ADP Founder, Will Marre, Interviewed in Forbes about Careers

I think a lot of us have the wrong idea of what it takes to make a big impact on the world.  We don’t have to relinquish all material belongings, retreat to Africa, and hold crying babies to make a difference.  Those that are making the greatest impact are making money at the same time.  That’s right.  They’re making money by saving the world.  It’s actually the strategic thing to do.  It makes solutions to our problems sustainable and scaleable.  It helps us solve big problems faster.  I call it socially strategic enterprise.  What a great idea.

I was recently interviewed for the Forbes magazine article, “Get Paid to Be a Do-Gooder.”

*Taken from Forbes SLIDE SHOW

The article discusses the growing trend of people looking for careers that benefit humanity and the environment.  These opportunities are indeed endless.  As I suggested to Forbes, social entrepreneurship is a vastly growing field where entrepreneurs base their business on offering products or services that directly benefit society.  Great examples are the South African Roundabout that provides rural areas with water pumps driven by a human-powered merry-go-round mechanism and makes money selling advertisements on its water towers.

Also, the Grameen Bank, who generates a strong profit giving microloans to the poor and has created a worldwide movement toward self-reliance.

Of course you don’t have to be an entrepreneur to have a fulfilling, socially responsible career.  There are huge opportunities right now in the non-profit sector for strong business-minded individuals as non-profits are trying to come up with strategies to create sustainable income from either products or services to support their mission. What’s needed are people who are skilled in marketing, web development, IT, SEO, finance, etc.

Non-profits are not in short supply of people who want to go to Africa and hold babies, console mothers, and improve orphanages.  What they are in short supply of are people who can create an infrastructure to scale up systematic solutions and create sustainable income strains.

And finally, if you’re not in a position in which you can start a socially strategic enterprise or work for a non-profit, transform your current job into one that brings you meaning and satisfaction. Your opportunity is to just start seeing your current job as a means to reduce waste, promote responsibility, help your community or innovate new, sustainable value.

Yes, I know, the job market is tough right now, but this unemployment crisis has brought each of us to a moment of truth. We can either use it as an excuse to make our work meaningless, merely a paycheck, or we can see it as an opportunity to make our work count for something bigger than ourselves.

As I tell audiences around the world, it’s an exciting time to be alive.  We can save the world and make a sustainable living doing it.  We can have a fulfilling career and make a difference.  Our difference.  Just start.

President Obama’s Leadership Lite Act

Watching Obama and his Leadership Lite Act around health care is very interesting. He seems very confident. As an independent voter, I actually favor a citizen co-op, and large personal deductions to drive personal responsibility. In any event, I think any thoughtful person knows that health care needs to be wrestled away from the special interests that control it, and that are currently driving our country to bankruptcy one person at a time.  Obama’s leadership on the issue seems to have an extraordinary light touch. Meanwhile his opponents have become raging parodies of Sarah Palin, if that’s possible. They seem to have been very successful in whipping up post 65 year old Medicare recipients, railing about government-funded medicine. That’s bazaar…a world on steroids. Meanwhile, Obama is the king of cool. We’ll see if it works. The strategy that Muhammad Ali used, allowing his opponents to punch themselves out worked in a boxing ring.  It will be very interesting to see if it works in politics.

Deep Mindful Practice Leads to Extreme Talent

I had dinner with the legendary Jim Loehr, who talked a lot about a new book out called, The Talent Code. Its premise is, that all of us can develop our talents far more spectacularly than we do. One of the things that he talked about was the principal of deep practice. What that means is slow, mindful practice, not hurried rushed repetitions. In some ways, almost slowing down practice so that you can see what you’re doing in its component parts. This would be true if you were practicing becoming a world-class sales person as much as a world-class volleyball player. Mindfulness is the key thing…mindful practice. Another thing that Jim mentioned is how important it is to develop talent in young children. What makes us great is how quickly our mental connections connect in the brain. The brain wires that connect us all together are called myelin. The more myelin you have, the smarter you are, and the more talented you get. It’s pretty simple. He said, in working with teenage tennis stars he could really tell a difference between those who had a tennis memory starting well before the age of five. Their tennis myelin was abundant. It’s much harder for children with little exposure at an early age to music to pick it up later; that would also be true from everything from mathematics to learning languages. Early childhood education is looking to be a breakthrough in helping develop talent. But, it’s never too late, even deep practice at my age, which is very advanced, leads to the development in extreme talent. (Well, maybe not in my case, but in most cases.)

Welcome to a New America

The blast damage of what is turning out to be The Great Recession has united the mindscape of our workplace and marketplace in unexpected common desires of Baby Boomers (age 50 to 65) and Generation Y (age 20-35).  Yes, the generation gap is transforming like a giant, cultural smoothie of unifying values and opinions blended by our new technologies and flavored by the fruit of our shared concern for the future.  This is what research reported in two articles in the Harvard Business Review says (How Gen Y Will Reshape Your Agenda and Understanding the Post Recession Consumer).  The implications are potent for all of us seeking to make a living amidst the economic violence of our new economy.

In the workplace the new trends are turbocharged because Boomers expectations of working long, hard and loyally for a secure retirement has been vaporized.  Meanwhile Boomer children (Gen Y) have seen what work first, last and always priorities have brought their parents, so they want to create a sustainable work life that supports their personal interests and family aspirations even as they launch their careers.  In fact, they don’t view their job as a career.  Instead building a livable, integrated life is their career.  This translates to the mass of America’s working population wanting three things from the work place.

1. Personal flexibility. After health care the most sought after work benefit is flex-time and telecommuting.  Both Boomers and Gen Y want to be held accountable for results not face time.  Employees increasingly feel that the 24/7 connection of their digital leashes work both ways.  If you can email me or text me at home, then I should be able to work from home at least some of the time.  Today, time is the valued currency.
2. Personal meaning. 21st century workers want to contribute to a better world.  This begins with eliminating waste, being environmentally responsible, recycling and a host of “green” practices that make companies feel like good work places.  What’s in most demand are jobs with companies whose core business model benefits humanity or the environment.  The application pool of engineers who want to work on GE’s eco-imagination products is steadily swelling as is the number of advertising professionals who want to work on accounts of the most socially responsible companies.  This trend toward meaningful work is as true for Boomers seeking to leave a final legacy, as it is for their children intent on building a sustainable future.
3. Social Connection. Boomers have worked so hard that they have let their social support networks wither.  No more.  Following the example of Gen Y, they are suddenly investing more in friendships and family.  They are the fastest growing user group on Facebook and more and more Boomers are working with 25 year olds at work on a collegial basis.  In fact, the new business rage is “mutual mentoring” which involves Boomers sharing their wisdom, skill and connections with 20-something’s who are teaching them the wonders of emerging technologies.

In a recent YouTube video I posted, Job Creation for Today’s Unemployment and Uncertain Times, I discuss signposts to look for when searching for a 21st century career that are expanded upon in my book, Save the World and Still Be Home for Dinner.

Meanwhile in the market place the length of our financial famine is likely to permanently alter what we buy, how we buy and how much we buy.  Gone are the days of the insane consumer.  They’re gone because our money has been caught in an industrial strength shredder.  Incomes and credit are unlikely to grow for some time so consumers of all ages are:

1. Simplifying, reusing, substituting and generally discovering that often less is more Eating at home vs. out saves money and often increases family connections.
2. Choosing carefully by consulting the bazillion consumer reviews on the Internet.  Brand loyalty for loyalty’s sake is dying.  Quality, functionality and responsibility are thriving.  New brands are being created almost over night based on value more than bling.
3. Going green on the cheap by simply buying less.  The strong consumer trend in all developed countries toward environmentally friendly products looks to be irreversible in the long term.  As price and quality issues get sorted out with these products, consumers are feeling that wasting less and living more leads to a wonderful life.  The simplest way to reduce congestion and pollution is drive less or reduce our landfill trash by drinking our tap water.  A recent poll revealed that 47 percent of us believe we already have all the things we need to live a good life.  This belief has nearly doubled in the past three years.

Who’s doing this?  According to a broad base of consumer research, mostly all of us.  Donald Trump is an irrelevant icon.  Yesterday’s brand.  We, the big WE, rich, poor, working,  not working, young, old are all discovering that our real dreams are realized by timeless values of family, friends, and valuable work.  Will we go back to old addictions of work without end and debt without satisfaction?  I hope not.  This may be a harder path forward, but it’s real.  The past was fake.

What’s the best thing we can do? Perhaps the most powerful trend coming out of our economic turmoil is that we can’t consume our way to prosperity.  What we were doing as a society was unsustainable.  So decide what is.  What is a sustainable workstyle and lifestyle for you for the long haul?  What is your sustainable job of the future?  Many of us became serial consumers because we were bored.  If we deliberately filled our days with more satisfying work, our bodies with more healthy food, our minds with more inspiring thoughts and our hearts with more loving relationships, how much more would we have?

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GET A SNEAK PEAK OF WILL’S NEW BOOK, Save the World and Still Be Home for Dinner

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The Power of Focus

I jumped on a plane and flew out to Florida to work with the Human Performance Institute. Dan Jansen, who is a famous ice skater, who won a gold medal in the 1992 Olympics, had just been there telling his story about the only way he could win the Olympics. He had tried so many times and had won every single record in the speed skating events that he performed, but he couldn’t win an Olympic gold medal. It was really in working with Jim Loehr at the Human Performance Institute that he was able to overcome his nervousness, and just focus on the ice and win. It’s just a thrilling story that he’s telling visitors here. Dan is just a wonderful human being.

Focus is everything. Watching Tiger Woods lose the PGA tournament that he was leading due to getting what is called the yips in golf can show you how the power of focus can either undue you or make you a champion.

Health Care Reform - Discouraging and Disapointing

It’s unfortunate that health care reform is seemingly either deeply wounded or it may even be dead altogether. There are outrageous commentators from the far right calling Obama a racist. I saw Glenn Beck on television say that he believed, “That Obama had a deep hatred for white people.” This is beyond bazaar. Not only is Obama half white, and most black people have accused him of not being black enough, nearly all his advisors are grey haired white men. I guess I’m not clear on how such a racist comment could just be overlooked by the public and the media. Other extremists have recently called Obama a Nazi. These people are obviously not familiar with the term fascism, which is the business take over of government. Socialism is a government taking over the economy. Obama is certainly no Nazi, but to accuse of such things is so over the top. I think most of us are just extremely disappointed. Republicans act like bullies, and Democrats act like sissies. There is something deeply wrong with both parties that are leaving the greatest needs for the common good unmet. When government was gridlocked before, Ronald Reagan went over the heads of Congress to become so immensely personally popular with people that they could not deny his agenda. Obama had that same opportunity, but seems to be frittering it away on using a leadership model that is unclear to me at this point. I think we all wish that he would be the change he promised. Few of us have given up on that happening, but this health care mess is certainly discouraging.

Becoming a Master

I went surfing recently and the waves were small, but very clean. I got into a conversation with a man named Mike, a stand up paddle surfer who’s got the body of a God. He’s a lawyer, yoga instructor, and surfer. You only find those kinds of people in California. He is honestly the most fit looking person I have ever seen, and he’s close to pushing 50. The conversation started by him telling me about his progression through stand up surfing. You may have seen it on television, or if you live by the coast maybe you’ve seen it in person. But, these are really large surfboards, typically about 11 feet long and 29 inches wide, where the surfer is constantly standing, and using a long canoe type paddle to push themselves in the waves, turn in the waves, and paddle up and down the coast looking for waves. Standing up gives you a huge advantage, because you can see waves coming from the horizon. Yet, the disadvantage is that the boards are so big they’re often awkward to surf on, a lot like surfing on your front door. Mike on the other hand, had a very sweet board, only a little longer than nine feet and he was tearing it up. He told me that he had started on an 11-foot board, then went to a 10-foot board, is now on a 9-foot board, and is now trying to get down to a 7-foot stand up board. I’ve never seen a stand up board that short. What intrigued me about Mike is his enthusiasm for learning and mastering. He was very excited to test himself, and to get stronger and more skilled at this sport. He said it really gave him a zest for life and something to look forward to. It got me to wondering how many of us are really focused on anything where we are putting all our energy to becoming a master. It could be a hobby like stand up surfing or it could be an aspect of our work, but when we’re striving hard and interacting as hungry learners I’ve just found its life affirming. It makes every day exciting and gives us something to look forward to, even surfers.

Nonprofit Enterprise - World Saving Enterprise

I spent an energetic 40 minutes with the senior editor of Forbes Magazine. She is doing an article on employment opportunities in nonprofits. It seems that hundreds of thousands of college students are more interested in working for nonprofits these days, than for profits, and this is not surprising. The view most people have of business today is that businesses are primarily exploiters. I told her that what nonprofits need are people who are able to do marketing, fundraising, and development, and people who can grow the business side of their enterprise. Another big trend in nonprofits is to create sustainable income flow, besides grants and donations. For this they need people who can apply business skills in solving the nonprofits mission. Nonprofits need to get beyond their mission and into large-scale solutions that will solve our enormous problems. For this they need people who have serious business skills, and who can turn nonprofit enterprise into world saving enterprise.

The Dream Team

I’ve been working non-stop with the development team that is creating the health and wellness education for the Human Performance Institute. It’s a very exciting projec,t because we are teaching people how to increase their energy to achieve the things they really value. It’s an amazing and complicated project. We’re striving to make it very engaging, with video, testimonials, stories, and very creative ways of teaching. It’s amazing when you work with a dream team who are very experienced, award-winning designers. I’m sure it’s sort of like working with Spielberg on a movie. This is a team that has an acute sensitivity to knowing when less is the best or when more is better. It’s really a gift. I wish we could all use it in our personal lives with the same kind of intelligence and sensitivity this team is doing on this project.

Money Madness and Socially Responsible Leadership

Perhaps the most tragic failure of a human being is to live our life without learning its most important lesson.  It is our greatest opportunity for happiness.  It’s simple.  Life’s purpose is more than our self-interest.  Much more.  I am continually shocked by the alarming display of leadership failure that parades through our media daily.  Mostly this failure is rooted in the singular pursuit of self-interest, which, like a coiled snake biting itself, dies from its own toxicity.

Our government, which like all governments, struggles to effectively regulate the behavior of powerful, selfish economic interests is seemingly overwhelmed by its own corruption.  Our latest defense budget is weighted down with billions of dollars of earmarks for weapons and projects not wanted by our own military.  We fund these special interest contracts because companies donate millions to targeted senators and congressmen willing to sell their power for campaign contributions.  Many of these lawmakers who enthusiastically insist we waste billions on weapons that will never work are the same ones who violently argue we can’t afford health care reform.  This is failure of leadership.  It’s money madness.  Imagine our society if we exercised self-control instead of needing the bumbling bureaucracy of regulatory control. Regulations are awkward, slow things down and always lead to unintended consequences.  The only thing worse is no regulations, which gives us products that kill us, bankrupt us and poison our future.  We need wise regulation because we are selfish.  What if we weren’t?

Today we have Wall Street whose leaders are wrestling with Washington to avoid any meaningful regulation while they pay themselves billions in bonuses for catastrophic failure.  Citigroup and Merrill Lynch, both huge beneficiaries of taxpayer bailouts, have paid 1434 individuals over $1 million in bonuses in 2008 (USA Today).  This is for performance during the meltdown!  It’s bewildering.   These are people who lead an industry that has caused immense suffering to millions worldwide.  Over 6 million of us have lost our jobs in the past two years due mostly to wildly irresponsible leadership of our financial system.  Meanwhile, responsible bankers who haven’t participated in the financial madness get punished for the sins of the selfish.  Something very basic is wrong.  It’s madness driven by money.

Our health care system needs radical surgery because we are currently ranked 37th in the world in health care effectiveness as measured by money spent for results.  The primary reason for our breakdown is that too many pieces of our health care system are dominated by profit-first motives.  Should health care really be viewed as an “industry” to get rich on?  Are there too many pigs at the trough?  Meanwhile those health care leaders who are caregivers and most compassionate and effective get squashed in the gears of the machine of selfishness.  Something very basic is wrong.  It’s money blindness.

Then there is us.  As a nation we nearly consume 40 percent more per person than our closest runner-up, Great Britain.  Yet, we spend more money on anti-depressants, treating stress disorders, have the highest suicide rate and highest divorce rate of any developed country.  We don’t have to wonder why.  Did you see the study released this week at the American Society Association?  After studying 136,000 people in 132 countries, it concludes that less money can make life simpler and easier to enjoy (See Money Affects Life Satisfaction, but not Day-to-Day Happiness).  Money doesn’t buy happiness.  Happiness, contentment, life satisfaction, all those things we long for are primarily driven by the quality of our personal relationships and the enriching experiences we have.  I think we knew that.  Maybe we just forgot.

Of course not having enough money to pay our bills causes unhappiness, stress and relationship problems.  You see, money as a psychological motivator is known as a “dissatisfier.”  Not having enough causes dissatisfaction but having much more than enough doesn’t cause higher satisfaction.  What drives our higher satisfactions?  Meaning and love.  And the great source of human meaning is serving others.  Put another way, meaning is love, and love is meaningful.  That’s not new news; that’s persistent wisdom of humanity recorded through history.  Selfishness, self-interest, self-glorification is self-inflicted pain.  Love, service, relationships are joy.  We all know this.  When we forget it, most often we have been blinded by money.

What’s the best thing we can do?  First, put down our blackberries and iphones, push away from whatever screen we’re watching and experience the feelings of love with those who love you.  Second, view money like the weather.  Sometimes it will be sunny, sometimes stormy.  Sometimes we’ll have money, sometimes we won’t.  Don’t fret about what you can’t control but take charge of everything you can.  Don’t waste money on too many things.  And don’t sell your peace of mind for debt.  Third, demand that leaders of all our institutions act on principles beyond their self-interest.  The world’s power is shifting to the power of consumers, employees and voters.  Every choice we make can be an act of leadership.  An act of socially responsible leadership.  It’s time to cure money-madness and sharpen our vision to see that things really matter.