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I once read an article in Wired magazine about a guy who had developed an airplane with foldable wings that you can tow behind a car. It was a long article, and I was very interested in this airplane because at one point in my life I was studying to be a pilot. As I read the article I realized that this particular guy was having a ton of fun. He was trying to develop something that would revolutionize aviation and was really trying to change the world with his airplane. It was an exciting article, and I had read previous articles about this guy and his airplane at least one or two times before in other magazines. Apparently the airplane, called “The Icon,” would be going into production very shortly and selling for $139,000. This new airplane was predicted to change aviation for private pilots and make the skies accessible to the world.
When I read this particular article, however, something completely amazing happened. I realized that I knew the guy. In fact, I had spent a couple of days with him only three or four years previously when I had decided to pursue a master’s degree at Stanford Business School. I had gone up and enrolled in Stanford Business School and met him during a weekend orientation for new students. We had actually become friends and spent a couple of days together. At the time he was older than me, around 38, and I was in my mid-30s. Incredibly, in the few months I had been reading about this airplane and this guy, I had not realized it was him.
After picking out a dorm room, getting various textbooks from the school, and putting down a deposit on my tuition, I decided that I was no longer interested in going to business school. I thought that there was nothing the school could teach me that I did not already know about business, and that the businesses I was running would suffer too much if I went away to school.
How arrogant that was of me at the time.
Imagine believing you’re too old and know too much. Imagine how limiting this would be. You need to constantly learn and stretch yourself. In addition, you need to take advantage of every opportunity to learn that ever presents itself. Had I gone to Stanford Business School, I realized I might be doing something with the guy I met up there. Who knows what could have happened?
Every time I look up in the sky and see an airplane flying by, I remember the value of education and the things you can do with it. You can develop airplanes or do tons of other things that will literally change your life when you pursue education with vigor. Education is about the most important thing you can do with your time. Another thing about education is that it doesn’t matter how old you are. You can get an education at any time. Regardless of your age, if you keep learning, it’s going to change you. There’s simply nothing more important than education. The guy who developed the airplane and was now marketing it, was 38 at the time he enrolled in business school. It’s never too late to pursue your dreams.
Most people, at some point in their lives, decide they have learned enough. This is a huge mistake. There is so much power in knowledge. Knowledge can empower you to become better, faster, and stronger in everything you do. It is astonishing to me that so many people go through their lives making the same mistakes over and over and over again. Many of these mistakes could be fixed if they took the time to get some education and learn more about themselves. So many people fail to reach their full potential because they don’t allow themselves to get the education they should.
There’s more to education than just going to school, however. Education is also about making sure you’re continually learning. There are tons of books out there that you can read about your profession and what you do specifically that will allow you to get better and better at everything you do. You should be working in a job you’re continually interested in learning more about. The more you learn about your job and how to get better at it, the better you will do in your career. Regardless of whether you’re in sales, management, or the law, the more you know about your profession, the better you are going to do.
One of my favorite copywriters in the world is a guy named Joe Sugarman. I really like Joe Sugarman because he’s so exceptionally gifted at copywriting. His copywriting is all based on educating consumers about why they should buy a given product that he sells.
Sugarman is most famous for selling items such as BluBlocker sunglasses. Sugarman also owns a good portion of the islands of Maui and Kauai and the newspaper in Maui. Sugarman has written several books which include step-by-step instructions to teach people exactly what they need to do in order to write like him. The books are exceptional and people who follow the advice in the books can do very well if they are also copywriters.
I find it incredible that someone can make literally hundreds of millions of dollars by writing very good ads like Sugarman. Sugarman doesn’t even work all that hard. He finds a product he likes and thinks about the product in an unconventional way that educates the consumer by creating an analogy to something more significant than the product. Then, he writes an advertisement in a few hours and makes sure he has a number set up for ordering and someplace that will ship the product to people. It’s a bit more complex that that, of course, but this is the gist of it.
I have met Sugarman on several occasions, and he is relaxed and incredibly eager to teach people about what he does. This guy probably makes more money than the presidents of General Motors, IBM, and Boeing combined. While the main goal of no life should be purely financial (the goal of Sugarman’s life is not financial), the point is there are rules people can learn and easily follow that can drastically change and improve their careers.
Throughout the years, I’ve employed probably at least 100 writers in our offices in Los Angeles. I’m in the career business and not the writing business; however, I have always admired Sugarman. Whenever I’ve encountered a writer in our company who had promise, I have gone out and purchased for them all of the books by Sugarman I can find. I’ve spent $200+ doing this for some of my favorite writers. I tell the writers, “You are so lucky to have this talent. Read these books and study them. Let me tell you about what this guy, Joe Sugarman, has been able to do with the same ability. If you get really good at this, you can have the same sort of career he has had. In the interim, you can make a hell of a lot of money here if you learn all about this stuff.”
A lot of the people I have given these books to have been maybe in their early 50s. Others have been in their mid-20s, having just completed degrees at schools like Harvard. Others have been people who have come to our company from successful careers in other sorts of companies, like working in copywriting for major department store chains writing weekly newspaper ads.
The most depressing thing has happened with the education I’ve handed to these people. Almost all of the people I’ve given these books to have never opened them a crack. They don’t read these books. I know this because I’ve seen the books on their desks month after month, pristine and unopened. To me, this is amazing. If I were a writer, I would want to do everything possible within my power to dramatically increase my income and make sure I was the best I could be. If I could own half the islands of Hawaii as well, that wouldn’t be so bad.
There are people out there who have whatever job you’re doing figured out. All you need to do is find their book or learn about whatever they do. Once you know what they do, you can step up and learn from them as well. It’s easy to get good at something. There’s not a lot you need to do to get better and better at your job.
There is another thing that’s really important to understand about seeking out knowledge: the more you have, the more people will seek you out. People want to hire and do business with people who are knowledgeable about what they do and continuously study it. That’s why people hire you and don’t do the work themselves. That is why I hired copywriters and didn’t do the work myself. People are comforted by people who have taken the time to understand what they do and constantly learn.
Think about how you would react in the following situations if you were the boss:
In the first situation, you interview someone for a job in your company and the person comes in and tells you they are very good at what they do. They don’t provide you any reasons for you to really believe them, but they are pretty adamant about being really good at this type of work.
The second situation involves a person who comes in and, in addition to telling you they are really good at what they do, starts discussing all sorts of books they’ve recently put together about their profession and new developments in their profession. They tell you about seminars they’ve attended and developments in your field.
I would always hire the second person, and I think you would as well. We are comforted knowing a person cares about what they do and has educated themselves about it. The more we believe someone knows, and the more seriously we believe they take their job, the more we will want to work with them. This is just human nature.
It should be this way with you, too. Education is not just a matter of going to school and being done with it. Education needs to be a process of continually educating yourself, continually growing, and continually improving. The more you constantly push yourself, the more you will grow.
In some respects I feel many workplaces are sort of like zombie movies. People report to work each day, leave at the end of the day, and never seek to improve themselves. You need to constantly and consistently continue educating yourself about what you do. Never stop educating yourself. The more you learn, the more profound your ultimate experience will be and the greater the career and life you experience will be.
One of the best examples of the power of education is the career of Claude Hopkins, one of the greatest marketing strategists of all time. In 1919, Schlitz Beer of Milwaukee had mediocre sales compared to other nationally-marketed beers. Claude Hopkins was hired and brought in from New York to try to improve Schlitz’s sales. The first thing Hopkins did was try to learn everything he could about beer. He took a class to understand how beer was made, and he toured the facilities and learned everything he could.
One of the first things that Hopkins discovered was even though Schlitz was right on a Great Lake, they had dug a 4,000-foot deep well because they wanted the purest water possible. In addition, they showed Hopkins a mother yeast cell they had made that was the product of 2,000+ experiments they’d done because they wanted to ensure the beer had a certain taste. Then they showed him how the beer bottles were cleaned at least 10 times for purity before the beer was bottled. They also showed him several rooms with three-foot thick glass where the beer was condensed and re-condensed to ensure it was as pure as possible.
When Hopkins studied all of this, he said, “My God, you should be telling everyone everything you do in order to make your beer so pure.”
“Well, every beer does this. It’s not just our beer, but every beer,” the Schlitz people told Hopkins.
“Yes, but the first brewer who tells the public about this will have a huge advantage,” Hopkins said. Within six months of promoting this aspect of how they made beer, Schlitz went to number one in terms of its sales.
Hopkins understood the value of education and also the value of educating the public. You, too, need to really understand the value of education and what it can mean in your life. You need to ensure you are constantly educating yourself so you can improve. The worst thing you can do with your career and your life is stop learning. Get books, tapes, and whatever else you can and apply these to your work. This one piece of advice could literally change your career and life forever.
About Harrison Barnes
Harrison Barnes is the Founder of BCG Attorney Search and a successful legal recruiter himself. Harrison is extremely committed to and passionate about the profession of legal placement. His firm BCG Attorney Search has placed thousands of attorneys. BCG Attorney Search works with attorneys to dramatically improve their careers by leaving no stone unturned in a search and bringing out the very best in them. Harrison has placed the leaders of the nation’s top law firms, and countless associates who have gone on to lead the nation’s top law firms. There are very few firms Harrison has not made placements with. Harrison’s writings about attorney careers and placements attract millions of reads each year. He coaches and consults with law firms about how to dramatically improve their recruiting and retention efforts. His company LawCrossing has been ranked on the Inc. 500 twice. For more information, please visit Harrison Barnes’ bio.
About BCG Attorney Search
BCG Attorney Search matches attorneys and law firms with unparalleled expertise and drive that gets results. Known globally for its success in locating and placing attorneys in law firms of all sizes, BCG Attorney Search has placed thousands of attorneys in law firms in thousands of different law firms around the country. Unlike other legal placement firms, BCG Attorney Search brings massive resources of over 150 employees to its placement efforts locating positions and opportunities that its competitors simply cannot. Every legal recruiter at BCG Attorney Search is a former successful attorney who attended a top law school, worked in top law firms and brought massive drive and commitment to their work. BCG Attorney Search legal recruiters take your legal career seriously and understand attorneys. For more information, please visit www.BCGSearch.com.
Filed Under : Featured, Life Lessons
Tagged: aviation, be a pilot, career advice | a harrison barnes, copywriters, education, good to keep learning, hired copyrighters, job search, legal jobs, marketing, new job opportunities, sales, sales management law, stanford business school, successful careers
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Resourcefulness can make you better at everything you do, and separates the truly extraordinary people from the general herd. Do everything within your power to be resourceful in your job search, life, and career to give yourself the best possible chance of achieving your goals, and learn how to employ the resources currently at your disposal for maximum impact.
The most successful people in the world share the common characteristic of sharing, or concentrating on the value that they give back to others rather than on their own growth and profit. Focusing on yourself never leads to long-term success, but leads instead to unhappiness as well as emotional and financial challenges. Your greatest consideration, therefore, should be how you can contribute to others, and how your actions can impact their lives.
The best way to attain your goal is through small, incremental steps on which you can build. Establish a routine, and make sure you are consistently working towards some kind of goal. Start small, and always build upon what you have done before. Most people fail to achieve their goals because they believe everything should happen quickly and at the same time, instead of progressively building upon their past achievements.
Make sure that you are involved in groups that focus on positive things. Your success in life depends on your ability to focus on the outcomes you want, and the focus of the groups with which you associate will in turn shape your own focus. You must endeavor to always choose groups with a positive focus.
Everything you do is a form of preparation for your job interviews, as you are always under some form of scrutiny. The best employees can always spot other good employees, and you cannot “fake it”; merely doing a good job in your work is a form of interview preparation. Always put your all into your work, therefore, even if you do not have long-term plans to remain at your current employment. Switch jobs as infrequently as possible. The time to prepare for a job search is before you even realize that you need to do so.
Your greatest successes will come from some of the smallest actions in terms of meeting people. You will cause a “stacking effect” the more you meet and connect with people; conversely, people cannot connect with you when you are withdrawn and nothing will happen. You must do everything in your power to connect with as many people as possible.
When myriad candidates are applying to limited positions, practicing unusual tactics in your job hunt will prove far more helpful than following the established routine and waiting for positions to come to you. Much like in military strategy, well-planned and unconventional moves can help you conquer your goals without suffering significant losses. You can land an excellent position by focusing on companies’ needs, rather than depending on job and recruiting advertisements.
You can change your life forever by harnessing the power of persistence. Think about the people in your life, and whether they empower you or hinder you in achieving your goals. You must win at all costs, and persist until you succeed.
You need to provide people what they want, otherwise you will not have a job. Although they might not always be the most desirable kinds of jobs, certain jobs always exist because they provide services that people will always require. The only secret to continual employment is to provide a service that people always need; if you do this, and nothing else, you will always find yourself employed. Give people what they want.
Your ability to help people will determine the extent of your success; the more powerful and effective your help, the greater rewards you will receive. One of the rarest and most profound achievements is to follow through on your goals and create a paradigm-shifting idea. The more revolutionary your work, the more people you will affect and the more memorable of a career you will have.
You will greatly benefit your career by helping and promoting your company’s expansion. A common belief is that expansion is fundamentally positive, and a lack of expansion is fundamentally negative. You must be on the side of expansion rather than contraction in every area of your life. All employers seek people who will help them expand, and the more your ability to contribute to this expansion will provide you increased job security and a greater likelihood of being hired.
The ability to fit into your work environment is among the most important parts of obtaining and retaining a job, even more so than your skill level. Fitting in means nothing more than being comfortable in one’s work environment, and making others similarly comfortable. Employers want to hire people who will embrace their approach to business and the world on physical and moral levels, so you must strive to fit in with their worldview.
Focus on what you are doing, not what others around you are doing. There are people to take action towards their goals, and then there people who sit on the sidelines and comment on the first group of people. People who are mostly interested in gossip and watching others usually lack the confidence and determination to take action themselves. The most successful people go account and accomplish things rather than sit back and watch others make things happen.
In this article, Harrison advises you to live the lives you wish to have, do the jobs you want to do, and basically live your dreams to your best possible ability. Life is fleeting and no one knows what tomorrow holds. So Harrison puts forward certain questions – when are you going to start living the life you want and when are you going to take charge of your life. The time to have the career you want is right now, not tomorrow, and not later. You need to take charge of your career and life and no one else is going to do it for you. Your entire life and the quality of it is a product of your decisions. You can have, do, or be anything you want. Do not create alibis for making comprises in life. What separates the best and the happiest people is the ability to stop to making excuses and Harrison wants you to be this person.
Anyone can be up when things are going well, but the real challenge comes when things are not. Do not look at problems, which are inevitable for any person or business, in a negative light; think of them instead as challenges, lessons, or opportunities. There is a silver lining to be found in every problem, and finding that silver lining will enable you to grow.
Understanding what you do for a living is very important for your career. You should understand the generality of your specific profession. You and your career are a product. You need to know where and how to market yourself in the best way possible. You need to be relevant and understand the skills you are offering. Being a relevant product is essential for your success. It’s easy to be relevant when you understand what you are doing and what purpose you serve. Being relevant is more than just getting a job. Being relevant also relates to serving the employers with the skills they need. You need to understand your market and what your customers want. This is the way to stay employed, and it is also the means to continual improvement.
Things will not always go the way that you want them to go, so you must not be discouraged by adversity in your job hunt. When you persist and consistently put forth your best effort, things are much more likely to go in your favor. Also, you must resist others’ efforts to undermine your efforts and potential; focus instead on doing everything in your power to fight on and complete the task at hand.
Having a goal or vision will propel you towards greater career success and happiness. Without a purpose, you will find yourself depressed and ultimately fail to achieve your goals. Do not subscribe to the unrealistic problem that you should never have problems, but instead regard problems as part of your overall growth strategy.
Don’t ever give up, and make the most of the tools at your disposal. Take chances and invest in your best skills, and persist in the face of unfortunate events. Have faith in your considerable work and capabilities, and use them to create value for others.
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Maintaining a routine in both life and work is important to success. Not only do you need to establish a routine, you must make that routine demanding and push yourself to the limit. Budget a certain amount of time each week for networking, applying to jobs, brushing up your interview skills, and following up with employers. Such consistent effort on a daily basis will make a huge difference to your career success.
A recommendation from a powerful person can make a huge difference in your job search; a reference from an influential person makes a tremendous difference to a prospective employer, and thus can be a major advantage for you. When an important person whom the company trusts recommends you, you instantly qualify for positions that may previously have been unattainable. Make the absolute most of your connections with the powerful people in your life, because doing so can instantaneously change your career and life.
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Determine whether you are a global or specific person. Most people are either too general or too specific in the way they treat information, and overly detail-oriented people risk losing sight of the bigger picture. General people are more comfortable in managerial positions, while detail-oriented people prefer everything to conform to a logical sequence. Understand which sort of person you are, and seek work that best harnesses your natural inclination.
In this article Harrison talks about releasing the lack that you feel, in order to reach your full potential. If a sense of lack dominates your thinking, it will affect your interaction with the world and how the world sees you. There are many areas of your life where you are coming from a position of lack. Your ability to release this lack and go forward with your life can create a tremendous sense of peace and more natural accomplishments in your world. The amount of lack that people see out there is profound and it has a massive impact on their lives. According to Harrison, the most successful people in the world see the world as a place of opportunity and not lack.
When faced with difficult times, you must develop the ability to transcend the trouble around you instead of giving up or assuming that nothing can be done about your situation. Keep your wits about you and take charge of the situation, and you will find yourself on track for constant improvement and career success.
It is extremely important that you enjoy your job. Most people find themselves in jobs that they resent, and eventually make this resentment known by appearing disinterested and distracted. Success comes from being engaged in and grateful for your work. You can define your job according to your own vision; you can either choose to engage with your work, or avoid and despise what you do. People recognize and appreciate those who are enthusiastic about their work.
Your résumé is an extremely important document. There are entire books written about how to craft them. I have written at least one myself. There are scores of résumé consultants, companies, and others that will work on your résumé for a fee. Hiring one of these services can be useful and can improve your résumé. Nevertheless, most résumés can improve dramatically by following the below advice.
In this article Harrison explains how you can do better in your career by selling. The most successful people are absolute masters at sales. Selling is among the most important career skills you can have. When you know how to sell something you can do exceptionally well wherever you go. Knowing how to sell something is a key to survival, advancement, fame, and fortune. Everything we do is about making a sale. Selling yourself is about showing others the value you can bring them. So package yourself to the best of your ability, always be at your best and sell yourself. Develop your sales skills and do not be afraid to sell anything. Whatever your goal in life, becoming an effective salesman will help you achieve it.
It is absolutely vital to be in control of your life and career. When you fail to control your life, someone else will step in to do so and fit your life into their plans. Understand that it is in others’ interests to establish control over your life and work, and instead exert control yourself over your life and the events around you.
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Many thanks for the nice things you said about me Harrison. Hope to see you again soon.
Joe
This is an incredible article. I’m sending it to all of my LinkedIn contacts and anyone else I know. I can’t wait to read some of Joe’s works. My life has been changed by reading and lifelong learning. I just wish more people “got it.”
Gail
I manage sales reps and it is also amazing to me how many times I give them books and other sources that will help them become better and they just choose not to use them. So much potential to make a difference just lost.
I have always been a beliver that i can learn something every day no matter what it is, if it is the way someone else likes to do or say somthing or the way someone wants to Manage others or the way some people like to build things.
there is always some thing to learn if you are open to learning.
Thanks for re-posting this blog entry.
Love the article. Really good writing and great design.
Never stop learning; I know but back at you.
Lee
This article came at a point in my life where I’m starting a new job and able to re-invent myself with a broader skillset than in previous positions, and incorporating lifelong learning will become a key to staking a claim to my enhanced reputation. This was good timing to reinforce my intentions to go back to school “some day” with the need to vigorously explore such options. Thanks for posting.
Very insightful, and spot on in the effort I am currently engaged with. Things have changed so profoundly in recent years with cancer diagnosis and treatment that many oncologists never heard of various therapies, approaches or technologies such as CRISPR — these things were not taught to most oncologists when they went through medical school. This levels the playing field for others who have not attended medical school to get up to speed and join in the effort in educating ourselves and others into the new paradigm of cancer research these days. I am just using this as one example where learning in your field is required especially after graduating to stay current. Thank you for sharing your wisdom. David Ligon, Founder & CEO, Oncology Fox, LLC OncoFox.org