The above phrase certainly holds if I've learned anything over the years. The journey can diverge and move forward and backward, yet it's critical to continue taking those steps.
Throughout these following three blogs, my 1st on the TPI³ site, I will discuss my career through the decades, emphasizing my solopreneur journey these last five years. A funny thing happened on my path to career development. There was a first job. Then a second, a third, and another, and yet another. Over each of those stops, I learned a lot about who I am and what I want. Changing industries, roles, and, yes, cities and provinces was an adventure in helping companies and growing as a professional and a leader.
Despite my lengthy "corporate" career (there were more larger companies than smaller ones), I have consistently thought about having my own business. Sometimes, when I felt I wasn't ready, I considered returning to school to get a Master's Degree in Entrepreneurship (which, looking back, seems a bit contradictory). My first attempt at a business arose in the early 90s, fresh out of University, and again in the early 2010s when I wanted more control and input into how I was spending my time (after all, work does comprise a significant percentage of our lives). At those points in time, my focus was (a) software development and IT support for the veterinary industry and (b) continuous improvement tools (Lean Six Sigma, Technology) and project management support, focusing on the manufacturing industry.
Fast-forward through those decades and into the pre-COVID year of 2019, when I decided to put out my own "shingle" and go all-in with consulting (or so I thought; more on that later).
Let me say it has been a very enjoyable ride so far. Yes, it has been filled with unexpected turns and a few potholes, but it has also had some exhilarating moments. I usually like being open about mistakes (or calling them misjudgments), and I'll start the same way here. When I relaunched JEWAL in 2019, I kept the same core service offerings as in 2011: CI tools, PM skills, overlaying technology, and data mining while focusing on the Manufacturing industry.
Guess what? Of the customers I've had over the last five years, only two have been in the Manufacturing space, and neither wanted me for Lean Six Sigma implementations or PM project oversight. They primarily focused on leadership skills, developing other leaders, longer-term planning, and goal and KPI implementations.
It took me until last year to realize an important fact. I was a different professional in the 2020s than in 2011. I spent over a decade in healthcare, and my IT and Manufacturing days were more in the rearview mirror (still in sight, but not crystal clear). In the last decade, I focused more on building (teams, locations, business operating systems) than managing (people, tasks, projects). The days of being an SME for programming and development are well behind me. Similarly, while I'm proud of my work with continuous improvement and Lean Six Sigma, I know there are Master Black Belts out there who could run circles around me with their knowledge of the lean tools, not to mention statistical control and run charts.
I don't write this with any regret or sadness. It's a natural sign of career evolution and, to a large degree, what excites me to be doing right now. I've taken this newfound self-awareness to update my business profile and website, even though I can't do the same with my 200+ business cards from 2019 as quickly. Side note: How long will that business communication tool be around anyway?
Recently, a colleague asked me about the type of engagements and projects I was working on. When I mentioned my focus the last year or so has been (surprisingly) on forming and coaching leadership teams, strategy deployment and execution, business operating systems, performance management tools, and organizational structures, many of which I would (incorrectly, I know) caption under an "HR" type of role. She quickly responded, without missing a beat, that as we move later in our careers, it becomes more about people, leadership, coaching, and guidance as we begin to pass along our knowledge to the younger generation of leaders and try to assist them in their leadership journey; however, that may look. And if there are people like me, that journey can be full of twists and turns, although it is essential to try and remember your North Star and what you want to be doing.
Over the last few years, I've referenced the Japanese term "ikigai" quite often. It is considered the ideal spot to align what you love and your unique skills with where you can provide value to others (and maybe even the world) and earn an income. "A reason to live," roughly translated. The pragmatist in me wonders how realistic it is to find such a place. I'm sure many do, but I suspect it's the minority of us. Regardless, as part of these reflections, I've started to think about what exactly my ikigai would be. After all, even in the back end of one's career, it's never too late to consider.
I have recently begun narrowing down my core strengths (or unique skills). They differ from what I thought in 2019, though they remain equally valuable (if not more so). Over the last six months, I've written about many of them in earlier blogs. I still need to develop these skills even though I consider them a strength already - there is always room for improvement. I read and reflect on those books and articles that help me continually optimize my ideas on these skills. After all, little in this world is a "one size fits all."
So, where do I excel? Building and implementing business operating systems, fully or partially, is my unique skill. This includes strategy creation frameworks, balanced scorecards, OKRs and KPIs, dashboards and review processes, with monitoring, tracking, and adjustment (PDSA cycle) to optimize performance. I provide guidance and training to leadership to ensure that top performance can be achieved. That's where I've seen my skill set surge and be recognized in these last five years as a consultant. I wasn't solely responsible for these elements in my corporate career. Still, I had a lot of exposure (and input) into how these companies worked to be able to sift through their systems and identify the good (best practices) from the bad (yes, garbage). Some individuals have more specialized expertise with these individual skills. I won't disagree. However, when I bring them all together cohesively with my experiences - learning from my successes and failures, to enable a successful deployment and execution. That sounds like a unique skill to me.
If I have now identified that portion of ikigai (skills), what's next?
What do I love to do? I'll save that for the next entry.
Darren
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