How to Get Ahead Without Murdering your Boss (20 page)

4. Attend this year's chartered accounting conference.

A year down the track…

Nathan met with Tom Packer, Strong's replacement as CEO, to discuss his interest in remaining with Medivalue in a CFO role with significantly reduced hours, so he could spend more time with his wife and new daughter. Tom was initially relieved, believing that Nathan may have been resentful that he wasn't appointed to the CEO position. A very hard worker and used to putting in long hours, Tom was surprised at Nathan's desire to reduce the time he was spending at the office. Aware of the challenging times ahead in launching the technology internationally, Tom didn't commit to Nathan's request for greater work/life balance and admitted that there might be significant travel required to establish financial management strategies and systems in new geographic markets.

After due consideration, Nathan recognised that Medivalue could not offer him the work model he desired. He started to look for another job and found a CFO role in a well-established medium-sized company that better matched his values. Tom, although sad to lose Nathan, was keen to have some input into choosing his own CFO.

Yasmin Perfect

Career review

Yasmin's father was a property developer, and her mother a homemaker. Her father left home when she was very young, and because he provided no child support, Yasmin and her mother had to change their way of life to fit their strained circumstances.

Yasmin left school at the end of Grade 11 to undertake a secretarial course. She hated school and was motivated to earn money as soon as possible. She liked the idea of working in a flash office in the city, near all the fashion shops. After completing her course, she took a role as receptionist with a legal firm and was promoted to a secretarial position.

Three years later, Yasmin married her police officer boyfriend and they had a baby a year later. Yasmin took two years off and then returned to the law firm where she worked four days a week. After her husband was killed in a shooting incident, Yasmin had to find a full-time job. She worked on a temporary basis for a year, before joining Medivalue as Arnold Strong's PA.

Yasmin enjoys secretarial work, but she has struggled with the demands of full-time hours and single motherhood, often feeling overwhelmed, sad and guilty about spending time away from her son, who is now eight years old. Her mother has been very supportive and looks after Tom before and after school.

Career options

1. PA for new Medivalue MD

2. Events management

3. Retail

4. Public sector administration role

5. Social work

Arnold Strong's death was a moment of truth for Yasmin, causing her to think carefully about her life in general and her career path. While not dissatisfied with her work, she yearned to do something that would allow her more time with her son and a higher level of remuneration. She recognised that she was an emotional person and tended to be sensitive to criticism but was gratified by the positive feedback regarding her organisational skills and presentation.

Yasmin had a general interest in a number of other areas, including retail and social work. As a result, she had no clear career goals. She explored tertiary education options, but with her financial and time constraints, ruled that option out as not viable at this time. She was interested in events management, although it was a questionable fit with her values, and she had limited experience.

Yasmin identified two short-term goals:

1. Take six weeks leave to spend time with her son and volunteer with an events management company to determine if she liked the work.

2. Begin looking at public-sector opportunities to improve her work/life balance.

A year down the track…

Yasmin volunteered with an events company run by a friend, but although she enjoyed the work, the hours and customer demands were onerous, and she ultimately decided that this was not the career path for her.

She liked the new Medivalue CEO, Tom Packer and found that, although demanding at times, she enjoyed working for him. He gave her time off to attend school functions, as long as she made up the hours.

Yasmin is still considering a move into a public-sector role that would provide security and increased flexibility, but she hasn't found a role of interest to date.

Clara Cooke

Career review

Clara was an only child and grew up in a creative environment; her mother was an artist and her father a musician. Due to her parents' careers, her family moved seven times during her school years. As a child Clara was shy and slightly overweight. She struggled to make friends and was bullied badly as a teenager. Clara had a close relationship with one auntie, Auntie Ann, who was a chef and would regularly stay with Clara's family between her many different jobs. Auntie Ann had excited Clara's interest in cooking, and the mobile lifestyle seemed a natural part of work life due to Clara's life experience. Auntie Ann was able to arrange a chef apprenticeship for Clara. In the absence of other options, this seemed a logical career choice when she completed school.

Clara found she had a natural talent for cooking and progressed easily through her training. To build her skills and reputation, and enjoying some stability after the multiple childhood moves, she worked for six years at one of Sydney's better restaurants. She then met her partner, a restaurant manager, who encouraged her to travel. Clara spent three years overseas working in the restaurants of several three star London hotels. When that relationship broke down, she returned to Australia.

Clara's experience allowed her to source a role at a small, boutique Sydney eatery. Always a hard worker, her creative menu development and culinary expertise helped the restaurant become well known and successful. After five years, the owner suffered a heart attack and decided to sell. Clara took out a loan and purchased the restaurant.

Clara refurbished the restaurant to give it a trendy and modern look. She created a new signature dish and business was growing steadily. Unfortunately, Clara's strengths were on the creative side, and she struggled to manage the operational running of the business, finding the recruitment of good staff and the development and leadership of a cohesive, efficient team especially challenging. Mr Arnold Strong was a regular patron and ultimately offered to purchase a fifty-five percent share of the restaurant, promising Clara that she would maintain creative and management control.

Strong did not keep to his word and began to interfere in all aspects of the restaurant operation, casting aspersions on Clara's competence to staff, suppliers and patrons behind her back. Clara, stressed by the continual conflict with Strong and the staff, just wanted to get out and agreed to sell her remaining percentage of the restaurant to Strong at a bargain basement price, on the condition she was paid to continue to run the restaurant until such time as she found alternative employment. He sacked her the day after settlement. With financial commitments to meet, and distressed by the damage done to her reputation, Clara was keen to obtain alternative employment as soon as possible, preferably out of Sydney. Therefore, when Strong mentioned the advertisement for a chef's position at the Edge resort, she applied.

Career options

Clara left The Edge soon after Arnold's death. She took another position as a chef at a lodge in Tasmania. Battling depression and a sense of failure despite the move, Clara soon found herself in conflict with her boss and colleagues. She started relying on alcohol and pills to get her through each day. Ultimately, she reached a point where she was unable to function at work. Realising that she needed help, Clara sought psychological counselling.

A year down the track…

Counselling raised a range of issues beyond the incident with the Sydney restaurant. Clara is slowly working through these issues with her psychologist and is again focusing on exercise as one strategy to deal with stress. She remains on medication at this stage because she has recently commenced working two shifts a week in a small Launceston restaurant.

Career Management Resources

Self-understanding, Identity and External image

Bolles, Richard Nelson. (2009)
What Color Is Your Parachute 2009: A Practical Manual for Job-hunters and Career-Changers.
US: Ten Speed Press.

Ibarra, Hermina (2003)
Working Identity. Unconventional Strategies for reinventing your career.
Boston: Harvard Business School Press.

Mitchell, Karen (2004)
Careers and Motherhood. Challenges and Choices. How to successfully manage your career through pregnancy, birth and motherhood.
NSW: McGraw-Hill.

Scott, Ted & Harker, Phil (2002)
The Myth of Nine to Five. Work, workplaces and workplace relationships.
NSW: Richmond Ventures Pty Ltd.

Schepp, Brad and Debra (2010).
How to Find a Job on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, My Space and Other Social Networks.
New York: McGraw Hill.

Watkins, Michael D. (2009).
Your Next Move. The leader's guide to navigating major career transitions.
Boston: Harvard Business Press.

Worklife — Catalogue of assessment tools, career books and resources
www.worklife.com.au

Environment

Australia Centre for Industrial Relations Research and Training — ACIRRT (1999)
Australia at Work
. Sydney: Prentice Hall.

Cocks, Doug (1999)
Future Makers. Future Takers. Life in Australia 2050.
Sydney: University of NSW Press.

Coombs, Ann (2001)
The Living Workplace. Soul, spirit and success in the 21st century.
Canada: Harper Collins.

Ellyard, Peter (2001)
Ideas for the New Millennium.
Melbourne: Melbourne University Press.

Hamilton, Clive (2003)
Growth Fetish
. NSW: Allen & Unwin.

Rifkin, Jeremy (1995)
The End of Work: The decline of the global labor force and the dawn of the post-market era.
New York: Tarcher Putman.

Financial objectives

Bell, Anita (2003)
Your Real Estate Jargon Explained.
Sydney: Random House.

Bell, Anita (2003)
Your Share Market Jargon Explained.
Sydney: Random House.

Bell, Anita (2001)
Your Mortgage And How To Pay It Off In Five Years By Someone Who Did It In Three.
Sydney: Random House.

Bell, Anita (2001)
Your Money: Starting Out & Starting Over.
Sydney: Random House.

Financial Planning Association of Australia — click on Consumer tab for resources —
www.fpa.asn.au

Action, Reflection and Results

Hakim, Cliff (2003)
We Are All Self-Employed: How to take control of your career.
US: Berrett-Koehler.

Bridges, William. (1998)
Creating You and Co: Learn to think like the CEO of your own career.
New York: Perseus Books Group.