In the Wrong Job | BTalk Australia

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(19min 06) Have you ever wondered whether you're in the right job? Did you get where you are today by chance, without really planning your career? Russell Johnson, the Managing Director of EPR International, says it's not uncommon. Infact the vast majority of people are in the wrong job. The chances are you are too and you're subconsciously telling yourself that you've sold yourself out.

In today's BTalk Australia Phil Dobbie asks how you can change your career. When is too late?

What do you think? Add your comments in the Talkback section at the end of this post.

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Change Your Job, Change Your Life | BTalk Australia
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• Today's Transcript

Phil Dobbie: Hello I'm Phil Dobbie and welcome to BTalk Australia. Today, is it time for a career change?
Are you in the wrong job? If you are, you are probably grumpy a lot of the time and maybe not progressing up the ladder as fast as you might so to help with a bit of self analysis I'm joined by Russell Johnson. He's the managing director of EPR International. Now Russell you look at precisely this don't you, trying to find out whether people have got the job that suits them. So how many of us do you reckon are in the wrong job?
Russell Johnson: Well if we could take the best efforts of the Gallup organisation which probably most people would know is an international organisation that essentially does polling around the world, they've done some polling around job engagement which is an indicator of job satisfaction. And what they found, this was a survey done I believe three years ago in Australia, I don't think it will have changed substantially since then but it's done in other countries around the world as well, Australia actually came out equal second most disengaged nation in the world at an average of 81 percent of the working population either somewhat disengaged or very disengaged from their work.
Dobbie: That is a staggering statistic, isn't it?
Johnson: It is indeed. Although it's not staggering to us because we see it all the time. We see the effects of it and the damage that it causes.

Dobbie: So we'll come under the damage it can cause in just a second but first of all why is it happening? Is it just because we just drift through our careers? You know we finish school or university and we somehow get stuck into a career and just stay there?
Johnson: Yes what tends to happen is that because of economic pressures we get into a career and we stay there. We find it difficult to move. There are all of the conventions around that sort of thing. The fact that we can't just openly talk about that we're about to move on or anything like that. There are a lot of inhibitors around the idea of moving and, of course, the biggest inhibitor of all is that most of us, we don't know what we want to do. There aren't any really good structures for helping people. There are some rudimentary structures for helping people in the very, very beginning stages of their careers but generally speaking when people don't have any real career experience the first steps are simply experimental of learning and all too often we end up not progressing beyond those and simply becoming stuck in a career that's wrong. It's not unusual for us to meet with people who've been on the wrong path for many, many years.
Dobbie: That evil of money gets in the way very often as well, doesn't it? I'd say you know I've been in the wrong career for a large part of my life because the career I wanted to pursue didn't pay me enough.
Johnson: Exactly, yes.

Dobbie: And I think that's a common scenario, isn't it?
Johnson: Well and truly. The money, of course, can become a great attraction and the reality is that the world of work is an inevitability and in an economy such as ours I guess is that the money is held out as an attraction to the best people along with things like power, travel, a whole lot of perks and so on that actually are not particularly good substitutes for the intrinsic satisfactions of doing a job that we love but they can blind us to those things.

Dobbie: Yes, but we discover this very often, when we're too old. You know we mature a bit or our values in life change quite a lot but when we're young we want all of those things you've just mentioned.
Johnson: Yes exactly and I would say generally speaking it's not so much we discover them too old. We discover them too old to be able to make a change easily. We've discovered them certainly at a stage where getting on to the right path is harder and it does get harder as the years go by, but it really becomes a matter of commitment. Some people are committed enough to do it, others would rather live a life. I shouldn't say would rather prefer to more that most people don't see a strongly motivating alternative, don't understand how to make the change and so simply end up living a life of low level dissatisfaction around career.

Dobbie: So what does the damage that's done from being in the wrong job? Both to you as a person but also I imagine you're doing some damage to the company as well. You won't be giving it your all.
Johnson: Yes damage to the person individually, what tends to happen and this is a very subtle thing, over time what tends to happen when people are in the wrong job, deep down inside we can't hide anything from ourselves obviously and subconsciously we know very well we are settling. In a sense we're selling out. We're accepting something that isn't what we're really all about. And the message we're sending to our subconscious is I don't believe in myself enough to reach for what I really want. Well that's a very powerful message and over time what it results in is an erosion of self confidence, self belief, self esteem, call it what you will. There is a gradual lowering of general morale and to the point where for many of us the belief comes to be well I'm in the wrong job but after all I don't really have any options. I can't get where I want to go. And we've actually sent ourselves a message that then because it lowers our self confidence it actually lowers our whole potential for really high level satisfying living because we've stopped believing in ourselves and if we don't believe in ourselves why would we believe on any other level that we're entitled to what we want either?

Dobbie: Is this really perhaps what the main cause of a mid-life crisis? What you've described sounds like a mid-life crisis and having the wrong job could be a big part of it.
Johnson: Absolutely Phil, it is and, of course, you might have heard it said mid-life crises are happening a bit earlier these days than they used to. An awful lot of people, we've talked to a lot of people who even by the late 20's or early 30's and particularly around that sort of 30 turning point, are starting to say to themselves, this isn't what I want. I don't know how I got here and more importantly I don't know how to get out of it and get to where I need to go. So it isn't just mid-life but yes mid-life in particular round about that 40 mark or early 40's for a lot of people is a very major point at which if they're going to make a change it becomes a sense of now or never.

Dobbie: Now is there an easy way of gauging whether you're in the wrong job or not? Are there a couple of questions that you should be asking yourself?
Johnson: I suppose the most fundamental of all tends to be, do I get up in the morning feeling good about going to work? Do I look forward to going to work? Am I enjoying my work enough that even going home at the end of the day feels like perhaps a satisfying thing to do but at the same time I would enjoy staying longer as well? In other words, work is something we do because we love what we do. If we're doing that then we're probably pretty much, a least the prima facie case that we're on the right track.
Dobbie: Right, so an obvious question, do you feel like that?
Johnson: Oh absolutely. I love my work. I love it very deeply. I have been doing this work for 17 years. It took me the first half century of my life, so I've given away how long I've been around, but it took me the first half century of my life to get absolute clarity about what I wanted to do and I became one of the founding partners at EPR at that time because it really was that full and complete recognition and I've loved what I've done ever since.
Dobbie: You still sound very youthful there Russell despite the age that you've just given away.
Johnson: That's very kind of you.
Dobbie: Now what about the damage that you can do for the business that you're working for? And can it become self-fulfilling? You're in a job that you can do but you don't enjoy. Perhaps you don't give it your all and ultimately maybe it's going to be your demise.
Johnson: Well I believe that's true actually. I think what you're talking about something quite literally it could actually shorten somebody's life.

Dobbie: Yeah shorten their life or shorten their career anyway.
Johnson: Oh it can do both. I've got no doubt it can do both. I've worked with countless people over the years for whom it has been in the process of taking away the things that mattered most to them in life and in many, many cases because we can get quite obsessive about trying to make it work in a role that doesn't work, I've seen people who's relationships have suffered and in many cases what could have otherwise have been wonderful relationships have been broken and destroyed by being in the wrong career. So I believe it can actually operate on all those levels. It can be damaging for the business, it can be damaging to us individually, it can be damaging to our relationships. It's simply the truth in our society that work is for most of us far too large a part of our existence for us to settle for something that's not what we really want to do. The damage it does is the damage it does, and the collateral damage is immense.

Dobbie: Now the way we move between jobs these days, I mean we move often and quickly and there's quite a bit of pressure as well from recruitment consultants who call you up while you're still in a job trying to get you to move on to the next place. And, of course, these recruiters are usually paid on a commission basis on the number of people they place so are they making the situation worse?
Johnson: I suppose you could say on one level that that's the case Phil, but in many respects I think it's only fair to say that's the system and because they're paid on commission and that's what they're encouraged to do, it's inevitable that they are going to perpetuate the problem. The focus goes on to qualifications and money and the sort of superficial satisfactions of work around, you know you could earn more money doing this or something like that. So that does tend to enlarge the scope or the extent of the whole problem but it's exactly what they're paid to do and that's to be expected.
Dobbie: So the obvious question, how do you find the right job?
Johnson: Well most people with difficulty and commitment, and commitment is the most important thing, it's all too easy to in effect sell out on ourselves and say, look this isn't great but it's pretty good and I've got it better than most other people. And quite often people who are doing very well on the face of it I think get sucked into this whole thing of security and so on, which is a very dangerous illusion because if you're not really doing what you want to do you probably don't have as much security as might be apparent. The best security is actually to be doing something that you love and so the starting point of that is actually self awareness, self awareness around what you want. And I would put that in terms of the most important aspect of that is actually having a long-term vision for your career. It's startling how few people have a clear vision of what they want to accomplish in the long term. Though I find that most people have got a strong impetus to want to make the contribution a lasting contribution and so on. The contrast between that and what they're doing is very often pretty stark. On a day-to-day basis it becomes more a matter of well I'm here in this job, it's not quite what I wanted, but it's what I've got and I have to make the best of it. All of which is completely inconsistent with living on a basis that's led by a vision and objectives and saying this is what I want to make of my career. So the starting point, I do believe, is around that long term vision and then it's a matter of bringing it back to the short term and saying what do I need to do now to start bringing that about?

Dobbie: Now you've got to have the ability as well, haven't you? Do you think people are generally realistic in matching what they like to do and what they're actually capable of doing?
Johnson: Well there's a spectrum in all of that. I would say most people are pretty realistic about it. My experience is most people are quite realistic in general terms. There are a few who are over confident. It usually doesn't stop them progressing. They often progress beyond the level of their competence. You've heard undoubtedly of the Peter Principal that whole thing of being appointed a level of incompetence. That does happen. For many, many more people I think it's a case of broadly matching their abilities to the level of responsibility but it just may simply be the wrong role or the wrong organisation and so on. And there are a good many people whose self belief, their limitations around self belief cause them to aim below what they're really capable of doing. I think that's probably if there's a major problem around it that tends to be more that one than the other end of the scale where people are overestimating their abilities. There's a lot more who underestimate.

Dobbie: Now tell me a little bit about what an organisation like EPR does then. You really help with this self-analysis stage, do you? Trying to find out what it is that people really want to do and whether they're capable of doing it and pointing them in the right direction?
Johnson: Absolutely, but we find that that's simply a part of what needs to be, generally speaking, an integrated exercise. It's a bit of a navel gazing thing if nothing is done to bring it to a higher level of self realisation, self actualisation, whatever you want to call it. The clarification is simply a part of an exercise, which ideally when somebody is seeking to make a move, would begin with a certain amount of work around clarification first of all of what they want and second of their value proposition and how it relates to what they want. And then perhaps a bit of an assessment about what is the next step. What needs to happen next? What would be the right role at that time? And then it becomes a matter of the work that we do is usually about helping people to do that, to accomplish that because it'll involve quite often a real stretching of the envelope, so to speak. A level of bringing things together that allows them to make a bigger move than the market might otherwise be indicating they could make. We find a lot of people who do have the courage to do what they really want to do are actually coming to the recognition that, look the ladder that I'm climbing at the moment is propped against the wrong wall. I need to prop it against a different wall and I'm going to need to do something really significant here to get things on the right track. And so it becomes in part then the marketing exercise. The marketing exercise has to be very well conducted but when it is, it succeeds partly because it's linked to the acquisition of further clarity and further awareness of where that right opportunity exists and developing that further clarity is essentially a market research project, which if it's handled in the right way will actually expand networks and will allow other people to see you as an opportunity, so to speak.

Dobbie: So out of the people who've been to see you that 80 percent is down to zero or close to it or you'd hope so anyway, wouldn't you?
Johnson: Sorry I didn't' quite understand the question.

Dobbie: The 80 percent that we mentioned early, the people who're dissatisfied in their role.
Johnson: Yes, I'm with you, yes exactly. Yes that's our aim is basically to put people on the track that they want to be on and with most of our clients I would say that's exactly what we do. Some people choose to work with us for a more short-term end simply because they might be impelled by simple economic necessity and they might be saying look for the moment I'm most marketable in this field. I'd like to be shifting into something else but the truth of the matter is now is not the time for me or something along those lines and so it's not necessarily first and foremost about satisfaction. Sometimes it's simply more about economic imperatives and that's the old thing of Maslow's Hierarchy that you're probably familiar with, if we're short of money we're not going to worry too much about self actualisation, generally speaking.

Dobbie: Got to have a house and got to feed the kids, haven't we still.
Johnson: That's right, exactly. But yes most of the people we work with we're working at that higher level where it really is about self actualisation.

Dobbie: Now do you think given the downturn in the economy, more people are asking the question about whether they're in the right job? I mean I wonder whether people are finding they can't even find the wrong job anymore so if they're starting from scratch they may as well start with the right job rather than the one that was making more money.
Johnson: I'd like to tell you that that was the case. I think it would be a very healthy thing for people concerned if everyone would do that. That would be a healthy thing for society. In fact, if everybody were doing that and if all of us were well engaged in the work that we really wanted the explosion of prosperity and not to mention of general life satisfaction would be quite stunning. It's something to imagine. Hopefully one of these days it will happen. But I'd like to be able to tell you that in this difficult economy that more people would be actually questioning whether they're in the right job but I'd say most of the time no. Generally speaking the time when that happens is in buoyant times. We've had some wonderful years in Australia recently where we've helped great numbers of people to work through transitions into what they really want to do. Less people are inclined to do that in this environment although there's an interesting little paradox in that because many people who could be aiming for something better and more satisfying are simply not doing it. They're sitting tight feeling like this isn't the time to make a move. But the paradox is simply that because that's happening it allows a lot of opportunity for those who are genuinely proactive. Because employers still have needs.
Dobbie: Those who are forced into it just because they've lost their job. I guess they've got the time now.
Johnson: Sure. They've got the time, that's right. If they've got the foresight and the willingness to engage at the level that they really should and could that would make a quite major difference. There's a chance basically under those circumstances to make this a major inflection point in one's career. It's very much a matter of making the choice to do that, obviously. It's not likely to happen by accident.

Dobbie: So you've done it Russell. I've done it and we both sound like well adjusted people so hopefully (at least we're kidding ourselves) everyone whose listening they can throw their papers in the air and say gee let's start again and ask myself what I really want. Been great talking to you today. Thanks for your time.
Johnson: My pleasure Phil.