What’s new you ask? (and thanks for asking)

For starters I quit my job in favor of the great unknown. Well, maybe not totally completely unknown, but there are no guarantees in this life as you all know and so hopefully this was a good choice. Let me see if I can explain….

Coming to Michigan I was constantly warned about one thing: there’s no jobs.

Now, that’s a pretty broad statement to make, but I see more and more why that mindset was communicated to me because things are tough around here, and good people are struggling. I get that, I can see it. But I also see that there is a certain trap to that mentality if were not careful, because we can pigeonhole ourselves into a hopeless lull.

When I decided I was moving to Detroit from LA, I did two things. 1st – I put my house up for sale immediately. I did that so that I would not tippy-toe thru this process – it put me on a definitive timeline to make some things happen expeditiously. Next – I upgraded my resume, typed up a completely non-conventional cover letter (I hate convention – its far too safe, boring, and clinical) and went straight to the online Detroit Yellow Pages to find my new employer.

Yep, the Yellow Pages.

I didn’t answer any help wanted ads. I didn’t hold my breath waiting for Monster Dot.Com to hook a brutha up. Instead, I started buggin people via phone calls, faxes, and emails. I’m Steven. I’m coming to YOUR town next week to find employment, and I’d like an interview with your company. When can you make yourself available between the dates of ? and ?

See this is the deal, and why I do things the way I do things; because nobody else does, and therefore I’ve learned that if nobody does what you do except for you– then you in effect become somebody, while they remain what they were in the crowd, nobody, or worse…everybody. Get it? I learned this many years ago when I first got out of the Military and was looking for work in LA. I went to this strange convention, where this loudmouthed guy with a long ponytail was teaching people how to get jobs. He had no spreadsheets, no power point presentation, and no statistical data. What he had, was attitude, the yellow pages, and sweaty armpits showing thru his not-so-pressed shirt.

He would take us one by one and ask us a few poignant questions such as: “What can you do?”

If you made the classic mistake of answering by providing your past record such as “I was the regional divisional statistical VP of really deep thoughts at my last job,” he’d laugh at you and chastise you for not paying attention to the question he asked you. The question was: “What – Can – You – DOOOOOOOOOOOO???”

For example can you:

Multi-task? Communicate effectively? Lead? Work independently? Train quickly? Pay attention to detail? Problem solve? Rotate shifts efficiently? Train others? Think on your feet? Improve environment morale? Visualize?

These are the things that you DO. These are also things that cross over to virtually ALL types of jobs and vocations; and these are things that ANY employer is looking for, and incidentally – these things collectively are also the description of the modern American Housewife and Mother.

Mr. Ponytail then demonstrated his ideals by picking up the yellow pages, having anyone in the audience choose a company from the page, and he’d call that company on the spot. Every single time, he got himself an interview, simply by stating just a few of the above-mentioned ideals. There were a few (unemployed mind you) suits in the audience who scoffed at his approach, saying it was unrealistic and unprofessional. I’ve often wondered what happened to those suits, as this was the late 80s when I went to this convention, and since then many more suits have found themselves out of work.

So I learned from it, this unconventional approach. And over the years I’ve honed my own style, but ever since then I’ve never been out of work for more than two weeks, and I’ve never gotten a job out of the want ads. Every time – it came from the Yellow Pages.

Now, laugh if you want – but this same approach worked in Detroit. Within two weeks after putting my house up for sale I flew to Michigan and got three solid job offers, all three from companies who were NOT hiring, and NOT placing ads, and NOT headhunting. By that time I had probably contacted about 30 companies via fax, email, and phone calls, so let’s see – 3 job offers out of 30 contacts in a weak economy where there are supposedly no good jobs is what? Ten percent? That’s pretty dang good if you ask me.

Anyway, as I mentioned at the beginning of this article, I ended up quitting that job that I chose out of the three offers I got. Turned out I made a bad choice, my fault, it happens sometimes. The mistake I made is that I went with what seemed best on paper as opposed to what my gut told me was going to work best with my own personal ideals. I violated my own principles in so doing it that way, because I am one of those ridiculous romantics who believe in fairness and goodwill and common decency. One company who offered me a job was very obviously enamored with the same types of ideals and I foolishly set that aside. My gut told me to go there. But the other company that I chose offered me something else; a chance to run things on my own in two years and be the big boss. I chose the wrong thing.

Now, I have to be fair here because my (former) Boss reads this column from time to time I believe. So the names will be changed to protect the (not so) innocent. I will say that I went to work for the ACME paper clip company. And the owner, Mr. ACME had told me that he had no turnover at his company due to the high degree of loyalty his staff had and because everyone was so happy working for him. I was to quickly find that this was not completely true.

Mr. Acme was/is, on the surface, very successful - if that success is to be measured in terms of personal wealth. In fact on one occasion when Mr. Acme and myself were having a private pow-wow he went out of his way to explain to me that he had “F*ck You Money” and had bought the loyalty of his employees. Honestly. Seriously. He said that to me. I believe his intention with that statement was to redirect me to cower at his feet, only he made himself look like an idiot when he spoke this to me and I had no choice but to scoff at this remark and tell him it was one of the stupidest things I ever heard. I scored zero points in that pow-wow. But I learned a great deal.

I would soon discover other inconsistencies in what he had told me during our initial job interview, inconsistencies that only made it much more clear – that I had chosen wrong.

For example, his employee turnover rating was not exactly the zero he had described to me. Various names and examples of former employees would quickly rise to the surface in a short period of time, as would hushed descriptions of high drama in the workplace.

The loyalty factor he had described to me was also not exactly accurate either. What Mr. Acme had in reality was a short list of employees who chose to remain begrudgingly, due to financial concerns in a weak economy. Mr. Acme saw this as loyalty. I saw it as prison. But we all choose what we will in order to pursue a life of quality. I came here to Detroit to seek more quality in my life – and therefore my work situation was a glaring contradiction in the face of what I was attempting to do. And I knew it.

As for the financial evidence of success, well it turned out that what I was witnessing was the end of the ride for a former financially successful business model where millions had been made – but in reality not very much business had been conducted over the last three years. Some of it was due to the bad economy. But I suspect that a great deal of it also had to do with Mr. Acme’s aloof reputation amongst his clientele. If I am a potential customer and I need to purchase widget service, and Choice A is available, and Choice B is likewise available but is also an a-hole, believe me I’m going with choice A.

And finally – I soon discovered that Mr. Acme had a slight issue with temper tantrums. For example, one day Mr. Acme and myself were on the road and were waiting our turn at a local intersection. In front of us was a little old lady – could have been your grandma, Dear Reader. Grandma, being elderly, did not move into the left turn lane quickly enough for Mr. Acme. His solution? Laying on the horn, and cussing her out at full volume, with a colorful description of her being a “F*cking Dinosaur.” By the way – Mr. Acme is in his late 50s…. That pretty much sealed it for me. I made a bad choice.

A couple of weeks ago a new choice presented itself to me out of the blue. Funny how that happens sometimes… when you’re willing to take a chance. A former employer in homeland defense (completely different vocation altogether) offered me a job in Downtown Detroit that was very appealing. It was not a difficult choice to make, and so I said yes. This Easter Sunday I left for training in Virginia, and I’m pretty excited about it. Change is good. Keeps you young.

By the way, when I told Mr. Acme that I had decided it was best for me to move on, his initial response was that I had screwed him over. Interesting. You know how a thief never trusts anyone because he believes everyone else is also a thief? Well, Mr. Acme felt screwed, and I don’t burn anybody, so think on that one for a while. In contrast, my last employer in California hugged me and wished me well when I announced I was leaving the fold. Mr. Acme, however, with his F-U Money, lives in a different world than I do, a world where people get screwed over. Thank God I was never a part of that world, and leaving was inevitable.

So as I said earlier, I’m hitting the road this weekend, Dear Reader – and it will be a couple of weeks until I return and have the ability to leave you with another soapbox installment from the world of The Steve-O. Wish me well.

Steve-O can be reached at donthurtmuch@yahoo.com