Phillip Macko

Career Resiliency
Strategies to Supercharge Your
Career Trajectory
PHILLIP MACKO

CAREER RESILIENCY
STRATEGIES TO SUPERCHARGE
YOUR CAREER TRAJECTORY

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Career Resiliency: Strategies to Supercharge Your Career Trajectory
1st edition
© 2023 Phillip Macko & bookboon.com
ISBN 978-87-403-4479-0
Name and title of reviewer: Dan Edelman, Editor/Storyline Consultant

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CAREER RESILIENCY Contents

CONTENTS
About the Author 6

Author’s Note 7

1 Living to Work, or Working to Live? 8

1.1 The thrill is (going, going) gone 8
1.2 By the numbers 9
1.3 The Treadmill, The Pendulum and The Pivot 10
1.4 Resiliency Raising Resources 11

2 Managing Expectations - By the Mile 12

2.1 The Via Paradox 12
2.2 A Math Problem 13
2.3 The Tiny Tin Can 14
2.4 Tipping Dominoes 15

3 Doing Whatever It Takes, But Should It Take What We’re

Doing to Do It? 17
3.1 Picking a Fight 17
3.2 The Myth of Making Career Enhancing Sacrifices 17
3.3 The Times, They Are A-Changing 20

4 A Thin Sheet of Cracking Ice 21

4.1 Seligman’s work 21
4.2 The Current State of Play 22
4.3 I Hate it Here 22

5 The Modern Day Savanah 23

5.1 The Ancient Brain 23
5.2 Fight, Flight or Freeze 24
5.3 Unwinding the Yarn Ball 25

6 Jeff 26
6.1 Exceptional growth 26
6.2 An exceptional challenge… 27
6.3 How everything changed 28
6.4 Hold up a mirror 28

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CAREER RESILIENCY Contents

7 A Journey of Self-Discovery 30
7.1 Shiny marbles 30
7.2 The UVP Mission 32
7.3 A Thirty Day Challenge 32
7.4 The First Steps 34
7.5 Forming the Daily Habit 35
7.6 Three Meaningful Questions to Ask Yourself Weekly 36
7.7 Danger Will Robinson 36

8 Ishikawa’s Fishbone 38
8.1 RCA 38
8.2 Working on the Night Shift 39
8.3 Ishikawa Part 2 40
8.4 The Four Rs 41

Conclusion 44

References 45

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CAREER RESILIENCY About the Author

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Phillip Macko is a career coach and sales optimization consultant, with a career spanning
four decades, five industries and encompassing more than one dozen countries worldwide.
He’s coached hundreds of clients, and consulted for global pharma, international freelance
workplace platforms, an international engineering resource organization and a myriad of
other regional and national brands.

After twelve years as SVP, Sales for an international music publishing company, Phillip left
corporate America to get back to his entrepreneurial roots. From his early days as the co-
owner of a restaurant, to his forays into medical diagnostics, and now in his role as career
coach and sales process consultant, he champions the belief that with clarity and purpose,
anything is possible.

Phillip has presented to audiences around the world, most recently in China, where he shared
stories of career reinvention with more than 2,000 attendees of his keynote presentation.
He’s the three-time published author of Think Your Age, Don’t Act It, Make Others Greater
(both non-fiction) and a novel, The Conduit, which reached the #3 spot on Amazon for
its genre soon after its publication.

Outside of his professional interests, he’s an avid MMA fan, a cooking afficionado and
a lover of music. In Rio de Janeiro he’s an honorary “carioca.” In Finland he won an
impromptu, globally represented singing competition after presenting at the University of
Helsinki. In India he drove tuk-tuks through the streets of Bangalore after watching his
first cricket match. And in Canada he was an honorary speaker at the World Congress of
Physical Therapy. He lives in Ramona, California with his wife Jade, their daughter Mia
and a Corgi named Hachi (who he affectionately nicknamed Dr. Anthony Hachi). He has
three grown daughters, Brittany, Katie and Bridget, a son Peter, a son-in-law Jessie, and
two grandchildren, Bowie and Phoenix.

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CAREER RESILIENCY Author’s Note

AUTHOR’S NOTE
The year 2022 ushered in many unprecedented events – the (hopeful) end of a once-in-a-
lifetime pandemic as it entered its endemic stage, a war in Ukraine, supply chain challenges,
oil and gas prices rising – and the era of The Great Resignation along with its kissing
cousin, “Quiet Quitting.”

On average, 4 million Americans resigned from their jobs every month in 2022. 50% of
American workers were estimated by Gallup to be “quiet quitting.”

These trends weren’t limited to the U.S. These trends occurred world-wide.

Look, I get it. I’ve had my share of bosses I didn’t love working with or for. Lived through
my share of Mergers and Acquisitions. I’ve both been laid off and the one doing the layoffs.
I’ve worked jobs that I literally hated.

What I’ve come to understand from the aggregation of all these experiences is this - the
only common denominator in every one of them was me.

The above and much more is why I’ve written this book. I don’t want you to be part of
these statistics until you’ve fully explored strategies to help you better manage workplace
expectations, achieve greater work-life balance, gain career clarity on what’s most important
to you, and redefine your Unique Value Proposition.

Please do all this before updating your resume, changing your LinkedIn status to “Open
to Work” or taking your first interview with a new company.

I challenge you instead to first reach clarity on how to achieve career resilience.

Then to see where this clarity leads you.

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CAREER RESILIENCY Living to Work, or Working to Live?

1 LIVING TO WORK, OR
WORKING TO LIVE?

1.1 THE THRILL IS (GOING, GOING) GONE

As a professional career coach, I have the privilege of working with hundreds of clients each
year, all of whom share one common need: a meaningful, positive change in their careers.
Many, even most, are exploring the idea of leaving their current roles/ companies.

When I ask them to describe their current workplace life, they each share some variation
of a similar story. Maybe this is your story too. It goes something like this…

The weekend finally arrives after the five stress-filled, deadline-driven days it took to get
here, many involving late nights, early mornings, or both. It’s well into the evening when
you close the lid of your laptop a final time, slip your time card into a machine or lock
the doors behind you. You heave a sigh of relief and welcome a slow smile as it forms to
the thought of two full days of freedom from the grind.

No alarm rings the next morning. You throw covers over your head when the first rays of
daylight reach your eyes. It’s after nine when the pad of one foot, then the next, hits the
cold floor of your bedroom. It’s the next welcome Saturday morning in a long string of
Saturday mornings.

Caffeine kicks in as you catch up on all the necessaries your busy workweek didn’t allow
time for. Laundry, house cleaning, a quick trip to the grocery, a full restock of the pantry
and refrigerator after. Paint covers brush, screwdriver meets screw. You cross off an item or
two from an ever-growing to-do list in the afternoon.

Netflix is the oft-sought reward at the end of the day, finding you at your usual spot on
the couch, remote in one hand, a glass of your preferred beverage in the other. Later, when
a few drops of drool meet the pillow under your head, the evening ends.

Sunday morning comes. And goes too quickly. As the hands of the clock advance toward
five in the evening, unwelcome reminders of the workweek to come fill your head. You
close your eyes to these thoughts.

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CAREER RESILIENCY Living to Work, or Working to Live?

The alarm rings at six, you’re mid-dream. You mumble a few curse words, don your Monday
best and pour a cup for the road, or for the long commute from the coffee machine
to your home office.

Rinse, repeat, the work week is over. Rinse, repeat, the weekend is over. All the while
you’re dreaming of the vacation you’re planning. One where you experience a brief taste of
freedom, not in bite-sized two-day increments, but for a full and glorious seven to fourteen
days. Days where you can enjoy a brief taste of you being you.

And when it’s over, when the plane touches down on the runway and/ or the car pulls
into the driveway, when the suitcase is unpacked, when the alarm is set, when hours later
it rings, when the pads of your feet once again touch the cold wooden floor on Monday
morning, the rinse and repeat begins again.

Hmmm…

If the above rings familiar, know that it doesn’t have to. Nor should it. None of us dreamed
as a child of having a career where we spend year after year being bored, burned out, over-
worked or just plain disengaged.

So how did it happen?

1.2 BY THE NUMBERS

Except for years 2000 to 2004, workplace productivity has been in near steady decline since
the 1960s. Currently, lost productivity costs the global economy an estimated $7.8 trillion
annuallyi. Corporate financial losses facilitate talk of downsizing, creating uncertainty in
the workplace by placing both recent hires and more tenured (and higher paying) positions
in jeopardy. Positions in jeopardy cause workplace stress. Workplace stress leads to further
decreases in productivity.

And this vicious cycle leads to job dissatisfaction.

According to a recent Gallup pollii, 60% of the entire global workforce feels emotionally
disconnected from their jobs, 50% of workers experience job related stress daily, 41% are
worried about their future job security, 22% feel sadness while on the job, 19% are miserable
in their current roles and most concerning - 18% express anger about their current workplace
circumstances. If you’re a part of these percentages, you’re clearly not alone.

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CAREER RESILIENCY Living to Work, or Working to Live?

Further, Deloitte’s studyiii of 1,000 workers found that 77% of survey participants self-
identified as suffering from work-related stress, 64% characterized their stress as chronic. 91%
of respondents indicated that an unmanageable amount of job-related stress or frustration
impacted the quality of their work, and 83% indicated these conditions had a negative
effect on their personal relationships.

We’re doing a disservice to ourselves, our families, and our employers by allowing this to
continue. So, we have two choices. Make it better… or make an exit. But before we pack
up and head for the door, let’s be sure it’s the right thing to do.

1.3 THE TREADMILL, THE PENDULUM AND THE PIVOT

Cognitive dissonance, according to Psychology Today subject matter experts, is defined as the
state of having inconsistent thoughts, beliefs, or attitudes, especially as relating to behavioral
decisions and attitudinal change. A simple but effective example of cognitive dissonance at
play - we want to be healthy and fit, but don’t commit to healthy habits such as exercise and
eating right – as a result we experience cognitive dissonance and a requisite sense of guilt.

It’s twin sibling, career cognitive dissonance (CCD) is a very real condition too, and it happens
when there’s a disconnect between what we do, what we believe ourselves to be capable of
and how we’re perceived by others in the surrounding, supporting and/ or managing roles
we most often interact with. CCD is in direct conflict with our treasured self-worth. When
our sense of self is challenged, it creates an internal discordance our brain simply can’t abide,
so our minds seek resolution and drive us take action to resolve this internal disconnect.

In my experience as a career coach, I’ve seen cognitive dissonance drive clients to step off
the professional treadmill they’ve been running on for years, one day realizing they’ve been
running in place but never really advancing– only to step onto the next treadmill, all the while
pointing an accusing finger at the old treadmill and embracing the promise of the new one.

I’ve seen clients treat their career choices as though they were governed by the swing of
a pendulum, guiding them to an equal and opposite direction from the circumstances
they’re leaving. They’ve defined quite clearly what they don’t want, so they seek out the
opportunity farthest from it.

Finally, I’ve observed the full pivot. “This industry isn’t right for me anymore, so I’m
going to do something completely and wholly different.” Given that the average worker in
America will hold twelve different jobs from age 18 to 52, it’s quite common to leap from
one industry to another at least once.

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CAREER RESILIENCY Living to Work, or Working to Live?

All that said, as the saying goes, “Wherever you go, there you are.” There’s only one common
denominator to every job you hold and every company you work for – you.

So don’t step on the next treadmill, don’t swing the next pendulum, and don’t pivot, first
work on you.

1.4 RESILIENCY RAISING RESOURCES

In the pages that follow, we’ll explore ways to better manage expectations (both of yourself
and from others), the fragility that is today’s job market and how we can personally improve
it, the obsolete, self-limiting and self-sacrificing career rules we’re taught we must follow
and why we should challenge them – and most importantly, how we can employ resiliency
raising resources to achieve greater career satisfaction.

Let’s begin our exploration with a personal story…

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CAREER RESILIENCY Managing Expectations - By the Mile

2 MANAGING EXPECTATIONS -
BY THE MILE

2.1 THE VIA PARADOX

Paradigm-shifting career epiphanies arrive at the most unexpected times, and often in
the most unexpected of circumstances. Mine occurred in 1992, weeks after purchasing a
brand-new Geo Metro, a tiny three-cylinder car you could imagine desperately whispering,
“I think I can, I think I can, I think I can,” any time it approached the slightest of grades
while hauling more than just the driver.

I’d joined Kraft Foodservice, part of the Philip Morris family, in 1991 as a territory manager
covering a remote but expansive area – one I grew from $8,500 per week in sales to well
over $70,000 per week. As a result, I received the Rookie of the Year Award, a year later I
was awarded the nationally coveted Circle of Excellence.

In my fourth year, Philip Morris sold the foodservice division to Clayton, Dubilier and Rice,
a Jack Welsh (of GE fame) venture capital firm. Under the new ownership and over the
next eight years, I purposed myself to become a vital and necessary player in the company’s
game – knowing that this, and only this could offer me job security. I sharpened my skills,
looked for the competency gaps I could fill, and read every relevant business, self-help and
motivational book I could find. As a result, I was promoted to District Sales Manager, then
Regional Sales Training Director - and was able to survive at least four major rounds of
downsizing and layoffs.

Like so many before me, my luck didn’t last, when in year twelve, we were purchased
by a larger competitor. It became evident early into the acquisition that the acquiring
company’s products, systems and staff would take precedent over ours. Redundant positions
were scrutinized, later eliminated. Eventually my turn came. I was a number, and due to
my expertise in the products and systems being phased out, my number no longer fit the
bottom line.

Then I traveled the world. Wrote three books. My career blossomed. More on that later.
For now, I digress.

I lived in Hemet, California while in my role as territory manager. Florida Avenue (Hemet’s
main thoroughfare) was then considered to be one of the wealthiest streets in the entire U.S.,
but Hemet was nestled in the San Jacinto mountains, and a full forty-minute haul from the
nearest freeway. The distribution center for Kraft was located 153.2 miles round trip from

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CAREER RESILIENCY Managing Expectations - By the Mile

my home; the Idyllwild territory I covered was a 46 miles round trip; Anza a 73.6-mile
round trip; San Jacinto a 32-mile round trip. As you can imagine, I put a lot of miles on
my F150 open cab pickup. The F150, at the time, averaged fifteen miles per gallon city
and twenty miles per gallon on the freeway. Stick a pin in that, we’ll come back to it later.

My compensation for the first six months was a fixed salary, which “clicked-down” to straight
commission starting in month seven. There was no per diem, no gas allowance, all expenses
were mine to burden. So, before I accepted the role, I ran pro formas including estimated
fuel costs (amongst other cost events) weighed against commission potentials.

The theoretical calculations worked in my favor. Then the vias began.

2.2 A MATH PROBLEM

For clarity, the word “via” means “by way of ” or “on the way.” A via in my industry meant
delivering something to a client “on my way home.” In reality, I was making these deliveries
before I could go home.

To help illustrate the costs of these vias, I’ll share some math.

I had:

Forty-seven clients ordering once weekly at an average of forty-two cases = 1,974 cases

Twenty-five clients ordering three times per week at an average of forty-two cases = 3,150 cases

Total average cases delivered to my clients per week = 5,124

Assuming every case was picked, loaded, delivered correctly and in good condition, my pro
forma estimates would have been correct. But what I didn’t factor was the average number
of warehouse picking errors, which differs by industry, but as a whole is estimated between
one and three percent.

Kraft Foodservice, at the time, was on the high end of this range.

Using a baseline of 3%, here’s the case error rate:

5,124 x 3% = 154 cases.

154 cases a week delivered in error. Any guess as to how these errors got resolved?

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CAREER RESILIENCY Managing Expectations - By the Mile

Vias.

On my own time. And on my own dime.

2.3 THE TINY TIN CAN

My clients knew I drove an F150 pickup, one that could fit quite a few products in its
bed and back passenger areas. And so began the seemingly endless vibration of the pager I
wore on my belt and the vias that invariably followed. Fuel costs began to add up when, as
frequently as four times per week, I was round tripping to the distribution center to pick
up products for my clients, delivering them across the territories I covered, then returning
home to my family, often to dinner in the microwave and to children already asleep in
their beds.

Something needed to change. I met with my management team to discuss the delivery
issues and the toll they were taking on me and my family. Their answers: “It’s the cost of
doing business” and “We’re working on it.”

By year two I saw little improvement. To mitigate the ever-rising fuel bills taking huge bites
from my earnings, I sold my F150 and bought a brand new, three-cylinder Geo Metro
averaging thirty-three miles to the gallon.

That’s when everything changed.

Now, when my pager vibrated, I explained to my clients that I’d sold my truck, and that
my new Geo Metro had perhaps sixty to seventy percent less space to fit products than
did my F150.

I worried this may cause me to lose clients. It didn’t, and I couldn’t believe what happened next.

My client’s urgent needs somehow became less urgent. Now, most could wait for the next
delivery. For those that legitimately couldn’t, I still ran vias. Less than half as many. Oh,
and this. I was home earlier and more often in the evenings, in time to tuck my children
into bed and even tell them a story when they asked for one.

Instead of heating up a cold dinner in the microwave four nights per week, I was the one
cooking these dinners instead.

And that’s just the half of it.

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CAREER RESILIENCY Managing Expectations - By the Mile

2.4 TIPPING DOMINOES

Perhaps it was mere coincidence. Perhaps all the “working on it” my managers had assured
me they were doing had finally made an impact. I’ll never know for sure. What I do know
for sure is that within weeks of arriving at the distribution center in my new and tiny Geo
Metro, the pick rate and delivery errors to my clients magically reduced from 3%+ down
to an average of 1.2%.

And thus, in the Year of Our Lord 1992, came the aforementioned paradigm-shifting career
epiphany. All the money I spent on fuel, all the dinners I missed, all the time I lost with
my family, all of it happened …

…because of me.

Because I wasn’t properly managing expectations.

Imagine my surprise when such a simple thing as buying a smaller, more fuel-efficient vehicle
gave me back hours and days with my family, lowered my stress levels and importantly,
didn’t have a negative effect on my job security or income.

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CAREER RESILIENCY Managing Expectations - By the Mile

To my surprise, I had effectively tipped the first expectation-managing domino over. A

series of others would follow.

Here’s the bottom line. Had I not bought the Geo Metro I would have become yet another
number in 1992’s job satisfaction statistics. And as sure as I’m writing this sentence, I would
have eventually resigned.

I’m not suggesting all your workplace problems could be answered by making one small
change. But. More often than not, one small change leads to others and tips the dominoes
in your favor.

Here are a few very good dominoes to start tipping when faced with an opportunity to
better manage expectations:

1. Learn to say no
2. Before agreeing, try to better understand the situation by asking clarifying
questions
3. Don’t hurry your answer, ask for time to think it through
4. Before agreeing, think of more favorable alternatives, and propose compromises
5. When all the above fails, communicate the consequences to you of accepting,
making sure they’re both understood and appreciated

You’ll find new opportunities to help you better manage expectations by trying one or more
approaches above, you’ll also find other opportunities hiding in plain sight amongst the
obsolete, self-limiting, and self-sacrificing career rules we’ve been taught we must follow …

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 DOING WHATEVER IT TAKES, BUT SHOULD IT
CAREER RESILIENCY TAKE WHAT WE’RE DOING TO DO IT?

3 DOING WHATEVER IT TAKES,

BUT SHOULD IT TAKE WHAT
WE’RE DOING TO DO IT?
In my parent’s day, jobs often lasted a lifetime. In their day, expectations were a two-sided
coin that, when tossed, always seemed to land on the side of the employer.

Times have changed. So should our thinking.

3.1 PICKING A FIGHT

As of this writing, there are more than 1.7 billion websites online. Before the sun sets today
an additional 258,841 websites will be launched. Only a select few are awarded best in
class by Forbes magazine. One such website, Business Woman Media, was recognized as a
top 100 website for women by Forbes and has also won the prestigious Media Innovation’s
Best Niche Site Award in both 2019 and 2020.

On June 21, 2016, the website published an opinion piece titled, “9 Things You Should
Sacrifice for Your Career.iv” While I won’t argue with all their points, there are five we’re
going to go toe to toe on.

3.2 THE MYTH OF MAKING CAREER ENHANCING SACRIFICES

1. Embrace your commute – The article states you should accept that your dream
job is rarely located just around the corner from your home, and as such you
should be willing to sacrifice hours in your car in exchange for the chance to
advance your career.
a. Conventional wisdom - Face-to-face interactions in an office environment
foster strong workplace relationships, one’s leading to career advancing
opportunities. This may be true, but…
b. Consider - Apollo Technical recently highlighted a study by Owl Labsv. The
State of Remote Work, 2021, found that 77% of remote workers showed
increased productivity, with 30% doing more work in less time and 24%
doing more work in the same amount of time.
c. Score – My point. Global productivity is in steady decline, remote work
holds the promise of reversing this trend. Relationships do matter, but
productivity fuels the engine of growth.

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 DOING WHATEVER IT TAKES, BUT SHOULD IT
CAREER RESILIENCY TAKE WHAT WE’RE DOING TO DO IT?

2. Give up days off – The article advocates, when given the choice between taking
a scheduled day off and working, you should always choose work.
a. Conventional wisdom - It looks better in your bosses’ eyes when you
voluntarily sacrifice days off, as it demonstrates your dedication and
commitment to the organization.
b. Consider - The consequences of work-related burnout are clear: excessive
stress, fatigue, insomnia, sadness, anger or irritability, alcohol or substance
abuse, heart disease, high blood pressure, type 2 diabetes, vulnerability to
illness. And this is not me talking, this is from the Mayo Clinicvi.
c. Score – I’ll take another point with the following disclaimer - sometimes
exceptional circumstances arise. Do what you must when they do, but don’t
allow this to become a regular habit – or you place your health, well-being
and job productivity at future risk.

3. Give up evenings and weekends – Stay late, be the last to turn off the lights in
your cubicle enough years in a row and one day you’ll be turning off the lights
in a new and (highly coveted) corner office.
a. Conventional wisdom - Those who work hard and make sacrifices prove
their organizational worth and are more frequently rewarded with merit
increases and career advancement opportunities.
b. Consider – In today’s career economy, few things are forever. For example,
thirty-three percent of all workers will separate from their companies due
to a merger or acquisition. The average job lasts only 3-5 years. Finally,
according to Slate Magazinevii,“ Employers don’t tend to sacrifice their own
financial interests to protect their employees. When budgets are tight, they
lay people off.” This is especially true for employees in the later years of
their careers. According to Pro Publicaviii and the Urban Institute, more
than half of older workers are pushed out of longtime jobs before they
choose to retire, suffering financial damage that is often irreversible.
c. Score - Another point to me.

4. Don’t get romanced away to a new company from your current one – The
article states that sacrificing an excellent position with another company by
staying with your current company can be a strategy for success and lead to
future promotions.
a. Conventional wisdom - When a new opportunity arises within a company,
the most loyal will be rewarded.

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 DOING WHATEVER IT TAKES, BUT SHOULD IT
CAREER RESILIENCY TAKE WHAT WE’RE DOING TO DO IT?

b. Consider – Loyalty matters, but talent matters more. Stay when your
talents are recognized, appreciated and valued, but know that workplace
tenure statistics are changing around you. Further to the above, and
according to Zippiaix, on average, women will hold 12.1 jobs in their
lifetimes, each lasting 3.9 years. Men will hold 12.5 jobs in their lifetimes
lasting 4.3 years. Staying too long can cause you to become stagnant,
and it can actually hurtx your chances for career advancement by today’s
hiring standards. You owe it to yourself and your employer to do your
best, to grow in your knowledge and commitment to enhancing your
skillsets. When this stops, when your workday is more a rubber stamp
than a contribution, you’re doing yourself and your company a disservice,
regardless of tenure.
c. Score - Another point for me.

5. Just accept it when you don’t get a merit increase – The article states there are
times when a company simply can’t afford merit increases, and accepting this
reality gains you favor.
a. Conventional wisdom - Economic downturns, profitability expectations,
possible mergers/ acquisitions, revised productivity KPIs all lessen a
company’s ability to offer generous merit increases, and a loyal staff member
should be accepting of this.
b. Consider - It costs far less to keep a productive employee than it does to
lose one. Gallupxi cites the Bureau of Labor statistics for 2016’s annual
turnover rate of 26.3%, with an associated cost of one-half to two times
the departing staff member’s annual salary to replace them. Using this as
a baseline in a hypothetical 50-person company, with salaries averaging
$45,000 per year, per staff member, the cost of turnover can range between
$295,875 and $1,183,500 each and every year. Let’s refresh based on
more recent statistics. In 2021, the Bureau of Labor Statistics estimated a
whopping 57.3% turnover rate, a figure more than doubling 2016’s – so
take the numbers above and multiply them by a factor of two.
i. In plain terms, it costs far less to keep a staff member, even after reasonable
merit increases have been given, than it does to lose and replace them. So
stand up for yourself when you’re due a merit increase. Keeping you with
increased wages is far less expensive than losing you.

c. Score – The last of five points. All for me.

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 DOING WHATEVER IT TAKES, BUT SHOULD IT
CAREER RESILIENCY TAKE WHAT WE’RE DOING TO DO IT?

3.3 THE TIMES, THEY ARE A-CHANGING

Be brave enough to change with them and hold the line on the things that matter most.
Never accept consistent, long-term sacrifices to your health, time with your family, your
sanity, your identity, your relationships, or your integrity for a job. When you do, everyone
eventually loses.

Learn to manage expectations.

This, of course can be easier said than done. Exploring the condition known as learned
helplessness may explain why…

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CAREER RESILIENCY A Thin Sheet of Cracking Ice

4 A THIN SHEET OF CRACKING ICE

4.1 SELIGMAN’S WORK

Learned helplessness, by definition, is a state that occurs after a person has experienced a
stressful situation or suffered setbacks repeatedly. Over time and due to repeated past non-
successes, this person adopts the belief that they are unable to control or change their situation,
so they stop trying – even when opportunities for change and success become available.

This condition is best exemplified by the work of notable psychologist Martin Seligmanxii and
his team. Now I’m not one who advocates experiments on animals, even ones I personally
find repelling (such as rats), but Seligman’s early experiments on animals, as difficult as they
may be to learn about, do illustrate the learned helplessness condition. The next paragraph
may be tough for some of you to read. You’ve been warned.

In one such study, conducted on caged rats, the pathway under the exit gate was electrified
prior to the gate being opened. After nearly an hour of trying to escape; only to be stung
each time by an electrical charge, the rats, to a one, stopped attempting escape. Even days
after the electrical currents had been turned off, the rats stayed in one corner of their cages,
unwilling to even take the first step nearer to the now-opened, non-electrified pathway
under the gates. Only after the introduction of outside stimulus did they attempt to - then
successfully escape their confines.

I repeat, only after the introduction of outside stimulus.

Seligman and his team conducted additional studies on humans, thankfully none involving
electricity. In one, participants were subjected to repeated loud noises. Each was given a box
with a button that they were told, when pressed, would turn off the sounds. The participants
of this study were split into three groups. One group could terminate the noises by pressing
the button four times, the buttons given to the second group were nonfunctional, the
third group was subjected to no noise at all. In a second trial, these same participants were
given a box with a lever and provided the same noise-terminating instructions. Nearly to a
person, those who were unable to stop the noise in the first experiment failed to even try
to stop it in the second.

Two simple, but insightful examples of learned helplessness at play. This condition isn’t limited
to caged rodents and humans holding buttons, we experience it in our professional careers as
well, until one day things reach a boiling point and a new, outside stimulus is introduced…

21
CAREER RESILIENCY A Thin Sheet of Cracking Ice

4.2 THE CURRENT STATE OF PLAY

Think of this, in 2009, 21 million employees resigned from their roles. By 2019 this number
doubled to 42 million. In 2021, 47.8 million workers quit their jobs – representing a
staggering 31.5% of the entire workforce.

Could some or most of these losses have been avoided? To uncover the answer, we should
first explore the likely causes.

Pre-pandemic, many organizations (knowingly or unknowingly) rested precariously atop

a thin sheet of ice. Outside factors such as supply-chain globalization, near-shoring/ off-
shoring, AI/ robotics and automation-driven advancements coupled with general shifts from
manufacturing to services and a multitude of merger-driven acquisitions together formed an
environment of economic uncertainties, and as we learned earlier, economic uncertainties
create workplace and worker uncertainties.

In 2017, for example, Gallup’sxiii polling research found a full 85% of all workers surveyed
hated their jobs and self-identified as emotionally disconnected from them. Circumstances
worsened over time, and in 2020 as the pandemic raged, many staff members faced the
threat of lay-offs or furloughs, while those not in immediate jeopardy saw perhaps their first
ever taste of remote work and the freedoms it brought with it. Friends rediscovered friends,
workers rediscovered hobbies and passions. Work-life balance became better balanced.

And as it did, job satisfaction continued to plummet.

4.3 I HATE IT HERE

In 2021, many additional defining factors aggregated together. According to Pew Researchxiv,
in terms of major/ minor causes of job dissatisfaction, the percentages were as follows:
lack of advancement opportunities – 33% major/ 30% minor, feeling disrespected – 35%
major/ 21% minor, lack of schedule flexibility – 24% major/ 21% minor, working too
many hours – 20% major/ 19% minor.

These trends continued into the first half of 2022. Nearly two-thirds of the entire workforce
(65.07%) were estimated to be actively looking for a new job. Couple this with the expected
shift from full time employment to fractional/ contract work and we can now see the fissures
as they form on those thin sheets of ice.

If any or all of what we’ve explored thus far together resonates, either for you or for someone
you know, work with or manage, this is your call to action. It’s time to shine a flashlight
on the monster hiding under the bed. It’s time to rip off the bandage. It’s time to stop
running in place and step off the treadmill. There are career-empowering steps you can take.
To achieve them, there is work to be done.

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CAREER RESILIENCY The Modern Day Savanah

5 THE MODERN DAY SAVANAH

5.1 THE ANCIENT BRAIN

Let’s step back from today’s career economy statistics, and by extension from commutes and
Zoom meetings, from budgets and board rooms, all the way back to a time when mankind’s
needs were simple; food, shelter, clothing – and survival.

The species that you and I, and all other human beings on earth belong to is Homo sapiens.
It’s believedxv that the first Homo sapiens walked the earth some 300,000 years ago. The
precursors to Homo sapiens include Homo habilis (the first species known to use tools),
Homo erectus (the first species to discover fire) and Homo neanderthalensis (the first
species known to cook their food, wear clothing, and to both be skilled hunters of game
and conversely to have vegetarian diets).

The evolution of skills throughout humankind’s precursors can be mapped very closely to
the growth (and literally the size) of their brains, and the evolution from the brain’s most
ancient element, the brain stem (or reptilian brain) through the later developing limbic
and neocortex regions.

Here’s a bit about each.

The reptilian brain is first believed to be seen in amphibians some 400 million years ago.
In reptiles, as well as in mammals (humans included), it controls important core bodily
functions such as heart rate, breathing, body temperature and balance.

The limbicxvi brain first emerged in mammals an estimated 250 years later, and has evolved
in humankind. It records memories, and it is responsible for the whole of our emotional
responses. It drives value judgements and, by way of the emotions it governs, exerts a
powerful grip on our behaviors.

The neocortex, last to form of the three (some 2 to 3 million years ago), is responsible for
the development of human language, abstract thought, imagination and consciousness. It’s
notably flexible, with near infinite attributable learning capabilities.

Of the three, let’s focus just on the limbic brain for a moment, and specifically on one of
its components, the amygdala. The amygdala is responsible for what is commonly known
as the “Fight or Flight.”

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CAREER RESILIENCY The Modern Day Savanah

In the days of our ancestors, this fight or flight reflex meant life or death in the face of an
attacking tiger, even a dinosaur – and brought with it a heavy dose of adrenaline.

Author Daniel Goleman, in his book Emotional Intelligence, offers this, “If the Amygdala
identifies a form of threat within a signal, it triggers an adrenal fight or flight response.
This leads to shutting down the rational neocortex’s instructions and preparing the body
for immediate physical action. If the Amygdala identifies no threat, then the neocortex
remains in control.”

Today’s modern world offers threats far more subtle in nature, though the amygdala often
still governs our responses, ones that have evolved from “fight or flight” to “fight, flight,
freeze or fawn” according to leading psychologistsxvii. For our purposes, we’ll focus only on
the first three.

And remember, short of the Amygdala’s hijacking, the neocortex stays in control. Stick a
pin in the above quote, we’ll revisit it later.

5.2 FIGHT, FLIGHT OR FREEZE

There are physiological tells when we’re facing imminent danger, such as our ancestors did
when staring down a roaring lion or a tiger who is ready to pounce; our pupils dilate, our
hearing becomes sharper, our heart rate quickens – feeding blood and oxygen to the body so
as to enhance our ability to either run away or fight, our breathing quickens, muscles tense,
and we experience “butterfly stomach” as blood is diverted away from digestive systems.

The tells facing us when we experience the more subtle threats of our modern-day suit,
dress or pantsuit, storefront, cubicle or corner office work world are just as easily observed.

Fight – Emotions/ Actions – anger, defiance. Manifestations – passive/ aggressive behavior,

refusal to comply, complaints to HR, verbal defenses and/ or attacks. Externalization/
blame-gaming.

Flight – Emotions/ Actions – sadness, withdrawal. Manifestation - days off or sick leave,
keeping a low profile at work/ avoiding workplace gatherings, “quiet-quitting,” resignation.

Freeze – Emotions/ Actions – fear, surrender. Manifestations - giving in, acceptance, passivity,
immobilization.

Most, if not all of which are governed by what?

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CAREER RESILIENCY The Modern Day Savanah

The Amygdala.

But what we actually need help from is the neocortex. We need to tap into our language
skills to best articulate our thoughts and feelings. We need to tap into our imaginations
to propose new and innovative resolutions. We need to take advantage of the neocortex’s
infinite learning ability to adapt and grow from the experience.

We need to suppress our old-brain and engrained fight, flight or freeze instincts in order
to free our creative minds. Doing so empowers us to move beyond the moment (and the
past) to envision a possible future.

5.3 UNWINDING THE YARN BALL

As human beings, we innately rely heavily on our instincts. We make decisions that help us
escape from the jaws of cognitive dissonance. When faced with fight or flight, if we allow
our primitive brains to drive our behaviors, we have to live with the consequences.

So, let’s remind ourselves.

We are the aggregate of our life experience, and the sum of our relationships, thoughts, and
actions – both in our personal lives and in the workplace. We’re hard wired, good or bad,
for survival – a realm ruled by the amygdala - and the current career economy presents a
nuanced survival challenge, but a challenge to our survival none-the-less.

Modern life is rarely simple, it’s instead a tangled and ever-growing ball of yarn. We should
strive to untangle it.

The following story will help illustrate how…

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CAREER RESILIENCY Jeff

6 JEFF

6.1 EXCEPTIONAL GROWTH

I’m honored to count Jeff Levy among my list of dear friends. His career experience includes
participating in/ launching new technology companies, facilitating both leveraged and
management buyouts, raising investment capital, and managing as many as three hundred
staff members along the way. Jeff played an integral role in the launching of hundreds of
startup ventures and is the co-author of Making the Jump - Into Small Business Ownership.
Like me, he’s a career coach. In this capacity he’s advised over nine-hundred individuals
and helped more than three-hundred-twenty become entrepreneurs.

How he came to become a career coach is a story worth telling. One that matters.

In the late eighties, Jeff and his wife Andrea sold everything they had, moved to Seattle,
Washington and launched a tech startup venture with friends. As Andrea will whole-heartedly
attest to, Jeff has always been a risk taker, provided the risks he takes enable him personally
to have an impact on the success of the opportunity.

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CAREER RESILIENCY Jeff

Jeff and his partners successfully raised $2 millions for their film-based technology. And then
a small company called Microsoft overtook the space as the world saw an evolution from
film to digital. The days of his startup were numbered, and as the team worked through
the necessary transition, one of the original investors saw potential in Jeff and asked him
to join his new investment firm, Windswept Capital, as a director. Together they identified
a target acquisition company. Jeff did the market analysis and helped raise the money that
ended in an acquisition.

Eventually, Jeff became the President and COO of the acquired company prior to it being
sold to a public entity.

6.2 AN EXCEPTIONAL CHALLENGE…

In 2002, he and a fellow C-Suiter negotiated a management buyout of the company. Jeff
now had three-hundred-plus direct reports. He soon came to realize that the business was
his life, and that his personal identity was defined by his work.

Sound familiar? It should. A Gallupxviii poll found that a full 70% of employed Americans
with college degrees define their identities by their job and the requisite title they hold.
55% of all working American without a college degree do as well.

There are dangers in this, given the current job market landscape. As I’ve touched on earlier,
the average tenure for a job is 4.1 years. Many factors play a role in this statistic; the business
is sold; a recession comes in and cutbacks are made. A once-in-a-lifetime pandemic occurs.
A change in management changes everything, and the role you once loved transforms into
you playing a character in a workplace telenovela.

In 2002, Jeff unwillingly accepted a starring role in his own workplace telenovela after the
company’s Board of Directors announced they would be bringing in a new person to run
the company. If you ever have the pleasure of having a conversation with Jeff or attend one
of his presentations, you’ll come to know him as one of the most sincere, intelligent, and
kind persons walking God’s green earth. Jeff doesn’t hate anyone, but with a stark difference
in perspective, ethics and demonstrated respect for the employees, he found working with
this new, board chosen CEO to be untenable.

Jeff learned something about himself then and would share his lesson if he could with you
now. He would tell you, if asked, “When presented with a choice between career and values,
always choose values. You sleep better at night. Oh, and the career always comes back.”

27
CAREER RESILIENCY Jeff

Not long after a frank conversation with the new CEO, Jeff began negotiating the terms
of his resignation, a lawyered-up, verbal-knife-wielding process playing out over nearly six
months. At stake, his stock in the company, his partial ownership in the facilities. Nearly
his entire liquidity. All was saved – except Jeff’s job.

6.3 HOW EVERYTHING CHANGED

Then, as they so often do, a career-changing epiphany struck in the most unexpected of
circumstances. It came through a series of conversations with Andrea.

They were frank and honest. Empathetic and loving.

Life-altering.

Andrea challenged Jeff not to simply move on and accept the next role, which she was sure
would more than likely be the same as or similar to the last. Sure, he’d proven his meddle
running a large company, scaling a business, managing a huge staff. Andrea reminded Jeff
that this all represented what he did and/ or could do, but it was not who he was.

“Get to know yourself first, then plan your next step,” was Andrea’s advice. Advice my friend
Jason Madden gives to every transitioning military veteran he works with.

6.4 HOLD UP A MIRROR

Before re-inventing his career after retiring from active duty, Jason was a counterintelligence
officer with the Army and a Marine. He’s dedicated his “Second Act” to helping fellow
transitioning veterans, once founding the non-profit Veteran’s Empowerment Trustxix, and
now working closely with such veteran service groups as Recruit Militaryxx and Veteratixxi.

The military, for anyone who hasn’t served, offers a robust resiliency mentorship program,
one which educates transitioning veterans to leverage the survival skills they learned in the
service to facilitate their transition to civilian life. The first step in this resiliency mentoring,
and the thing Jason advises friends, veterans, and the clients he coaches, is to “start by
holding a mirror up to yourself.”

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CAREER RESILIENCY Jeff

And that’s exactly what Andrea asked Jeff to do. She challenged him to take a long or as
little time as he needed to find the answers to some meaningful questions by way of self-
reflective journaling.

She tasked him to explore himself, and to discover who he was, not what he could do.

To define what was most important to him. What his values were. What he wanted to be
known for and by.

She convinced him this self-reflection must come before he could begin thinking about a
business and his next career iteration.

After several months, Jeff reached clarity. By determining who he was, what defined him,
what fulfilled him, he was empowered to discover a career path that would bring him closer
to each of the things he’d identified, knowing there had to be an economic engine out there
that would allow him to achieve each of goals he’d established.

Fast-forward to today, Jeff is an invited speaker to the Small Business Association, SCORE,
JP Morgan, AARP, Bank of America, Northwest Entrepreneur Network and more. While
financially blessed in his career, keeping up with Jeff’s Facebook feed is an on-going game
of Where’s Waldo. He’s additionally active in his community, plays tennis three times a
week, attends Pilate’s classes with Andrea twice per week, and has breakfast with a group
of friends every Saturday.

As you might guess, at age 73, Jeff is more active than many working professionals half
his age.

This is only possible because he no longer defines himself by the work he does. He no
longer lives to work, instead he works to live. Andrea gave him the gift of time; and with
it he gave himself the gift of career clarity. The rest, as they say, is history.

You can have this same clarity too, but to do so first requires a meaningful look inward….

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CAREER RESILIENCY A Journey of Self-Discovery

7 A JOURNEY OF SELF-DISCOVERY

7.1 SHINY MARBLES

Should I stay or should I go? That was the question.

As we’ve learned, when faced with career challenges, our hard-wired survival instincts kick
in and the more ancient parts of our brain claim control over the situation. We experience
fight, flight or freeze.

In my case, early in my management career, it was fight, with a healthy serving of cognitive
dissonance and externalization on the side.

I’d been promoted to district manager at age 31 and put in charge of a team of twelve
territory managers. No more vias, in fact no more working weekends. I was lucky, I took on
a great team, their efforts regularly earning top performing district of the quarter honors. At
age 33, when the vice president of sales for our market was transferred to a newly opened
facility, I raised up my hand and presented myself as the clear choice to replace him.

The market president told me to lower it because, in his words, “You don’t know what you
don’t know.”

I don’t know what I don’t know. Hmmph.

This happened on a Monday, I passively accepted his criticism then marched back to my
private office where I aggressively attacked an innocent desk with my fists. My anger, fueled
by cognitive dissonance transcended to thoughts of resignation by Friday, when I updated
my resume, made a list of contacts I knew at competitive companies – all on the same
desk I’d assaulted days earlier.

I called a good friend and mentor on the drive home and told him I needed help planning
my escape. I made barbequed ribs; he brought the beer.

Once the last rib was picked to the bone, after a quick clean-up with a fist-full of wet
naps, and a few empty bottles into a twelve-pack, I launched into my rant about being
skipped over for promotion. I laid out my most eloquent externalization-of causes, cognitive-
dissonance-laced argument. He listened and nodded in a way I took to show his agreement.

As I continued to lay out all my justifications, a slow smile formed on his face.

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CAREER RESILIENCY A Journey of Self-Discovery

I thought I’d convinced him.

Turns out, he was having none of it.

These were his only words of advice, “Every day is a new day on the playground. Show
up with a shiny new set of marbles and see how many kids want to play with you then.”

I’ll admit, I was a little put off and even more than a little confused by his advice, so we
switched subjects to football. But once the beers were gone and my head hit the pillow, I
spun his words around in my head like a washing machine tumbler spins clothing.

Eventually I got it. Showing up with a shiny, new set of marbles meant showing up to work
with a new and enhanced set of skills.

A different friend once advised me to “Never have a Plan B, always be working on Plan A
instead.” I decided that if I were to change companies, it would be on my own timeline…
and on my own terms. I gave myself thirty-days and began making my Plan A plans. They
started with the question I asked myself.

I took out a piece of paper, turned it sideways, then wrote out my question, adding a long
line to the right.

Here it is:

How Can I
Become
More
Promotable?

Now it’s your turn. Ishikawa’s fishbone is all about root cause analysis urn. Create your
own career resiliency question based on how you’d like to improve your current workplace
situation, write it in a box like I did above, then draw a straight arrow across the page.
Now keep it handy, we’ll return to it later...

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CAREER RESILIENCY A Journey of Self-Discovery

7.2 THE UVP MISSION

Next, I went to work creating my UVP Mission. Following my format, create one of your own:

1. Begin by;
a. Drafting an “I Am” list, including the words and phrases you feel best
define you. For example, you may include words like - passionate, driven,
forward-looking, competent, dedicated, reasonable, objective.
b. Next, create an “I can” phrase list. Here you’ll tally up your current go-to
competencies.
c. Next, create an “I excel at” list, narrowing in on those you are strongest at.
d. Finally, draft a one to two paragraph personal Unique Value Statement
about yourself inspired by the above. This is today’s UVP. The clear goal is
to evolve it.
2. With your personal UVP in mind, make a list of all the possible options you
have to improve your current circumstances by leveraging today’s UVP, and
imagine the best possible outcomes along with any perceived downsides.
3. Next bravely and honestly examine your shortcomings and weaknesses. List out
each, then brainstorm strategies you could employ or steps you could take to
enhance or improve them.
4. Now look beyond yourself and deep into the workplace. What are the areas,
processes and things you (and others if appropriate) see most in need of
improvement? List out each of these opportunities.
5. Now, begin to dream and scheme in small increments. Tom Peters, in his
landmark book In Search of Excellence said, “Details, details, details make the
difference.” Think of all small, 1% ways you can leverage your strengths and
enhance your current UVP. Then make a list of all the 1% ways you can
improve on your identified weaknesses and shortcomings.

Now we’ll empower your work…

7.3 A THIRTY DAY CHALLENGE

Two principles to keep in mind before we get to the empowerment exercise.

1. Life is cause and effect. Stimulus, response. Change the cause or stimulus, see a
new effect or response.
2. Making huge, sweeping changes is often unsustainable by their very nature
(look at the success rates of New Year’s Day resolution-inspired diets). This

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CAREER RESILIENCY A Journey of Self-Discovery

is why I agree with James Clear’s recommendation from his excellent work
Atomic Habits – focus on the aggregation of 1% gains.
a. By making 1% improvements to your stimulus, you’ll at first experience
1% responses. These often are nuanced, so you’ll need to record of them.
Just as the aggregation of 1% gains add up incrementally, so do the 1%
aggregations of responses.

We’ll come back to these principles later. For now, back to my UVP Mission (UVPM).

What happened over the thirty-days of my UVPM changed the trajectory of my career. I
stopped dining on a nightly diet of bitter grapes, quit quiet quitting. Instead, I set about
working on myself. Refining my personal value proposition. Sharpening my skills. Exploring
ways to fill gaps and voids, to incrementally improve myself and my workplace.

Here’s the backstory on the most valuable opportunity I discovered.

Foodservice distribution operates on high volume, huge top-line revenues and tight profit
margins. Pennies matter, nickels and dimes do too. One of the 1% goals I established was
to better manage my team’s results as measured by these pennies, nickels and dimes by
exploring ways to improve their gross profit contributions – by 1% each quarter for at least
four consecutive quarters. I began by studying our product mix.

We were a broadline distributor of over 11,000 line-items. While “center of the plate” items
(seafood, red meat, etc.) drove volume and top-line revenues - creating the kinds of numbers
salespersons brag about and get recognized for annually - the associated profit margins
were paper-thin mints (Monty Python callout), especially when compared to other, more
profitable segments such as beverages (coffee, juices), paper/ linen supplies, and cleaning
chemicals (think dish machines, disinfectants, etc.) – for example.

After a fair amount of number crunching and analysis, I created a profitability calculator
based on hypothetical product mixes. Mind you, this was back in the green screen days of
MS-DOS, long before pivot tables and databases, so it was Flintstone-like – but it did the
job. Using this tool, my team could enter their client’s current product mix, calculate the
gross profits generated and their estimated commissions, then play with the product mix
by adding more profitable lines and subtracting less profitable ones to see the impact these
changes had both on profitability and commissions generated.

It was a game changer; our profitability numbers grew well beyond my 1% goal. Soon word
spread, awards were awarded. Soon my calculator was in use companywide. It spread to
other branches. As a direct result, I became the company’s profit guru and in less than a

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CAREER RESILIENCY A Journey of Self-Discovery

year was promoted to Regional Sales Training Manager and given responsibility over creating
and delivering an eight-week onboarding training program as well as designing continuing
education modules for the 250-person sales organization.

When the company was sold, I launched my next entrepreneurial venture. As an experienced
sales trainer at my former company, I became comfortable presenting to crowds. One such
presentation on behalf of my new company led to a consulting contract with a Finland-
based medical equipment manufacturer and the opportunity to train their sales professionals
from around the world.

Years later, after selling the medical business, I was recruited by an international music
publishing company to evaluate their sales team and present sales training and sales strategy
recommendations. This role became full-time, and took me across Canada, the U.S., Latin
America and Brazil.

It also took me to the Real Screen event in Washington, DC, where I met the documentarian
who recorded the story of the largest team of persons with disabilities to ever reach Mt.
Everest basecamp. It also recorded the story of my dear friend Gary Guller, the expedition’s
leader and the first man to summit Everest missing an arm.

I had the honor of telling their story in my second book – Make Others Greater. Publishing
Make Others Greater led to international speaking engagements, the most recent in China.

Sure, there were detours and roadblocks along the way, but everything I’ve shared above
began with my UVP Mission, and grew wings by way of the observational journal I created,
one that chronicled my UVP Mission daily experiences.

I’ve taught this strategy to countless others. Their career evolutions have proven to be just
as vibrant and exciting as mine.

Here’s how it works:

7.4 THE FIRST STEPS

Having started your UVPM, create a journal and keep at it for the next thirty-days. As you
do, keep the following in mind:

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CAREER RESILIENCY A Journey of Self-Discovery

1. As you explore and implement the 1% changes in your UVPM, take note of
their 1% responses, recording the impacts and interactions you have with co-
workers and managers as a result of these changes
2. Summarize your experiences at the end of each day as follows: What I Learned,
What Shows Promise, What Surprised Me, What Were the Roadblocks.
3. Return to your diagram and add the following – Learnings, Possibilities,
Surprises and Roadblocks. It looks like this and is all you need to do. For now.

Learnings Possibilities Surprises Roadblocks

Your
Career
Reliency
Question

Back to the UVPM journal. If you’re new to journaling, here are a few general tips:

1. Find the journaling vehicle that works best for you. Record videos, create a
Word document, put pen to paper. Whatever you’ll stick to is the right answer.
2. Start each day by re-reading your UVP.
3. Be open and honest with yourself, and don’t judge yourself for what you’ve
written or recorded.
4. Get creative. Draw pictures, describe feeling, smells and tastes in vivid,
descriptive terms.
5. Remember - your journal is for your eyes only.

7.5 FORMING THE DAILY HABIT

Conventional wisdom says it takes twenty-one days to form a new habit. Whether this is
true or not is openly debated, what’s not debated is that their success hinges on anchoring
the desired new habit into daily routines, rewarding yourself regularly along the way and,
when appropriate, enlisting the help of an accountability buddy.

The end goal is to develop procedural memory around your new habit. Procedural memory,
also known as implicit memory, drives our ingrained and automatic actions. Procedural
memories are first formed in our brain’s synapses. The more frequently an action is

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CAREER RESILIENCY A Journey of Self-Discovery

performed, the more this action becomes unconscious and automatic. By combining daily
discipline with long term commitment, journaling will become relegated to your storehouse
of procedural memory actions.

As a writer, I’ve mentored many aspiring authors who self-identify as frequent writer’s block
sufferers. To combat any writer’s block you may experience when journaling, give yourself
permission to stop seeking perfection – and just write. You’re not aiming to become the
next James Patterson here – so it’s okay to be imperfect. Accurately recording the events of
the day matters more than how eloquently they’re recorded.

Now have at it. Have fun. Make your writing playful or raw. Sparse or verbose.
Whatever drives you in the moment should be what you honor. Just get it all down.
Throughout the day. Every day.

7.6 THREE MEANINGFUL QUESTIONS TO ASK YOURSELF WEEKLY

At the end of each week, ask and answer the following:

• Did I move closer to, further away from, or make no progress toward the goals
in my UVPM?
• What advice would the person I want to become give me after this week?
• What successes did I achieve that I’m most proud of, both personally and
professionally, and how can these experiences be leveraged next week?

Don’t get discouraged if the above answers indicate a gap between your UVPM and reality.

7.7 DANGER WILL ROBINSON

Before we get to the next chapter, a word of warning. The UVPM is meant to help you
see things in a new way, to look for opportunities in the challenges you face. In sum, to
introduce a change in your workplace cause-and-effect continuum.

All this takes time. As you read the next chapter, you’ll discover where the final, and
arguably most important phase in your UVPM exercise leads. Don’t let the insights and
strategies you’re about to read effect the objectivity and open-mindedness you’ll need to
have a empower a successful UVPM outcome,

Confirmation bias defines the tendency we often have to interpret new evidence as confirmation
of our pre-existing beliefs or theories. Here’s a simple, but effective example from the

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CAREER RESILIENCY A Journey of Self-Discovery

great minds at verywellmind.com. “Imagine a person believes left-handed people are more
creative than right-handed people. Whenever this person encounters a person that is both
left-handed and creative, they place greater importance on this “evidence” that supports
what they already believe.”

Before reading the next chapter, make a list of all the pre-conceived notions you may have
about the outcomes from and challenges to your UVPM. And commit to yourself not to
seek ways to validate them for the next thirty-days.

If you don’t, you may prove yourself right – and in doing miss out on the many benefits
of the UVPM exercise.

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CAREER RESILIENCY Ishikawa’s Fishbone

8 ISHIKAWA’S FISHBONE

8.1 RCA
Unless you have roots in Six Sigma, you’ve no doubt been wondering about the diagram
you started in chapter 7. Here’s a hint – the answer’s in the chapter title.

In the 1960s, Professor Kaoru Ishikawaxxii created a simple but powerful tool to study
cause and effect relationships and in doing so, solve complex questions. Ishikawa is widely
considered to be one of the founding fathers of quality management in Japan, his thought
leadership strategies are about to become the latest tool in your toolkit.

While Ishikawa proposed a total of seven quality tools, including: control charts, run charts,
histograms, scatter diagrams, Pareto charts and flowcharts, we’re going to narrow in on the
final – the “Ishikawa diagram.” It’s commonly referred to as the “fishbone” diagram, you
can see how it got its name from the diagram below.

Fishbone Diagram

People Machines Measurements

Communications
Fixtures
Training

Incorrectly
Assembled Parts
Incorrect Parts
Standard Work
Not Verified

Methods Methods

Ishikawa’s fishbone is all about root cause analysis (RCA), helping us to stop sprinting from
problem to proposed solution, and instead to assess the underlying complexities within each
assumption and possibility we identify in order to accurately pinpoint the real underlying issue(s).

This tool has proven invaluable in helping countless users to step away from the problem-
solution speed-dating table fueled by career cognitive dissonance (CCD). As I experienced,
and as you also may know, CCD is an uncomfortable state to exist in. As such, our brains
push us to find solutions to solve our CCD state, and when we do, research has proven we’re
rewarded with dopamine – this according to studies cited by the University of Londonxxiii.

38
CAREER RESILIENCY Ishikawa’s Fishbone

The article states in its byline, “Brain regions which make dopamine, a chemical released
during sex, eating and monetary reward, have been linked to the Aha! moment of sudden
clarity during problem solving.

In sum, we’re rewarded by our brains chemical dispensary system when we solve a problem –
even when the solution we choose is later proven ineffective. Allow me to illustrate…

8.2 WORKING ON THE NIGHT SHIFT

While attending Youngstown State University, I took a job as shift manager for the Denny’s
Restaurant in Hermitage, PA. After completing my MIT (Manager-In-Training) program,
I shadowed the restaurant’s general manager on the dinner shift for my first month.

Every night was the same. A long line of hungry guests would assemble near the front door,
the general manager would take his place greeting, then seating them. The problem was, as
the night wore on, there were never enough clean tables, so he’d chip in by cleaning dirty
dishes from guestless tables, watch the line of hungry guests get longer, become increasingly
frustrated, yell for the buss persons to help him, apologize to the next guest he seated, then
rinse and repeat.

Dopamine assuredly coursed through his system when he put an ad in the paper and soon
after hired additional help, enabling him to beef up from two dishwashers/ buss persons to
four. Cognitive dissonance gone. Problem not solved.

Our labor costs climbed, and were soon out of whack with the company’s productivity
benchmarks. Corporate took notice. I was tasked to help figure it out.

By way of background, I believe in the principle of “managing by wandering around.”

That’s what you’ve done (or will do) during your UVPM – that’s what I did with mine,
and that’s certainly what I did my first solo dinner shift at the Denny’s in Hermitage, PA.

The following is a true story, the names have been changed to protect the innocent. (Kidding,
I don’t name any names, I just wanted to add a callout to the famed TV show Dragnet).

I digress.

Instead of taking the spot our general manager predictably took at the front door greeting
and seating guests, I freed myself up by bringing in one of my best waitstaff members to
take my place. I gave instructions to her and the host on shift that night – greet every guest
in line, regardless of how far back they are, update them regularly on their expected wait
times for a table, and when appropriate, strike up a conversation with them as they wait.

39
CAREER RESILIENCY Ishikawa’s Fishbone

Soon after the front door team was posted, I began wandering around. Literally. So as not
to raise suspicions initially, I stopped by the server’s prep station, and chipped in making
salads. I spent time on the cook’s line, firing chicken on the grill mostly.

Once I felt the coast was clear, my wandering led me to the area most responsible for our
out-of-whack productivity numbers. The dish station.

Know what I found? No one there. All of them, all four of them, were sitting back-to-back
on two upside down milk crates in the walk-in cooler reading newspapers.

As you can imagine, I had a document or two for each to sign once the shift was over.

And here’s the point. No matter how many new dishwashers we hired, there would always
be a backlog of dishes - if the dishwashers sat in the cooler reading newspapers instead of
doing their jobs.

Root cause found. Problem solved.

8.3 ISHIKAWA PART 2

Let’s get back to you, and to the “wandering around” you’ve done over the past thirty-days
(or will do). You began your UVPM exercise by crafting a career question in the initial
diagram you were asked to create, you may have also had a thought or two about the answer
or answers to this career question. This is why you were asked to set aside these thoughts
and instead experience the daily events of the experiment as they transpired - without trying
to prove your thoughts to be right.

Now let’s put the learnings to work. Grab a multi-pack of different colored highlighters,
you’ll need them.

First, skim through your journal highlighting in yellow every entry representing the learnings
you experienced over the last thirty days. Now make a bullet-point list of each highlighted
entry, and rank each in terms of its importance to your career resiliency goals.

Repeat the exercise with a different-colored highlighter for each of the remaining categories
in your developing fishbone diagram - possibilities, surprises, roadblocks - ranking each just
as you did with your learnings.

Add them to your fishbone diagram by making three hashmarks on the lines below each category,
then adding your ranked items. Your fishbone diagram now should look something like this:

40
CAREER RESILIENCY Ishikawa’s Fishbone

Learnings Possibilities Surprises Roadblocks

#1

#2

Your #3
Career
Reliency
Question

8.4 THE FOUR RS

Before we go on, take a moment to celebrate. You’ve spent (or are committed to spend)
thirty-days making 1% workplace enhancements and being the author of their cause-effect
outcomes. In doing so, you have the ability to look back to day to see daily insights as to
where the aggregation of these 1% gains began, and how they built on one another like so
many Lego blocks becoming a castle or a fortress.

Now let’s get to work on the answer (or answers) to your career resiliency question.

To begin, add four straight lines underneath the long middle arrow. Here are the labels for
each - rank, refine, re-evaluate, retreat.

The Four Rs.

Learnings Possibilities Surprises Roadblocks

#1

#2

Your #3
Career
Career
Resiliency
Reliency
Path
Question

Rank Refine Re-Evaluate Retreat

41
CAREER RESILIENCY Ishikawa’s Fishbone

Your learnings led to discovering possibilities. Once recognized, these possibilities led to
surprises. Sometimes, in the exploration of possibilities, you also encountered roadblocks.

Based on this thought exercise, re-consider the ranking of your list of possibilities, and
enter the (either validated or re-ranked) list of possibilities in order on the bottom of the
page (below the diagram).

Now, let’s pause and refresh on an earlier topic. Remember my 1% gross profit goal? When
I completed UVPM exercise and got to this section, it ranked #1.

Referring back to the learnings, surprises and roadblocks I recorded first in my journal,
then ranked, I considered their relationship to my goal, and where appropriate, used them
to create a list of the possible approaches I could take to achieve 1% profit growth for four
consecutive quarters.

I determined that there were six likely reasons why our profit margins were low. I used a
Five Why’s approach to explore each.

Here’s the Five Why’s I used to come up with the answer to my own career resiliency question:

1. Q1: Why aren’t my district’s profit margins higher?

a. A: (Likely reason #4) We’re encouraged to and rewarded for selling high
revenue producing center of the plate (COP) items.
2. Q2: Why are we encouraged to focus on COP items?
a. A: The saying in the foodservice industry is, “Control COP, control the
account.” Because COP items are the stars of the show. Sure, it’s great
when the green beans are tasty. The prime rib (or lobster or fried chicken)
must be.
3. Q3: Why do we believe that selling COP controls the account?
a. A: Chefs who change COP vendors risk compromising the quality of their
highest priced menu items. Patrons can and do notice when the quality of
their favorite COP item changes, most often assuming this to be an effort
by the chef to cut costs. Cost cutting costs customers.
4. Q4: Why don’t we explore other, more profitable and often proprietary
products to sell?
a. A: Because, in our current company culture, reps with the highest gross
sales win awards and trips. And retain their accounts.
5. Q5: Why can’t they be rewarded for profitability instead?
a. There’s a general lack of understanding, training, and cultural support to
drive this initiative company-wide.

42
CAREER RESILIENCY Ishikawa’s Fishbone

Once I completed the above Five Why’s, I realized that a company sea change was needed,
one that I knew would never happen top-down, so I vetted several bottom-up ideas. Reaching
my team at the “pocket book” level changed behaviors, one rep at a time. When profits
rose for my team, other managers wanted to know why. As they began using my strategy,
and their team’s profits rose, the VP of Sales started asking questions.

You know the rest of the story.

And speaking of stories, here’s why I tell them. Stories bring messages to life, making
them both a more memorable and more impactful. We relate to them personally, even see
ourselves as a character in them.

So now that I’ve told you my stories, it’s time for you to finish writing one of your own.

From your UVP, to your UVPM, to your completed Ishikawa fishbone, to the assumptive
solutions you developed – and finally to the Five Why’s exercise – you have all the characters,
plot-twists, heroes, villains.

It’s time to see how this story ends – and what new ones it inspires.

43
CAREER RESILIENCY Conclusion

CONCLUSION
If you’re reading this sentence, you have your own unique career story. It’s filled with heroes
and villains, with great quests, a few plot twists and likely even a few bumps and bruises.

While your past story is certainly prologue, it doesn’t have to hold career-sway over how
you write your new book. That said, empowering a new career trajectory isn’t easy, I never
promised it would be. I told you it would take work.

But if you put in the work, you will change the trajectory of your career and empower
your career resiliency.

Oh, one last thing. If you accept (or accepted) my thirty-day challenge and it helped you,
please tell me your story.

You can reach out to me here - https://phillipmacko.com/contact-me.

I hope to hear from you soon.

All the best,

Phillip Macko

10-23-2022

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CAREER RESILIENCY References

REFERENCES
i
Gallup – The World’s $7.8 Trillion Workplace Problem - https://www.gallup.com/workplace/393497/
world-trillion-workplace-problem.aspx
ii
Gallup – State of the Global Workplace: 2022 Report
iii
Deloitte – Workplace Burnout Survey - https://www2.deloitte.com/us/en/pages/about-deloitte/articles/
burnout-survey.html
iv
Business Woman Media – 9 Things You Should Sacrifice for Your Career - https://www.thebusinesswom-
anmedia.com/9-things-you-should-sacrifice-for-your-career/
v
Owl Labs – State of Remote Work 2021 - https://www.thebusinesswomanmedia.com/9-things-you-should-
sacrifice-for-your-career/
vi
Mayo clinic – Job Burnout, How to Spot it and take Action = https://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-
lifestyle/adult-health/in-depth/burnout/art-20046642#:~:text=Consequences%20of%20job%20
burnout&text=Excessive%20stress,Sadness%2C%20anger%20or%20irritability
vii
Slate Magazine – You Don’t Owe Your Company Undying Loyalty - https://slate.com/human-inter-
est/2020/02/loyalty-work-employer-employee-relationship-like-a-family-run.html
viii
Pro Publica – If You’re Over 50, Chances Are Your Decision to Leave a Job Won’t be Yours - https://
www.propublica.org/article/older-workers-united-states-pushed-out-of-work-forced-retirement
ix
Zippia – Average Number of Jobs in a Lifetime (2022): All Statistics - https://www.zippia.com/advice/
average-number-jobs-in-lifetime/#:~:text=On%20average%2C%20men%20hold%2012.5,from%20
4.0%20years%20in%202018.
x
LinkedIn – Career Risks of Staying Too Long at One Company - https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/career-
risks-staying-too-long-one-company-mike-adamo/
xi
Gallup – This Fixable Problem Costs U.S. Businesses $1 Trillion - https://www.gallup.com/work-
place/247391/fixable-problem-costs-businesses-trillion.aspx#:~:text=The%20cost%20of%20replac-
ing%20an,to%20%242.6%20million%20per%20year.
xii
National Library of Medicine – Learned Helplessness at Fifty: Insights from Neuroscience - https://www.
ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4920136/#:~:text=Learned%20helplessness%2C%20the%20
failure%20to,learning%20undermined%20trying%20to%20escape.
xiii
Gallup Research (Published on LinkedIn Pulse) – Why 85% of Working Professionals Actually Hate
Their Jobs - https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/why-do-85-working-professionals-actually-hate-jobs-
bhattacharya/?trk=pulse-article_more-articles_related-content-card
xiv
Pew Research Center – The Majority of Workers Who Quit a Job in 2021 Cite Low Pay, No Opportu-
nities for Advancement, Feeling Disrespected - https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2022/03/09/
majority-of-workers-who-quit-a-job-in-2021-cite-low-pay-no-opportunities-for-advancement-feel-
ing-disrespected/
xv
Forbes Magazine – What Was it Like When the First Humans Arose on Earth? - https://www.
forbes.com/sites/startswithabang/2019/05/15/what-was-it-like-when-the-first-humans-arose-on-
earth/?sh=1c00be9d6997
xvi
McGill – The Brain from Top to Bottom - https://thebrain.mcgill.ca/flash/d/d_05/d_05_cr/d_05_
cr_her/d_05_cr_her.html#:~:text=The%20reptilian%20brain%20first%20appeared,roughly%20
250%20million%20years%20ago.

45
CAREER RESILIENCY References

xvii
Simply Psychology – Fight, Flight, Freeze or Fawn: What This Response Means - https://www.simplypsy-
chology.org/fight-flight-freeze-fawn.html#:~:text=Fight%3A%20facing%20any%20perceived%20
threat,please%20to%20avoid%20any%20conflict.
xviii
Gallup – In U.S., 55% of Workers Get Their Sense of Identity from Their Job - https://news.gallup.
com/poll/175400/workers-sense-identity-job.aspx
xix
Veteran’s Empowerment Trust website
xx
Recruit Military website
xxi
Veterati website
xxii
6 Sigma – What is Ishikawa - https://www.6sigma.us/etc/what-is-ishikawa-fishbone-diagram/
xxiii
Goldsmiths, University of London – Aha! Moments Linked to Dopamine-Producing Regions in the
Brain - https://www.gold.ac.uk/news/aha-moment-dopamine/

46