How to Start Work

When I was a teenager walking to and from school helped me prepare for the day and unwind from the day. It was my way of managing teenage angst. As I was not a child genius I expect teenagers of today have found coping strategies to manage their anxieties and the stresses of life. Even without Grange Hill and Byker Grove they make it through.

There is so much talk about the anxious generation we forget how resilient they are. I am incredibly grateful that I grew up before mobile phones and social media made it difficult to hide from the world. Even when we were hiding during the pandemic, teenagers survived.

Back in the 90s I could not wait to be an adult as I felt “young” compared to my worldly, experienced peers. We wanted to populate our CV of Life with the boasts, successes and milestones that gave us status. If only we knew what adulthood would be like and the CV competition would follow us into work.

I can look back now and laugh or maybe cry as I remember my adolescence and the rush to grow up. “There were kids who had ‘relationships’, but they’d quickly settle into a sort of parody of domesticity, tea on laps in front of TV, walking around the shops, as if trapped in a particular game of Mums and Dads,” writes David Nicholls in Sweet Sorrow.

I laughed out loud when reading that on the train commute to work. As a dad who eats his dinner in front of screens and is writing a book about why work matters, I want to help young people deal with the sorrow that comes with the search for meaning and purpose.

How to Start

Jodi Kantor’s book How to Start encourages people to embrace the struggle and do it as well as you can.

‘Most of us, at eighteen or twenty-five or later, are curious, confused, and drawn in multiple directions. We benefit from struggle, we require it. Being an A student, going to a great school, looking sharp on LinkedIn, having certitude about what you want to pursue - if there were ever guarantees of a smooth entry into the working world, they’re not anymore,’ writes Kantor.

Her 112-page book makes good points about the collective agreement that education plus hard work should equal something good. That is what we signed up for especially if we incurred debt paying to learn. Whatever your education, the possibility that the equation is faltering is terrifying.

I discovered her book in The Economist article Career advice for Gen Z Why traditional career advice is failing youngsters which also referenced Runnin’ Down a Dream by Bill Gurley. He and Ms Kantor both encourage students to pursue their passions. ‘Nothing will make you more successful than loving what you do for a living,’ reasons Mr Gurley. You can be moral, eco-friendly, sleep at night and earn a good living if you have the CV to warrant high remuneration. The choice between work that is fulfilling and work that is well paid may not be yours to make.

My takeaway from the article was: ‘If you are good at your job you will have more leverage to do enjoyable work than if you pursue a passion and are mediocre at it.’ That is true and allows you to transition from wannabe to a version of your dream.

War for Talent

I am good at writing but not a professional or published writer. I am good at HR but not in the talent pipeline for leadership roles. I am passionate about what I do but I remember what Lucy Kellaway said about talent being a lie. ‘Most people are not talented, they are average.’ If there is a war for talent, who or what is the enemy? AI? Your colleagues? The leadership team? Other companies? Yourself?

The Kellaway rule of hire competent workers and look after them makes sense, but that doesn’t excite people who want to be the best they can be. Maybe that stability is what young people want from work. That is the least we can give them along with entry-level work. That is how I started.

‘Low pay is a challenge, yes. But those years often provide invaluable training, the kind that builds slowly and then yields something great,’ says Kantor. ‘In a fulfilling work life, the ratio of satisfying tasks to annoying ones is favorable, and all those actions add up to the performance of a craft.’

Craft & Need

Kantor urges us to master a craft by becoming exceptionally good at something through expertise and human skill. You then apply your craft to meeting a need that can earn you a living. If looking for a job is like launching paper airplanes at a brick wall, the advice from Benjamin Todd, the author of 80,000 Hours is to ride the wave of automation, moving into the skills that become most valuable at each time.

Back when I was a teenager there was an attitude that only mugs work for a living these days, and our teenagers are well aware of it. The welfare culture makes us British and it many benefits, pardon the pun. I doubt these mugs read the Daily Telegraph to see that climbing the career ladder is pointless when young people claiming ‘anxiety’ benefits rake in more cash than those grafting on minimum wage.

Anxiety and employment can co-exist if younger people are given a chance to prove it. Generations before them have already proved it.

Inspiration

What we talk about when we are working and living

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