Friday reflection

Future You says, "thanks"

Hi there.

I want you to take a moment and think of yourself a year from now. Let’s call the woman you picture, “Future You.” I’d like to talk today about how telling your story online, now, is a way of doing Future You, and Future You’s career, a big, serious solid.

Telling your story online — getting clear on what you want people to know about you and your work, and using LinkedIn and other tools to beam out those messages — is a more effective and pleasurable way of attracting your next job than the old-fashioned slog to which so many people still default. If you want to hear more about this, check out an article I recently published on Medium: The future of work requires a new approach to job searching.

What I didn’t say in that article, but want to say to you, is that while I know having an online presence may feel like a burden now — one more thing to do in your busy life — it is such a profound gift to our future selves.

Let’s say your name is Tina. (Hi, Tina.) Tina of Today might think, “Eh, I’m happy enough at work, I’ve got too much else to do”; she might let her LinkedIn profile grow stale, and go for months without engaging with other people’s content online.

On the one hand, good for Tina, right? We’re all busy and have a profound need for rest. But don’t be so quick to label her online inactivity as #selfcare. Because what happens when, six months from now, Tina gets a shitty new boss who makes her life hell, or slowly realizes that she’s outgrown her role or is otherwise dissatisfied? The thought of “the old slog” approach to job searching is paralyzing. She doesn’t know where to start. She gets stuck.

This is why so many people end up staying in jobs they don’t like, or in toxic environments, well past their expiration dates. It doesn’t have to be this way.

What if, instead, Tina set up a recurring calendar appointment for just 15 minutes every weekday to check in on LinkedIn, for example? To make sure her profile was current, to see what people in her network were saying, to read and comment and like and, yes, add some of her own ideas to the mix, too?

Then, when she’s ready to look for a new job, the scaffolding is there. Her LinkedIn connections, for example, have a fresh impression of who she is and what she’s up to in the world, of her voice and of how she thinks and what she cares about. Her network is therefore much more ripe for her to reach out and say, “Hey, I wonder if you know anyone looking for someone who…..”

Because this is how you get a juicy job in 2022: Not by sitting alone at your computer, methodically throwing a series of proverbial darts at online job postings, but by being seen and heard from on a regular basis, on a medium (the internet) that lets you reach not only your friends and colleagues but also their friends and colleagues.

Not to mention, being active online is about operating as part of a larger community in your work. That includes reading and sharing ideas that are relevant to your work and understanding of the world.

It comes down to this: The time will come when you’re ready to make a change, and starting from zero is so much harder and more painful than building on existing momentum. So do Future You a solid, and commit to a regular practice of showing up online. Because, spoiler alert: Future You is, well…you.

xo

Amanda