The Episodic Career summary

You’ve probably come across politicians angrily accusing the unemployed of being lazy, claiming the solution to life’s problems is to work harder. It’s an easy answer, but it often misses the mark. That’s because unemployment isn’t a matter of laziness. 

The stats back that up. As the American Economic Policy Institute’s data shows, jobs have become a scarce commodity since the 2008 financial crisis. In April 2014, for example, there were 2.4 million positions available in the US. Sounds like a lot, right? Well, it does until you know how many folks were looking for a job that same month – 9.8 million. 

Employment has changed in recent decades. In the past, most folks got a job after graduating from school and then stayed with the same employer for the rest of their careers, slowly inching their way up the company ladder. Today, however, careers are episodic, and employees move from job to job in an increasingly fast-changing labor market. 

The upshot? No one can afford to rest on their laurels. The pace of innovation is rapid, and workers in every economic sector are constantly trying to stay ahead of the competition. Take an example from the author’s career. Back in 1995, she learned how to use HTML to create websites for her news stories. That was a sound investment at the time – after all, lots of people were learning the coding language to give them an edge in the job market.  

Working life is full of struggles and difficulties. Some, like spats with your colleagues, are fairly trivial. Others, like losing your job, are much larger issues. In this blink, we’ll explore a couple of strategies you can use to make things easier when the going gets tough. 

The key to navigating crises is to be honest with yourself. Take it from the author. After working in journalism for a number of years, she realized that her chosen career wasn’t working out. She didn’t like being called up at any time, day or night, and sent on an assignment.

The author interviewed Kristine Danielle while researching this book. Kristine had a rough start in life and ended up addicted to drugs and working as a prostitute in Seattle. Her story makes you wonder how folks ever manage to turn things around and create a happy life for themselves. 

The answer is deceptively simple – willpower. 

Are you unemployed or unhappily employed? Don’t worry – it happens to everyone at one point or another, especially in such a fast-changing labor market. The key to getting out of this situation is to maximize the efficiency of your job search. Let’s find out how. 

The best place to start is to reach out to distant contacts. Naturally, you’ll want your close friends on hand to give you emotional support. But when it comes to landing a new position, you’re better off casting a wider net. That means making the most of your acquaintances. 

There’s no doubt that online job listings on platforms like LinkedIn and Indeed are some of the most convenient ways to look for new positions – but how effective are they? In short, if you want a job, you might just have to leave the comfort of your own home. 

Take it from Pastor Richard N. Bolles, the author of the 1970 guide to job seeking, What Color is Your Parachute. An instant classic, Bolles’ study has been updated every year since its publication. According to 2015 data included in one of those updates, online job searches only lead to a position in four percent of all cases. To put that in perspective, knocking on doors at small local companies had a 47 percent success rate. Employing a firm to do the legwork for you, by comparison, had a 28 percent success rate. 

As if the labor market weren’t tough enough, laws protecting employees against discrimination are also getting weaker. In 2013, for example, the US Supreme Court ruled that the law only recognized managerial discrimination if the offender had direct “supervisory power” over an employee. In other words, it’s only discrimination if the person has the power to fire you. 

That’s an issue, especially as discrimination remains a common workplace problem. While researching her book, the author asked employees in a variety of fields if they had experienced discrimination at work. A full 31 percent of respondents said that they had. Even more troubling, 81 percent of those folks hadn’t reported the issue because they feared doing so would endanger their positions.