peaked at 10 percent, that we’d ever see this sort of robust hiring?

All I can say is that 2009 was bleak for a lot of people, and it left a lot of scars.

I still see those scars in some organizations who continue policies and approaches they put into place then.

But what got you there won’t get you where you need to go. In light of what is, in fact, nearly functional full-employment for professionals, most organizations have to get smarter on how they treat their people.

In 2009, it seemed like there were forty or fifty out-of-work people in line for every job available. They would take anything – anything! – to keep themselves afloat, and some took significant pay cuts. Today, the unemployment rate tells us that there are too few people for the available jobs, so the surefire way to attract talent is to do everything you can do to take care of them.

This means your human resources function has to be on the ball and in the game. They have to focus on finding talent who will not be looking, and they have to be empowered to make solid, significant offers to the right people.

Your HR team also has to advocate for people who are doing really well in their jobs within the organization. If you don’t promote, grow and reward your top performers, you will lose them to an organization that will.

Where I live, Washington, DC, Amazon is coming into the market as an employer. They have committed to creating 25,000 new jobs at an average salary of $150,000. Average. This will put tremendous pressure on other employers in the area to up their game.

Imagine: You’ve got a great IT manager on your team who makes everything run smoothly. But you’ve held back raises for two years and routinely asked her to work on weekends and evenings when things get hairy. That talented woman? If she lives in the DC area, she’s already sent her resume to Amazon because she knows she’ll make more money doing more interesting work. And if she lives somewhere else, she might be making a plan to move.

She leaves – who are you going to find to replace her? It’s not going to be easy since there aren’t forty or fifty people in line for that opening, trust me. If you wait to see what resumes you collect from your online posting, there might be one. Who’s been out of work off and on for their entire career, and not entirely an ideal candidate.

When I raise this issue with some leaders, they tell me that their team is so happy and so committed to mission that their people would never leave. Never! In a million years.

Oh, but they will. For more pay, more opportunity, saner working hours, better bosses and more interesting work.

I’m already seeing it in my own clients.

So, to survive – I’m not even talking about thriving here – organizations have to begin to futureproof.

  • Compensate people fairly. Give raises. Give bonuses. Extend raises and bonuses beyond the C-suite to every single person within the organization.
  • Open up hiring to people who don’t look like you and don’t think like you. Diversity and inclusion leads to innovation. Innovation leads to success.
  • Stop paying your people for 40 hour workweeks and asking them to put in 60 hour workweeks. Those people will be among the first to leave.
  • Focus on creating an outstanding HR function within your organization, one that’s focused less on admin and more on strategy, recruitment and retention.
  • Jettison bad bosses. You know who they are – you simply lack the will to either manage them to better behavior or let them go. Truth is, either they go or everyone else will.
  • Provide professional development for junior people in the organization. Because once you fire the bad bosses, you’ll need someone good to step in and do a great job.
  • Say thank you. The vast majority of working professionals want their sacrifices – the missed family events, the crunch times, the difficult choices – to matter. When you see commitment in your team, acknowledge it and express your gratitude. It goes a long way toward creating a cohesive team.

There are particular challenges managing organizations when there is functional full-employment. In many ways, the Great Recession created an employers market where salaries could be trimmed and overhead reduced.

Those days are gone.

Today, right now, it’s a talented and skilled candidates market. Are you prepared to everything you can to manage that reality?

I Was Just Going To Ask You The Same Question

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You probably know that I’m not about making New Year’s Resolutions. They can be forced and unsticky and, therefore, fall by the wayside before February even starts.

I am, as you also probably know, more of a planner. So last week I sat myself down with my Personal Planning Tool – yes, I created it and I actually use it! – and the stuff that came up for me was really helpful.

The Tool is designed to get to a few action steps which you can easily do. For me, they were :

  • Look at client list for 2018 and chronicle successes
  • Create a spreadsheet tracking business revenues for the last four years
  • Create a revenue forecast for the first six months of 2019
  • Create three workouts I can use at the gym; schedule gym time

I’m proud to say that I knocked these things out in the lull week between holidays and I’m feeling rather smug about myself.

The Tool also gave me the ability to clearly see my priorities for 2019, and that’s where you come in. It’s clear that I want to step it up in the coming year. I want to be in the position a year from now to say that my work made a difference. So let me tell you about what I have planned.

I have executive coaching programs for individuals as well as organizations. One of the happiest things I’ve done in my coaching career is to partner with organizationswho want to really support their leaders. I coach people, facilitate learning and change – and it’s the thing I love doing.

With individuals, you can work with me in three, six or twelve month programs. I have space for one person in my unlimited coaching program, so let me know if that person is you.

In 2018, folks in my unlimited program negotiated better deals, dealt with office politics and stress, learned new skills and basically had more fun in their work. It was also pretty fulfilling for me to fully partner with them and not worry how many hours we were using.

That was wonderful. I love these people and look forward to working with them again in 2019.

My lower-cost program, The Club, is terrific but full at the moment. You can email to get on the waiting list if you’d like.

I have some groups this year, too. For men, I’m doing a new program this year. Did you know that the number one thing which gets people promoted and creates more success is social/emotional intelligence? I work with a lot of men clients and this is an area which – once guys get a sense of the rules and how it all works – gets results quickly. You can find more information here: Emotional Intelligence for Men

For coaches, I have my Circle of 12 mentored mastermind program starting up on January 8th. There are eleven people committed, so if you’re looking for a close community of like-minded peers who have good practices that need to move to great practices – think about joining us.

Also for coaches, I have my Executive Coach Mentoring program beginning in March. This one is designed for people focusing on working with organizational clients. We’ll learn about best practices, client acquisition and tools to support your business. It’s great, if I do say so myself.

And, for coaches who are on Facebook, I continue to moderate The Business of Coaching group which has been serving the coaching community since 2012. We have 1200 coaches from all around the world who participate in thoughtful and supportive conversations about our work. If you’d like to join this “secret group”, please let me know.

Finally, I recently was on a panel with an executive recruiter and an executive communicator, talking with a group about personal branding, career progression, leadership, mentoring, speaking and a host of other matters. We took questions, so, believe me – we ran the gamut! It was a delight, and I am looking forward to working with these two in other venues. Maybe your venue?

So, yeah, maybe this year will be ambitious. But I am planning for it to be the right kind of hustle – you know what I mean. Engaging, fun, feeding my curiosity, connected and connecting. I get sort of giddy thinking about it.

How about you? What’s on your dancecard for the coming year? Where are you going to have the impact only you can have?

I am all ears, sugar. 

Maybe You’re An Anxious Striver

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Years ago I learned something from my friend Jen Louden. It’s her idea of “Conditions of Enoughness”. Basically, it’s deciding before you set out to do anything what “enough” will feel like, so you know when you’re done.

I thought of this brilliant concept recently when hearing people talk about their drive for constant improvement. It occurred to me that constant improvement could actually be a bad thing.

Like, how you remove minute parts of a knife everytime you sharpen it. And, if you persist in sharpening the edge, at some point the knife loses its structural integrity and becomes a wisp of a thing rather than the sharp thing it once was.

I was reflecting on people who are what I call “anxious strivers”. The kinds of folks who are driven to go-go-go and do-do-do. Who only eat foods which have a point – their diet exists merely to provide protein, minerals, and “good fats”. They only read books which will improve their lives. Every spare minute is devoted to Doing Something In Service To Something Else.

Joy has very little role in their lives.

I have to ask, though: When you live in pursuit of constant improvement, when do you know how to stop? When do you know what enough is like? Because of the relentless “constant” in “constant improvement”, are you putting yourself on a hamster wheel that never stops and calling it exemplary performance?

Perhaps then, rather than constant improvement, we need to think about simply having clear goals and working to meet them. In that context, the questions become more like: How did I do yesterday? Do I need to do something differently than yesterday to reach my goal? Is it enough to keep doing what I’m doing and stay on this path I’ve set? Does this feel like enough yet?

That’s not to say stop learning. To stop incorporating your learning into your actions. I would never say that, because I’m a learner through and through.

I am suggesting that anxious striving, never knowing what enoughness looks like, never doing something just for the fun of it, sharpening your edge until you have nothing left… this is the recipe for burnout and unhappiness and, oddly enough, ultimately leads to a lack of real, meaningful progress.

Quit Your Job

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There has never been a better time to quit your job and find a new one.

(I can sense you spluttering from afar.)

(You’re thinking that it’s easy for me to say.)

(You’re thinking I might be certifiably nuts.)

(You’re thinking that I don’t know what it’s reeeeaaaallly like out there, especially for someone who’s young or old or whatever you’ve got going on in your life.)

But I know I’m right about this.

In the county where I used to live, Arlington County in Virginia, unemployment is at 2.2%. That’s a full two percent less than the U.S. average. I’ve talked to hiring people in Arlington and they have open jobs which they cannot fill. Good jobs.

I spoke to a client this past week who’s facing the same issue in Washington, DC. Open positions, no candidates.

Around the U.S., there are a record 6.6 million job openings.

Makes you go “Hmmmmm”, doesn’t it?

Because you’ve been stiff-arming a search for a new job. Sure, it’s crossed your mind. But you think:

  • Job searches are a pain in the butt and take forever
  • No one will hire me because I’m under 30/over 50
  • What if no one wants me?
  • What if I find out my skills aren’t that great?
  • What if I land in a place that’s even more toxic than the place I’m in now?

Shall we knock those down, one at a time?

  • With unfilled jobs across the board, finding a new role is going to be easier than ever
  • People who might have previously been excluded are now included, because jobs must be filled. If you’re qualified, you’ll get a look
  • See “unfilled jobs across the board”
  • If you’ve stayed current with your skills in your current role, you should be OK. If you haven’t, take an online course to brush up your skillset
  • Toxic work place? Let’s drill down on that one

“According to a U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics and Yale University report, 70 percent of all jobs are found through networking. A recent survey by CareerXroads shows that only 15 percent of positions were filled through job boards. The survey showed that most jobs are either filled internally or through referrals.” (Washington Post) If you, then, focus on networking and generating referrals for your new job, you can ask about the work environment and office politics. If your friends (the people who are doing the referring) say the place is gruesomely toxic, you can pass on that opportunity in favor of the kind of workplace where it’s an utter pleasure to work.

Those workplaces exist, by the way.

And, studies have shown that income changes more significantly when you start a new role versus small annual increases at your current job.

So, a better workplace plus more money! What’s not to like?

You might say, “But I love living where I live and there are no jobs like you’re talking about here!”

What I hear you say is more about your priorities than anything else. Where you live is more important than what you do.

Which is totally fine. In fact, it’s awesome.

You know what’s important to you – now, own it. Realize that your job exists to support your life, so if you’re unhappy at your job… you can still get a new one. Maybe you’ll have to consider a different field, a different kind of role, a new use of your skills. As long as you stay in your town (honoring your real priority), you should be fine. Plus, you know, happier.

The Great Recession, which happened ten years ago this week, impacted all of us. We got frightened, and gun shy, and maybe a little bit cowed when it came to work. We remember when a lot of our friends and family found themselves out of a job and had a hard time finding something. Anything.

And so we’ve carried that trauma forward with us in a collective way.

Now is the time to lay down that burden, once and for all.

There are jobs out there. Good jobs. Lots of them.

If you’re not happy where you are, go somewhere else.

And if you’re an employer who’s not doing everything you can to make your workplace a good place to work with good pay for all – get ready. People can leave you in a hot minute these days – and they will if you neglect your greatest asset. Your people.

 

The Thing About Making A Plan

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The first business plan for my coaching practice was written on the back of a placemat while waiting for a lobster in an out-of-the-way shack in Maine. It was 2004, and I was on my way to visit some friends for a little R&R. I started thinking about my business and made a few notes:

– How much money I wanted to make in the next year

– How I would price my services to meet my income goals

– How many clients that meant I needed

– What kind of programs that meant I needed to offer

– What kind of additional training I would need

– How I would talk about my services

While I deconstructed a delicious lobster, I noodled on my plan. And when I removed the very attractive bib from around my neck and paid my check, I had a strong, workable direction for my business.

And I put that one-year plan in my purse and didn’t look at it again for six months.

Surprisingly, though, in that six months, I had done everything on my plan. Ahead of plan.

That’s right – I didn’t obsess, or over-think. I just executed.

Because the mere process of creating the plan – just putting my to-dos top of mind – catalyzed my action.

Now, there are those who detest plans. Maybe because they think plans are too rigid, don’t allow for creativity, aren’t that spontaneous, won’t accommodate serendipity.

[These people tend to – in Myers-Briggs talk – have a strong preference for “Perceiving”, the dear darlings. They value flexibility above all and will do anything in their power to preserve their ability to go with the flow. And I completely get it. That’s why I started this post of with the lobster story – just to show all those P people that planning can be easy. And tasty.]

A great plan, though, is not judged on how many tabs, tables and cross-references it includes.

A great plan is judged on how well it works.

With a plan, you know where to put your energy.

With a plan, you have a direction.

With a plan, you know what to say a whole-hearted “Yes!” to, and what to put in the “When There’s Time” file.

And planning can be easy. Easy-peasy.

Want to do one yourself? OK, take out a placemat-sized piece of paper. [lobster bib always optional.]

Answer these prompts:

– What do you want right now, more than anything?

– What’s your life going to be like when you get what you want? What’s it going to look like?

– Who are you when you’re at your best? What elements are in place? Which of these things already support getting what you want?

– What’s the first thing you need to do?

– Whose help do you need to do it?

– When can you start?

Focus, and put your best effort into these questions. When you’re done, you’ll realize that you have a plan, sugar.

Then fold it up and put it in your pocket.

And I’ll bet you, in six months, you’ve accomplished everything that needs doing.

Bet you a lobster dinner.

 

 

A Woman’s Journey To Heroism

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img_5799Books, movies, poems, songs and numerous stand-up acts have been based on Joseph Campbell’s remarkable work on The Hero’s Journey. And rightly so. Campbell’s intensive study of the hero lore of many cultures uncovered a similar theme – a monomyth – recurring regardless of time and place.

It’s brilliant.

And it’s also only about dudes.

In the monomyth uncovered by Campbell, women feature exactly twice: The Hero meets a Goddess who inspires him, and then he meets a Temptress who, well, tempts him. The rest of the time, he’s a guy on a quest sometimes accompanied by other guys.

I had taken a stab at examining The Heroine’s Journey in a blog post I wrote back in 2014 – it was mostly about how we have a new female hero showing up in today’s literature and film, embodied by the character of Katniss Everdeen in The Hunger Games trilogy.

To really dig into the topic on a larger level, though, I had to do some thinking. I took out my journal and started writing to understand the similarities and the differences between a classic man’s experience and the hero’s journey of women I’ve know and read about.

I wondered where Campbell’s ideas intersected with what I’ve observed over my lifetime. The answer?

Not very often.

I had to refill the ink in my pen more than one time to get to the heart of the matter. And here’s what I think about a women’s hero’s journey. It starts like this: A woman is going along her merry way, doing whatever she’s doing. She might be stressed, she might not be. She might be rich, poor, old, young, whatever.

She’s living the life she’s living and then all of a sudden –

A crisis erupts. The floodwaters rise, the cow runs off, the husband runs off, the tornado’s a-coming, the rent needs to be paid, the boss is inappropriate, the nuclear reactor is leaking. Whatever it may look like, something bad happens.

And the first thing she does is try to fix the crisis. She mends and tends. She looks for solutions.

But there comes a time when she’s aware she can’t fix it – there’s no way it can be fixed at all – and has a moment of deep recognition that the only thing she can change is her idea about who she is and what she’s capable of doing.

Her identity shatters. Who she thought she was, and how she thought the world was – it’s all gone.

In the depths of her soul, she finally asks who she wants to be.

She embarks on a period of trial and error to find this new self.

In the course of her quest, she forms a tribe. These are women, men, children, animals who support her as she figures out who she really is.

She has experiences. She’s growing more and more conscious. She learns.

One day she has fresh awareness: She feels like herself. A new self.

A new crisis comes up, and she handles this one very differently. This new crisis allows her to see just how strong she is.

She has created a new life.

And the people in her tribe are safe. She can live happily and contentedly, thoroughly aware of her strength and resilience.

Women – does this in any way resonate? Clarify things for you? Give you hope that there is a path through any difficulty?

Now to the men who are reading these words – why does this matter for you? If you love a woman, or are father to a girl, and you want to be a part of her tribe, recognize that her journey toward a heroic life may be significantly different from the male hero’s journey you’ve been saturated in since birth. This may be why sometimes you don’t understand why the women in your life don’t seem to value what you value, or organize their lives the way you organize yours.

Because a man’s journey – according to Campbell – is an external adventure, full of battles where you can prove yourself.

And a woman’s journey – according to me – is an internal adventure, full of the kinds of moments which allow a woman rise up and know herself deeply.

Neither is right. Neither is wrong.

We prosper as human beings, though, when we respect and support the necessary paths each of us must walk to live our own heroic lives.

 

 

How To Ask Questions So You Get Good Answers

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If you want to be in relationship with another person – really in relationship with your spouse, your child, your co-worker, your neighbor – you have to know things about them. You have to listen.

And to listen in a conversation, you have to ask the kinds of questions which allow true responses.

I will admit, friends, that this is something I had to teach myself to do.

For instance, rather than ask, “Did you have a good weekend?”, I learned to ask, “How was your weekend?”

Because when I ask if you had a good weekend, what I’m telling you what I want to hear. I want to hear it was a good weekend, dammit. And I have not left any room for you to reply, “It was a tough weekend. My kitchen ceiling caved in, my cat ran away and I broke my tooth when a baseball thrown by a major leaguer hit me in the mouth.”

To tell you the truth, for the sake of our friendship, I’d rather hear about that action-packed weekend than hear, “Fine.”

I’m less about superficial and more about real these days.

We need to come to terms with the fact that there’s a teeny bit of bullying going on when any of us ask a question that, in essence, tells the person exactly what kind of response we will accept. And we know being bullied feels cruddy – why would we, even subconsciously, do it to others?

Another thing: You also have to be present to ask good questions, which seems to be a problem facing so many of us. Being present means asking the question and waiting for the response, not asking a throwaway question that prompts a throwaway response.

Me (thinking about getting to my desk and getting to work): “Doing good?”

You (thinking about getting me out of your hair): “Yep, doing fine.”

This interchange doesn’t build anything, doesn’t grow anything, doesn’t lead to us understanding one another. It’s boring. Our relationship is not one iota deeper, truer or more real as a result of our interaction. Neither of us is really present to one another in that moment. Why, then, do we persist in doing it?

There’s another way to ask questions so you get good answers, and you can teach yourself how – it’s:

“What was it like?” rather than “Did you have a good time?”

“How is your mother?” rather than “Is your mom OK?”

“Where are you on the Framastan project?” rather than “You got the Framastan project done, didn’t you?”

“What’s your homework plan tonight?” rather than “You’re going to do your homework tonight, aren’t you?”

Let’s look at that last one a little deeper. The question implies that homework is always an iffy proposition and you know the kid won’t do it unless you’re constantly on them about it. You’re basically saying, with that question, “I don’t trust you, you loser.” Night after night after night of that sort of pressure – does it work to get the results you need? That the kid needs? Is it what any of us need?

Always ask an open-ended question that allows the answerer the freedom to answer however they’d like. With their truth.

You may not always like it or be prepared for the answer – but it’s precisely that kind of willingness to listen and openness to vulnerability that draws people closer together.

And, ultimately, that’s what we all want, isn’t it?

 

What Brave Really Looks Like

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It’s easy to forget, in the rush of the day-to-day, what brave really looks like – so let me remind you of one or two things:

Sometimes brave simply looks like getting out of bed in the morning.

Sure, it’s brave to try something new. Admitting you have no idea how to do it is very brave.

Brave also looks like voicing an opinion.

Or respectfully disagreeing.

Or admitting you haven’t made your mind up yet.

Brave is being a true and kind friend to yourself.

Brave is extending your hand to a stranger.

And, brave is standing up for the rights of a stranger.

Anyone who creates art – using paint, clay, stone, words, numbers, performance, color, texture, shape – is incredibly brave.

Brave looks like absolutely loving the body you have.

And it’s brave to know you need to change something – and taking the steps toward that change.

Listening is brave.

Loving is brave.

Breathing is brave.

That means you, my friend, are so very brave.

Remember this the next time you have doubt or wonder where your confidence has gone.

It really hasn’t gone anywhere – you just forgot for a minute exactly how brave you are every single day.