How To Not Only Survive But Thrive While Working From Home?

On the face of it, working from home (WFH) looks to be quite appealing.

After all, WFH brings lot of good things to the table.

Such as:

• One can save lot of time and energy that is spent on commuting to the office and then back home as also other travel required for professional reasons
• One can transition from workspace to personal space almost instantaneously so anyone staying far away from their office is back home the very moment she shuts down the office laptop!
• One can spend more time at home and with their family, spouse and children and even pets
• One can stay away from office gossips and several unproductive activities that one may have to willy-nilly indulge in while at the office
• One can take care of certain simple and quick household chores at home during the work time which would have not been possible if one were working at the office
• One can find it easier to schedule meetings since meeting room availability is not an issue in the virtual world
• One can tend to feel more equal to others since the size of one's cubicle or cabin at the office becomes irrelevant and everyone is just a circle on the screen with some initials or an image! 

However, WFH comes with its own set of challenges and pitfalls too.

Here are some of the major ones:

• Lack of social and emotional connect with your colleagues
• Thin line between work time and personal time
• Blurring of work environment and personal space as personal space provides the physical aspect of work environment for performing work in the virtual mode
• Too much and very frequent disruption while working
• Strain on eyes due to excessive time spent in front of the laptop screen
• Adverse impact on physical well-being since
• The physical venue of every virtual meeting is the same every time - in front of the laptop!
• There is not much walking to do to reach the office cafeteria, one might as well be working just next to the dining table in one's home
• There is not much walking to do to reach the office washroom, one might as well be working just next to the washroom in one's home
• There is not much walking down the office corridors to visit a colleague's cubicle or cabin and of course no corridor conversations are possible!
• Adverse impact on mental well-being since
• The interactions with your colleagues become lesser
• The interactions, if and when they happen, typically tend to be highly work-centric
• The socializing done in virtual mode has severe limitations 

So how does one not only survive but thrive while working from home?



Here are some ideas and points that may be of great use:

• Develop empathy for your office colleagues:
• Expect to overhear a colleague's family and children on certain occasions while you are having a meeting with her
• Calibrate your management style, in case you manage people:
• Focus on deliverables and outcomes and not on hours
• Maintain close watch on who will do what and by when
• Invest time to understand the person behind the team member
• Keep the team motivated
• Exhibit patience:
• Take it easy when someone is late by a couple of minutes, occasionally, as virtual meeting may also overshoot beyond its planned end time
• It is easy to overshoot in virtual meetings because there is no one waiting outside the virtual room for the next meeting!
• Stay physically healthy:
• Get up and go away from your laptop once in a while as possible and move your body, stretch it a little bit and also relax your eyes
• Take care of your eyes and fingers since in the virtual world, your eyes and your fingers become the most important organs of your body to navigate your way through!
• Stay mentally healthy:
• Call the colleagues with whom you have good personal equations occasionally
• And as you do so avoid using the official channel, call on their personal number from your personal number
• Spend some time on yoga and meditation and mental relaxation exercises to stay calm, relaxed and focused
• Take leaves occasionally when you are totally away from your laptop, which is the gate to the office in the virtual world!
• Develop empathy for your family:
• Remember they need to do much more than the usual to take care of your needs as you are at home
• Don't forget that your family is not used to seeing you so much and in some sense you are barging upon their routine when you are working from home!

Why You Need to Put Up with the Shit at the Place You Currently Work and What to Do About it?

The title uses the phrase "place you currently work" and there's a very solid reason behind it.

If you work with an organization where you experience extreme levels of toxicity then you may be longing for and trying hard getting off the burning ship.

However, until you can move out, it is no more an organization in a real sense, but simply a "place you currently work" or rather a "place you hate to go but still need to go"!

You may be severely disengaged. And you may be in a state of mind where you are ready with the resignation notice and just waiting for a job offer.

But why do you need to put up with the shit at the "place you currently work"?

Here are some of the reasons:

• You have been trying hard but haven't managed to find another job. Again, even if you find one, don't be desperate to take it up before a thorough evaluation. You don't want to move from one toxic place to another
• You can't leave your job because you got to pay your bills - utilities, doctor/medicines, EMI, school fees, groceries, etc.
• You do not have any source of income other than the salary you get from the current job. And you don't have enough investments to  continue with your current standard of living using the returns from your investments.

Basically, you have no choice from a financial perspective.

At such a time, it is very important for you to remember the following points:

• Do not resign in frustration till you get another job
• Visualize what is the worst that will happen in case you get laid off or fired before you can find another job
• Take extreme care of your physical health, sleep well, eat well
• Stay positive and professional at the "place you currently work"
• Remain relaxed, calm and composed so that there is no adverse impact on you mental health
• Make sure you do not carry your frustrations at the "place you currently work" back to your home and your family
• Take stock of your finances to figure out where exactly you stand from a money stand-point
• Assuming you loose your job today, calculate based on the above point, for how many years/months you can survive on your investments at your current standard of living
• Cut down your expenses to what is essential, better still become a minimalist
• Work furiously towards attaining financial freedom so that you can deal with things in your life from the level of f**k you
• Pay off all loans that you may have as early as you can and become 100% debt-free
• Buy a house but do remember the point immediately above
• Ensure you are adequately protected with the right kind of insurance - term, medical, accident and disability, and home insurance
• Keep the lights on as far as your job search efforts are concerned and in fact increase the focus!
• Keep yourself motivated by imagining the day when you will accept an offer letter and send the ever-ready resignation notice
• Lastly, don't bottle up your frustrations and thoughts and do vent them out by writing them down (maintaining a blog for this is a fantastic idea, and it is free as well if you choose the right platform!)

Remember if you are in such a situation, you life may be very miserable. You may be feeling desperate to get out. You may have started to become negative in your outlook.

This may start reflecting on your behavior both a the "place you currently work" and more dangerously at your home and with you spouse, kids and parents.

You should realize that this spiral of negativity is not good for you in whichever way you look at it. And you must immediately stop your descent down the spiral of negativity.

In such a difficult and tumultuous time in your life the key message you should always carry in you mind is this: Stay positive, calm and composed. You owe it yourself and your family!

Stuck in a Rut and Going Totally Nut!

There are times in you life when you would find yourself stuck in a rut. You can't move up, down or sideways and you can't move out.

And you suddenly realize that its been several years in the rut and you have become part of "them" and are no longer "you". You have been trying to get out but have failed so far!

You may see bias, unfairness, partiality all around you, loyalty being paraded in a naked manner, silly stuff being done every day and stooges getting promoted.

You also notice that the stooges have also been stuck for a very long time in a much bigger rut and are doing almost the same thing they used to do 10 years back!

What scares you the most is that very soon you will also hit the 10 year mark. It keeps you awake in the night, it makes you count every second when you are at work.

You are desperate to get out, you are frustrated with your plight, you just want to get rid of the toxicity around yourself.

But you can't.

So stuck in a rut for too long you are going totally nut!

You can't see any lights towards any exit path leading out of the rut you are in.

You also see that the top men and their loyal dogs are not afraid of the rut and that is because they are the ones who created it in the first place.

You are eagerly waiting for that one chance to get going.

And the question that you ask yourself every day is just the same.

When? When? When will you get the chance to escape this sick situation. For how further long will you need to suffer? How long?

In-Hand Salary - What the HR and Recruitment Folks Don't Want You to Fully Understand?

An earlier blog post CTC Break-up - What HR and Recruitment Folks Don't Want You to Fully Understand  dwelt upon the CTC break-up and provided details of its various components.

HR and recruitment folks are true followers of the below quote by Prof. Aaron Levenstein:

“Statistics are like bikinis. What they reveal is suggestive, but what they conceal is vital.”

For an HR and recruitment guy this would actually mean the below:

“CTC break-up is like bikini. What it reveals is suggestive, but what it conceals is vital.”

The vital information that CTC conceals is the "In-Hand Salary" or the "Take Home Salary" - the money which actually lands in you salary account on the last day of the month.

And as they say the rest is history and soon forgotten for ever!

So let's analyze an example of CTC salary break-up to understand how to figure out the In-hand Salary hidden beneath the details.

Use the following google sheet to understand this better.

Calculation of In-Hand Salary from CTC Salary

Suppose you are currently in a company C.

You can play with the numbers in "Yellow Cells" to see how various components are calculated and to figure out what the In-hand Salary, Deferred Cash Benfits and Net Cash-flow would be under various scenarios at company C.

• On Paper - the assured that is promised to you in your salary letter
• Actual/Adjusted - the actual/adjusted that goes/will go into your salary account (including the actual incentive/bonus, once declared)
• Projected - the assumed that you expect from the upcoming performance appraisal.

The paper CTC includes incentive/bonus but the calcuations for "On Paper" and "Projected" ignores this component. "Actual/Adjusted" would consider this component though.

The key to a good understanding of CTC salary and In-hand Salary is to categorize the various components into the following heads:

• Taxables - these are fully taxed. Basic salary is the most fundamental component of this and "Flexible/Special" column is generally used to match the paper CTC figure
• Tax-frees - these are not taxed with certain restrictions. They may be clubbed with "Flexible/Special" but for the purpose of the above sheet consider only that part of "Flexible/Special" that is completely tax-free
• Deductibles - these are part of CTC but is actually used by the Employer either due to certain statutory and legal need (PF) or to save tax (NPS). Some of these like gratuity, insurance don't even show up on the pay slip
• Uncertains - these are part of CTC but are paid subject to certain conditions and may be recovered by the employer in certain  situations. They are, as the term also indicates, uncertain in some sense. These are fully taxable though.
• Exemptions - these are useful to claim tax benefits. Along with the tax-frees, these help bring down how much you pay as income tax and hence help increase the In-hand Salary.
• Deductions - these are shown on the payslip but you don't get it. They result in lowering the In-hand Salary. PF (Employee Contribution) falls under this head. Also, NPS (Employer Contribution) falls under this head.

Using the above you can easily calculate the monthly In-Hand Salary.

You can also calculate the Net Cash-flow, which includes deferred cash benefits in the form of PF and NPS. You may not get the deferred benefits every month but you would eventually get it, with some returns on it as an incing on the cake!

The google sheet does all the above calculations for you to get all the above figures instantly once you have entered the values in the "Yellow Cells".

In another blog post How to Evaluate a Job Offer? one key point that was touched upon under the reasons to quit was was this: Decent hike over your current salary - consider both In-Hand Salary and Net Cash-flow (never go by the CTC Salary!)

Suppose you are currently in a company C and you get an offer from another company O. How do you compare them on the above point?

You can use the google sheet to do this comparison easily. Put the required CTC Salary details under Company O - both under "On Paper" and "Actual/Adjusted", as required. All figures will appear automatically.

You can compare the hike ratio for both In-Hand Salary and Net Cash-flow from this sheet easily. Remember to compare both as you will eventually get all of it!

CTC Break-up - What HR and Recruitment Folks Don't Want You to Fully Understand

In case you are a corporate animal but don't clearly understand what CTC is, here is some much needed information.

CTC stands for "Cost To Company" and is your all-inclusive cost to the company.

You need to carefully note that everything the company spends on you, be it PF, NPS, Gratuity, Insurance, Incentive, Retention Bonus, Basic Salary, Perquisites is eventually paid from your CTC.

It even includes the perquisite amount for the "supposedly" free lunch in many organizations.

So as you can see there is indeed really nothing called free lunch!

Bonus for meeting target performance is also a part of CTC. 

However, you may get more or less or even none depending upon many factors. So in some sense it can be seen as being outside the CTC.

Following sections provide a typical CTC salary break-up and explain the various components in greater detail.

Basic Pay

Basic Salary 

This as the name suggests is the most basic part of CTC and is also the most important one since it drives many of the other salary components.

Basic Salary is fully taxable.

House Rent Allowance (HRA) 

40% to 50% of the Basic Salary. Tax exemption on HRA is the minimum of the following three: 

• Actual house rent allowance received from employer
• Actual house rent paid minus 10% of basic salary
• 50% of basic salary in case of metro, 40% in case of non-metro

Benefits Pay

This includes long-term retirement-oriented benefits.

This is directly deducted from the CTC and never comes your way!

These either carry no tax liability for you (Insurance) or not taxed at all (PF) or taxed at the time of actual payment (Gratuity)

Employer's Contribution to PF (Provident Fund)

Minimum Rs. 1800/- per month (12% of Rs. 15000/- which is the wage ceiling set by EPFO) to a maximum of 12% of the Basic Salary

Insurance

This also goes from your CTC, so there is really nothing free about the insurance cover

Gratuity

4.81% of Basic Salary

Choice / Flexible Pay

This includes several components some of which are driven by the Basic Salary.

This component of the CTC provides options to save tax albeit within certain limitations.

Meal Coupon  

Tax-free till Rs. 1100/- per month (Rs. 51/- per day for 20 days)

Conveyance Allowance

Tax-free till Rs. 1600/- per month

Medical Allowance

Tax-free till Rs. 1250/- per month

Leave Travel Allowance (LTA)

6% of Basic Salary

National Pension Scheme (NPS) Contribution

Tax-free till 10% of the Basic Salary

PF (Employee Contribution)

Minimum Rs. 1800/- per month (12% of Rs. 15000/-) to a maximum of 12% of the Basic Salary

PF Adjustment (Employer Contribution)

Adjustment in case Employer's Contribution to PF in the CTC is at Minimum and not 12% (always ask the prospective employer to provide CTC with Employer's Contribution to PF set at 12%)

Special/Other Allowance 

The final place to dump the "adjustment" amount to get to the magic figure of CTC

Others

This includes other components that are related to miscellaneous aspects such as performance, joining and retention.

These are fully taxable just like the Basic Salary.

Incentive or Variable Pay

The secret weapon of the company's management to engineer profitability (in case it is poor or even if there is none) by short-changing the employees

Retention Bonus

The dangling carrot to force the money-minded and good for nothing employees to firmly stay put

Joining Bonus (One Time)

The dangling carrot to entice an offered candidate to join

Note: Some of the above CTC components are subject to government and statutory guidelines and may be treated differently in the future.

How to Evaluate a Job Offer?

When you decide to look for a job change it clearly means you don't like something at your current place of work!

(Image courtesy: http://cliparts.co/clipart/96793)

You should carefully analyze and note down the factors that drove you to to look for a change in the first place. These factors are very useful for evaluating a job offer.

After applying to hundreds of organizations and after interviewing with a few that decide to call you and consider you beyond the resume screening stage and if all goes well till the very end, you end up with that fantastic e-mail in your inbox.

"Congratulations! we are pleased to inform you that you have been selected; please find attached the salary details. Please note that this offer will be deemed cancelled within 1 day if you do not accept the offer in writing/email."

Suppose you are currently in a company C and you get an offer from another company O.

What do you do next? How do you evaluate the job offer?

The best way to evaluate whether to bite the bullet and go ahead with the change is to do a "Stay versus Quit" analysis for C and "Accept versus Reject" analysis for O.

Company C - Reasons to Stay

Even though you want to leave, every company has something good about it!

Examples include:

• Tax-friendly salary structure
• Get to stay with family
• Work pressure is manageable
• Company is stable
• Office is close to home and driving time/distance is bearable

Company C - Reasons to Quit

These are the reasons that got you started on this journey to move out!

Examples include:

• Decent hike over your current salary - consider both In-Hand Salary and Net Cash-flow (never go by the CTC Salary!)
• Sick reporting structure
• Problem people with big egos
• Issues related to disparities in experience versus role versus grade versus responsibilities
• Forced to report into someone who is highly toxic and totally incompetent
• Lack of motivation to do work  beyond the bare minimum due to above
• Coterie culture formed by the top man
• Group of stooges around the top man
• Glass ceiling created by the coterie and stooges
• Top man and senior folks don't inspire confidence in company's future

Company O - Reasons to Accept

You went through the hiring process and invested your energy because you would have certainly liked several aspects of the prospective organization!

Examples include:

• Better designation and job title
• Escape sick reporting structure
• Escape all reasons mentioned above in Company C - Reasons to Quit
• Get to work in an interesting area
• Chance to get into a different though related line of work

Company O - Reasons to Reject

As you went through the hiring process you may have made certain observations and in addition got to know several aspects from your sources that appear concerning!

Examples include:

• Excessive work pressure
• Office politics and cultural issues
• Work nature may be very different from what has been promised
• HR policies not in line with accepted norms in the industry (too less leaves, no work from home)
• Reporting structure different from the impression that is created around it
• Net salary not significantly higher though increase in CTC shown in the offer may appear that way
• People in top management do not seem too professional
• No laptop even at senior levels
• May need moving away from family
• Exit option not clearly visible

The last point is worth highlighting.

You should always be completely aware of "What Most Companies End Up Lying About When Hiring Someone?".

Even before you join a company you should have a clear thought out exit plan firmly in place!

The reason is when you join Company O it immediately becomes Company C and even though you decided to join, just like every company has something good about it, every company also has something bad about it!

As the curtains come apart, the play starts and the various scenes unfold in the new organization, you may soon realize that you need to look for an offer from another company O!

Ready to Turn a Solo Trainer and Consultant? Pause and Ponder these Points

Ready to turn a solo trainer and consultant?

Yes?

So what are the points one should take care of?

The business world is a tough and nasty place so it is better to be fully prepared before taking the risky plunge.

The points below serve as a good checklist for doing a readiness check before one is ready to turn into a solo trainer and consultant:

• Assess your financial position and ensure sufficient money is available for 2-3 years for maintaining current standard of living of the family
• Ensure you have adequate term insurance and medical insurance
• Consider taking personal accident insurance for self and wife (if she also drives) and house (stick to structure insurance)
• Bring down living expenses by reducing discretionary spending (non-veg, movies, malls, furniture, gadgets, etc.)
• Doubly ensure that monthly passive income is more than the monthly expense
• This depends on the city and the lifestyle. 
• For example, for a city like Delhi/NCR, assuming zero loan liability, own house (no rent) and a decent lifestyle this number would be around 60K.
• Be mentally prepared that you will not make any money in the first 6-12 months
• Discuss and sensitize family about this and the challenges involved
• Start creating/grabbing training/consulting opportunities internally
• This is like learning "how to swim in a pond"
• Find some people who have done it and seek their mentoring and guidance
• Take their help in expanding network and also connecting to right people
• Attach with the mentors to learn "how to swim in a river"
• This eventually leads the way to learning "how to swim in the ocean"
• Touch base with your connections in the network to explore moonlighting or other opportunities for training/consulting

Stuck in a Dead-end Job

Getting stuck in a dead-end job is a reality especially for those who work in business organizations that have not been seeing adequate growth and where the organizational pyramid keeps getting fatter at the top every year.

Here are some of the ways in which one gets stuck in a dead-end job:

• One outgrows the current role but the next level job is simply not available. In this case the person will have to continue in the current role and if she is not able to move out will get stuck.
• One becomes a senior professional in a company after having worked for several years. In this case if the person has not kept abreast of the changes in the market in respect of skills she carries and has in some sense fallen behind will get stuck.
• One is assigned to some special initiatives by the management. This is a clear indication that the management doesn't care whether the person stays or not. The person will find that the accountability to achieve something keeps on increasing gradually but the authority to get things done stays unchanged and may at times gets diminished.

The biggest problem from those who are stuck is to the organization's culture. Such people would typically show following behaviors and characteristics:

• They carry big ego around and try to make others, especially those lower in the hierarchy, realize their weight
• They are too demanding as well as pugnacious and try to prove that they are always right and others are wrong.
• They are full of conceit, false sense of pride and superiority and carry a sadistic and condescending attitude.
• They are highly cynical and question everything for the sake of proving a point and to show their importance.

Is this Right Time to Move on from Your Current Company?

This simple yet powerful question is one of the most important fundamental questions and must be an integral part of one’s career advancement plan. Asking this question at the end of every month (in some detail) and at the end of every quarter (in complete detail) should become a standard procedure for any professional to follow religiously.

Another important fundamental question is why should you stay with your current company? The answer to this is the reasons driving the answer to the question “Is this Right Time to Move on from Your Current Company?” are absent or very weak at that point in time.

So how to decide – “Is this Right Time to Move on from Your Current Company?” The answer to this question is very simple and can be captured in the following two statements. The sequence of the following two statements is equally important. If statement B is the first reason then you are still not desperate to quit however if statement A is the first reason then you are certainly desperate to quit.

• Statement A – The reason you are still around is because you need the job for the money you are making from it to pay your bills, otherwise you would have quit by now
• Statement B – The reason you are still around is because you haven’t been able to find another job though you have been trying very hard, and the moment you land one you will quit immediately

It is interesting to understand how you reach to a stage where the only reason for you to stay with your current company is limited to the above two statements. So what are the drivers for you to reach to this stage? Here are some:

• You are certain you will not grow any further irrespective of your performance and irrespective of how much longer you stay put
• You are not learning anything new and not at all improving upon your competencies in any significant manner
• You are interacting with stakeholders who are themselves not growing and the discussions you have with them are purely transactional and operational in nature
• You have come to believe that the organization is not run professionally but rather by the whims and fancies of an old boys club
• You have come to realize that the people who are heading the various areas lack in leadership qualities and are totally narrow-minded due the prevalence of an old boys club culture
• You have come to the conclusion that the company has a bleak and dark future because the so called leaders lack in leadership qualities and are totally narrow-minded

Cycle of Engagement – From Joining to Leaving

When one joins a new organization to take up a new position one is generally highly determined and brimming with energy to succeed. One willingly gives the best to help the organization achieve its objectives, especially those for which one is responsible, either directly or in some manner. The passion to succeed is a function of one’s degree of trust on the organization’s ability to help fulfill one’s own career success objectives.

Career success objectives in this context have following connotations, the list of course is not complete.

• Involvement in pertinent decisions taken in the organization
• Promotion to higher positions in the organizational hierarchy ladder
• Increase in compensation and benefits aligned with market and performance
• Opportunities to continuously develop professional competencies

The degree of fulfillment of the above objectives has strong influence on the degree of one’s engagement with the organization. And the level of engagement of an employee with the organization over the next many months, quarters and years is shaped by the extent to which the employee’s objectives are achieved.

When one realizes that further advancement and achievement in respect of the connotations listed above is not possible or becomes increasingly difficult or not at all under consideration by those in one’s line of upward reporting, the writing on the wall is clear. The process of disengagement initiates from this realization and for all practical purposes the employee resigns mentally. 

The employee would resign physically much later, after the employee starts looking out and gets a job offer in hand. This culminates eventually in the employee leaving and joining elsewhere. A new cycle starts thereafter.

Since an employee would essentially work for achieving one’s career success objectives while working with an organization, it is quite important to understand the linkage between organizational objectives and employee’s objectives.  Those in the management ranks in an organization who are aware of this constantly work on the psyche of the employees ‘who work in the trenches’ so as to keep them engaged and productive.

When to Move out of an Organization

When to move out of an organization is the most important question every employee should constantly ask everyday, right from the very first day of joining that organization.

Just like any smart investor would sell off the stocks held at an opportune time, a smart employee should move on from the current job at an opportune time.

Here are some signs that can guide the decision on when to move out of an organization:

• Career growth is not visible and may be entirely absent
• Reporting is suffocating and not right and fair
• Leadership team is like an old boys club, and not at all professional
• Top leader is not ethical and has no vision

Is Your Current Job Demeaning Your Intellect and Self-respect? Yes? Then You Got to Go

All working professionals should ask this question to themselves as part of the quarterly self-review of their career. Asking this question confirms that one indeed is on the right track and with the right organization.

The sharpness of competencies and experience that one has picked on the way while moving along one’s career can get blunted if one works with the wrong organization for more than the tolerable span of time. Interestingly, an organization which is wrong for someone can be the right for someone else. In addition, an organization which is right when one joins it might become wrong at a later point in time. The quarterly self-review is a good method to determine this.

The association of a professional with an organization depends on the career aspirations and objectives of the professional vis-à-vis the organization’s ability to help that professional achieve those. Certain organizations especially with a father figure leading a founding team of loyalists and lifers may be exception to this rule. In such organizations the loyalists and lifers work like a slave to the father figure and the father figure is a like a corporate king.

The loyalists and lifers will not move out even if the job they do is demeaning to their intellect and self-respect due to following reasons:

• They will not get another job outside as they won’t be able to demonstrate that they can survive elsewhere. Even if they manage to move on they will come back in no time when they realize loyalists and lifers can’t survive in a true professional set-up.
• They would form a closely associated coterie which has mutual admiration for each other due to the loyalty for the father figure but their performance and competencies might be extremely low. However, for some reason they will naively assume all the loyalists and lifers together have great brain power.
• They will have created a comfort zone and become frogs in a well and hence lost the ability to accept new and differing ideas. The father figure would leave the pack of loyalists and lifers by showing reluctance to even hear about new ideas. As per them, things can be done only their way.

Professionals who are unfortunate to be a part of such organization would realize to their dissatisfaction that such organizations are non-professional at the core, believe in loyalty over performance, promote coterie culture, not allow new ideas to come in and artificially sustain the hegemony of the father figure and the old boys club.

True professionals in such organizations, which definition strictly excludes the father figure and the pack of loyalists and lifers, would often encounter humiliating, frustrating and unfair situations which are demeaning to their intellect and self-respect. Such professionals got to go and quickly at that.

Taking Care of Your Career

Getting opportunities to learn and chances to grow both laterally (to expand your horizon) and vertically up (to reach senior positions) is an important ingredient of professional success. You career growth and the jobs you hold on the way to professional success are important elements to ensure you are able to provide and sustain a certain standard of living for yourself and your near and dear ones. Hence, you owe it to yourself to take care of and navigate your career.

You would typically enter the workforce at around 20-25 years of age and can continue to work till 60-65 years of age which means you can have a career span of 35-45 years. However, surviving this long is not easy with so many challenges on the way – companies closing down, organizations downsizing due to business decline, reduced demand for one’s skills in the market, lay-offs due to industry-wide recession, getting fired for various reasons and difficulties on the personal front (terminal illness, debilitating diseases, incapacitating accidents).

Many professionals carry the impression that the manager you report into or the company you work with owe you a favor since you are working to make them successful. The reality is far removed away from this impression and quite harsh. No one actually works for the company, instead they work for protecting their interests - the manager works for protecting her interests till she is around, the executive management team works for protecting their individual and collective interests till they are around, the shareholders (especially those who are founders, promoters, owners) work for protecting their interests till they stay invested.

Hence professionals should also work with the same orientation - work for protecting their interests till they are around. Never expect the manager you report into or the company you work with to help you learn and grow. This is something which must be owned and operated by you solely as you are the one who gets directly and severely impacted at the end of the day.

If you are a founder-type professional you should hold your control on the company (never dilute equity beyond a certain percentage). In such a case you can work on and on as you wish, literally until the day you die, and hand over the reins to the next generation and this can go on for many generations. As long as the company’s business model adapts and stays relevant your future generations will remain founder-type professionals. In the unfortunate event of the company going turtle you won’t need to bother as you won’t be there to know about it. It is also interesting to note that founder-type professionals would have vested interest in creating an army of loyalist-type professionals who man key positions with the founder as the father figure at the top.

If you are a loyalist-type professional, chances are high you would be manning a key position in a company (such companies rely on creating an army of loyalists who man key positions with a father figure at the top). In such a case you might want to continue as long as you can. However, be careful in case the direction of wind starts changing and the ship starts sinking. Remaining with the organization at that juncture might jeopardize your career. One example when this can happen is the company getting acquired by another company. The father figure and his protégés will be the ones who will be sent home with hardly much time for packing their bags when the new management team takes over.

If you are a normal professional you should act like free agents. You should work with an organization as long as you are adding value to yourself and to the company you work with at that point. The moment you sense learning and growth is blocked, it makes complete logical sense to move on. In case you are in a company with many loyalist-type professionals, many of whom are lifers, you will generally find that it is difficult to join the group of loyalists as the father figure at the top will never trust you, no matter how competent you are and how well you perform. Moving on would be the only choice left with you after you stay with such a company for a certain duration. If by chance, you are included as part of the group of loyalists you might want to stay put while being constantly watchful of the direction of wind. In troubled times, the new loyalists will be sacrificed for the old and original loyalists.

Accepting the Offer for a Leadership Position at an Organization

Accepting the offer for a leadership position at an organization is a crucial decision in any professional’s career. Getting an offer for a leadership position at an organization is tough but making an exit from such a position is many times tougher. Hence it is important for those seeking a leadership position at an organization to gather information on certain aspects before accepting the offer.

At the time of hiring, companies and recruitment consultants show the position is all rose with no thorns. The following questions can be helpful to gather information on the thorns that come with the rose. These will help in making an informed decision when the offer for a position is made by a company:

• Who all will I report into? This gives good idea about reporting effort and complexity. This is quite important in matrix organizations.
• Who all will report into me? This gives good idea about team handling effort. There may be more than one team reporting into a role.
• Who will be my peers? This gives good idea about influencing power in the position being offered. Being placed lower in the hierarchy as compared to others with peer-level responsibilities will impede effectiveness.
• What is the company’s latest revenue figure? This gives good idea about how big or small the organization is, especially in case of privately held firms.
• What is the company’s future growth plan and outlook? This gives good idea about where the organization is likely to be in a few years hence and the longevity of the stay with the organization one can look forward to.
• Who will handle the budgets for the area I would be responsible for? This gives good idea about the existence of old boys’ club culture in the organization.
• What next position can I look forward to? This gives a good idea about the career growth path and possibilities or lack of it.