The CareerPlanner Blog

A Meaningful Life in Your 50's, 60's 70's...

Last week I bought an interesting book after hearing the author interviewed on public radio. 

This book proposes an alternative view to aging and retirement.

Instead of just getting old, moving to a retirement condo in Florida and playing golf or bridge everyday until you shrivel up and die, Theodore Roszak's The Making of an Elder Culture, suggests it's time for the aging and retired Baby Boomers to dedicate at least part of themselves to leveraging their vast numbers (they are a huge voting block) to making the changes that are so desperately needed in this world.

Roszak points out that during the 1960's and the summer of love, this same generation banded together to:

1) Put an end to wars like Vietnam

2) Protecting the environment and ecology from over population and man made pollution

3) Promote values other than corporate and personal greed

4) Keeping the Military Industrial Complex in it's rightful place

In a way he suggests it's time for the Boomers, after a life of conspicuous consumption, to go back to their ideals of the 1960's and finish what they started. Plus he suggests, there will be two benefits of major importance:

1) It will be more fulfilling than what you are doing now

2) If you can help fix the problems of the day - government, war, health care, the environment, greed, you will experience the benefits yourself because you are living longer

His main motivation in suggesting that it's even possible for the elder generation to make a difference today is the change in demographics which it seems most of us have been ignoring.

This demographic is that those over 50 years of age are becoming the single largest block of voters and thus this AARP like group can influence policy and government.

I especially enjoy Roszak's explanation for why most people (marketeers, politicians, big business, you and me) don't realize the power the elder generation has:

1) The elder generation has not used it's power yet.  They won't be noticed until they do the equivalent of marching against the war in Vietnam.

2) We notice and worship the young in this culture.  I'm talking about America, and Europe.  TV shows prefer to feature young, good looking actors rather than gray hairs.  Thus we focus on the young and we probably just wish the old would go away.

3) Old is relative, and we usually don't see ourselves as the old people who should just fade away.  When my Father was 75 I heard him complaining about some old fart in the car ahead of him.  Today I was out jogging, and thinking about this aging thing, as my 55th birthday is headed this way.  I passed three people out for a walk and they called me a youngster. 

What does this mean for you if you are an aging Baby Boomer?

It means you can change the world, and you probably want to, because government, big business, and insurance companies aren't going to care about you,  other than how to get your remaining money.

So it's time for Boomers to band together, organize and start pushing for legislation that will protect the elderly, and the planet. 

Stay tuned for more, or just go read the book yourself...

Ripped off by the "Salad Bar in a Box To Go" scam at Whole Foods

The No Rip Off - Good Karma Refund Policy

Today, after being ripped off at Whole Foods Grocery store for a  Salad Bar in a Box To Go that cost me $18 I decided to rewrite one of our policies at CareerPlanner.com. 

Read what happened to me and let me know if you've fallen for this...

Today 7-17-2009, after being ripped off by the local Whole Food Grocery store I decided to change CareerPlanner's refund policy to totally protect anyone that buys from us.

So here is what happened to me today...

After working out at the gym, I went in to buy something to take home for lunch. I usually eat at home to save money. But I was out running errands and the thought of a turkey sandwich just didn't do it for me.

I usually get this seafood soup and corn bread, but they didn't have it today. So I went to the salad bar and loaded up a "to go box" with lettuce, spinach, peas, corn, shredded carrots etc.

When I got to the cashier the price of this "to go salad" was $18.62 plus tax.

For a salad in a box. Come on. Who are you kidding?

The cashier explains to me that the salad bar is $7.99 per pound. OK, so maybe 2 pounds of salad is more than I should have taken even if I am a big guy and I just finished exercising.

But this is not Steak or Prime Rib or fresh fish. This is garden stuff. Leaves and vegetables stuff.

So, the problem was, I apparently did not know what I was buying. I don't usually buy salad bar stuff to take home. Just like you usually don't buy career planning stuff from somebody you don't know.

So I was pretty angry at the product marketing person at Whole Foods who knows exactly how fast a to go box of salad can add up. And that person has the nerve to charge $8 a pound and no they don't put a scale there so you can weigh what you have.

So, because of that I decided to simplify CareerPlanner's refund policy.

Since you probably don't buy Career Planning stuff often enough to know what you are buying, our new policy says this: If our stuff does not help you with your career, you get your money back. All of it. It's that simple.

There, now I feel better,

Michael T Robinson

One Minute Free Career Test

One of the fastest ways to determine what needs to be changed with your career is to ask yourself this question:

If I had $2 or $3M dollars of cash in the bank, would I still be doing this job?

If not, what would I be doing after I got bored drinking Pina Colada's and Mai-Tai's, while sitting on the beach in Maui?

Maybe you already love the work you do, but you would rather do it for a company that has better management or is more healthy financially.

Or maybe the work and the company are great but something else isn't quite right, like a long commute, or pay that is lower than your peers, or a boss that is not very good at helping you and the company become more successful.

Or perhaps, you are lucky enough to enjoy just about any job that keeps you busy and provides a pay check. Yes, there are people like that.

So ask yourself, how would you choose to spend tomorrow if you had 2 to 3 million in the bank.

That is a good test of your career, and it's free.

To learn more about a career test, click here...

How Do You Know When You Are Doing The Wrong Kind of Work?

Today I had a prime example of watching a person who was forced to do the wrong kind of work.

And it was me.

I normally love the work I do, but for the last few days I have been doing book keeping and accounting in an effort get ready for our tax prep guy.

After a few hours of typing numbers into Quicken / QuickBooks and struggling to balance accounts and get all the expenses correctly categorized, I was a wreck. I was repeatedly cursing the software. 

I was grouchy and cranky (more so than usual) and my dog had even run to the other end of the house.

I was pessimistic and the whole world looked bleak. 

So when I took a break to chill a bit, I realized that this is what it is like when a person is forced to do work that they are not well suited to.

I've taken our Career Interest Test and our new Personality Test several times and they both say that I should avoid repetitive, highly detailed work, like accounting and book keeping.

The Personality Test says I am an "INTJ," and if you want to destroy an INTJ at work, keep them away from creative work for several days.  Force them to do repetitive, detailed work. 

Wow. I knew I hated the book keeping, but I always associated it with taxes and nobody likes taxes.  Now I know better.  Its the very type of work I was born to avoid and it is driving me up the wall.  Plus it's driving my dog to hide in the guest bedroom.

So I wonder what it must be like for someone who has a job where they have to do a lot of work that they are not well suited to?

What if you needed to earn a living up until you are 90 years old?

 I recently read where a person who is 40 years old today will easily live long enough to reach a time when medical technology has advanced far enough that one's life can be extended indefinitely.

Sound far fetched? - see Ray Hammond's The World in 2030.  Hammond is a futurist who was commissioned by the plastics industry to identify long term trends that they could capitalize on. 

Futurists forecast that by 2025 (only 16 years from now), medical technology will offer two breakthrough technologies that will extend our lives, but they will be very expensive and only those with a good income need apply.

These two breakthroughs will be rejuvenation treatments and replacement organs grown from your own DNA. With those, they say, a 40 year old person today can easily live past 120.

In the near future there will be two classes of people.  Those that can afford quality rejuv and those that can't.  Don't believe me?  Many of the rich and famous today are already taking Human Growth Hormone (HGH) to give them more energy, to help them heal faster, and to be a bit more perky.

So what does this mean for your career?

It means that you had better have a good source of income that will still be working for you when you are 80, 90 or 120 years old.  Am I joking?  Sorry no.  Wish I was.

Here is the big picture when it comes to careers.  Let say you are 40 today.  Remember how much you experienced in your first 20 years, from birth to when you could legally drink. You did a lot.  You got educated. You held your first job. You learned to drive. You fell in love... You may have spent time and effort getting trained or educated for your first career.  You accomplished a lot.

Now remember how much you experienced from when you were 21 to 40. This is lifetime #2.  You got married, maybe had kids, built a career, took nice vacations...

Now picture that every 20 years is a different lifetime or a different life segment. 

Thus you have at least two more 20 year life segments ahead of you. Better plan for them.

If medical technology comes through, you might easily live to 120.  That would be four more full life segments. Holy cow Batman, that's a long time.  My savings plan might run out of money.

In the old days, people planned to retire when they hit 63 and then play golf or fish until they died.  For a source of income they counted on:

• a company pension plan
• a military service pension
• a civil servant pension
• selling their home
• social security
• a stock market portfolio
• rental property

Well, today we can see that most of these except maybe the rental income, are in trouble.

So, if you are 40 today, you need to plan to earn income for a very long life, possibly until you are 120.

Unless you are fortunate enough to have already become wealthy, you have some work to do.

But with all this time ahead of you, it may make sense to start investing in your next career.

If you are 40, you may have thought, heck I'm going to retire at 63, why would I take the time to learn new skills, develop new talents.   I only have 23 years of work left.  Wrong.

Think again.

Maybe you have more time than you thought...

7000 Foreclosures Per Day According to Obama on Larry King

Last night on Larry King Live, Barack Obama was mentioned that there are now 7,000 new foreclosures everyday.

Everyone is talking about home foreclosures but people do not seem to know there is a way to prevent or stop the foreclosure on your home.

It's called "Loan Modification" and you can see how it works at http://www.loanmodifications360.com/

Basically you can pay for this service where they will go to your lender and negotiate a more affordable loan payment.  They can usually get you a lower interest rate.  Sometimes they can reduce the amount you owe on your mortgage.

This all works because the banks do not want anymore houses.  They have too many already. 

You can check out their blog http://loanmodexpert.typepad.com/

You can try to process a loan mod yourself, but you will come out better if you hire an expert.  They know how to work the lenders. 

My Barber Knows More About The Economy...

The other night, Phil Gramm, the genius (?) who advises Senator McCain on the economy said that there is no real problem with the American economy, it's all in our minds and we are all a bunch of whiners.

Most of us Americans have suspected that those in charge of our government and living inside the Washington DC "Beltway" were a bit out of touch.  But now we know just how far out of touch they are.  It's not just George W. Bush who looks so damn stupid.  It's most of the Republicans and Democrats in DC.

My barber seems to know more about the economy than McCain and Phil Gramm put together.  I was in there the other day getting a haircut and my barber had these observations about our economy:

• Credit cards are being used to pay for haircuts twice as often as this time last year.  Presumably because people don't have cash because they are out of work or their mortgage payment is bigger than they can handle. These are $18 haircuts.
• At the local grocery store, the bagging and shelf stocking staff is now composed of 45 to 60 year old ladies.  It used to be students and Hispanics.  These older ladies have had to go back to work to help make ends meet.

But apparently in DC, people still have money for haircuts.

A funny story about barbers and the cost of haircuts.  Up until a few years ago I used to go to a hair stylist who would charge $40 to $60 for a haircut. I had been doing that most of my adult life.

That made some sense when I had lots of hair to cut.  However, if you look at my picture today http://www.careerplanner.com/MichaelTRobinson.cfm  you'll see that spending $50 for a haircut was just plain stupid.

The real reason I cut back my spending on haircuts was to prepare for a time when I might not be making the big pay check.  A time when the economy was going to sour, and sour badly. 

Well the time has come and I'm glad I switched to my barber / economist with his $18 haircuts. 

By the way, the stylist that was cutting my hair moved to the city (San Francisco) where she gets  $300 to color someone's hair.  Gee, maybe I should get the gray out.

Good and Truly Bad Career Tests on the Internet

I am so pissed (not drunk for you English Folks, but really angry).

I just wasted about 1 hour taking a competitor's (LiveCareer.com) online career test and trying to read the report.

This was supposed to be a free test designed by a psychologist, but when I got to the end they wanted $24.95 to $39.95 to actually get a copy of the report. 

This whole web site exists for the purpose of advertising.

I only took this test because Google has them ranked #4 for the term "career test."  Plus Google gives them a page rank of 7 (PR7).  And this is a crap career test. Let me tell you...

There was 100 questions to answer.

In between every 10 questions there was at least one full page advertisement, and one not so subtle advert designed as a bonus question.  Bonus Question in a career test?  Who are you fooling?

Worse than the ads, they forced me to choose between answers that I did not want to select.  Each question has 3 answers and you have to mark which activity you like the most and which you like the least.

Well what if you hate all three choices.   Here is an example.

Which do you prefer to do the most and which do you like the least:
A) Running a boarding house for students.
B) Illustrating children's books
C) Teaching needy children overseas

Well I don't want to do any of those.  Nor am I any good at any of those things.  Yet they forced me to pick one that I want to do.  That's absurd.

I could not concentrate with all these ads flying around.  I was sure I would accidentally click on one and be bombarded with their email the rest of my life.

Then to read my report, I had to look at and find my way through  about 15 more full page ads.  They stuffed one advertisement between every page of my career test report.  That is total bullsh...

I have taken many career tests and this by far is the most intrusive and annoying career assesment test I have seen on our 10 years on the internet.

They said their career test was created by  Dr. Douglas N. Jackson.  Well Dr Jackson, you sold out to advertising.  Guess you don't really care whether people use your tool to find a better career.

So here is my sales pitch.  The career test at www.CareerPlanner.com has no advertising.  Plus it does not force you to choose answers you don't like which will throw off your results.

It does cost $19.95 to $29.95 and they tell you that right up front.  When you read your test report it won't be full of advertising.  Plus it's accurate and reliable and they have a full money back guarantee.  Also, they know what they are doing at CareerPlanner.com.

And here is my disclaimer.  I own CareerPlanner.com.  We have been helping people find better more rewarding and more fulfilling careers for over 10 years.

About Working on Vacations

I wonder how many people enjoy doing their work while they are on vacation?

This must sound crazy, but when I'm relaxing on a vacation, or a few days away from the office, I usually find myself inspired to do some work.

But I'm lucky because the work I do, or at least most of it, I love.  It's not the work I did when I was a Vice President or CEO in high tech.  I did enjoy much of that, but only small portions of that work was interesting enough to do on a vacation.  Usually the only high tech work I did on vacation was reading and learning more about strategic marketing and long term planning.  The rest of that work was best left for when I was back in the office.

No, the work I love to do is to build up the CareerPlanner.com web site with good content and innovative career tools that can help people achieve better careers.  Now that work gets me motivated and that is what I find myself doing on a holiday such as today.

So one could say it's not work if I enjoy it so much that when I wake up on a holiday it's the first thing I do after getting a cup of coffee.

If you enjoy it so much can you legitimately call it work?  There has to be a better name for it when you are able to do the work you love.  When it adds real value to the world.  When it helps people.  And especially when the work you do is productive and not wasted. 

So much of the work one does when one is managed by a less than capable boss is a waste of everyones time.

I remember being on a board of directors where one of the investors was just plain stupid.  We all wasted more time trying to explain the basics of the business to this person.  Meeting after meeting we had to answer the same questions.  Well no he wasn't stupid.  He had just stopped learning years ago and was cruising by on his reputation.  People that have stopped learning are not very useful to have around.  Well more on that at another time.

My only point here is that when you do the work that you love, it is so rewarding that you might find yourself waking up and doing some work one morning when you are on holiday.  That will be a true test of whether it's the right work for you.