HOW TO GET YOUR DREAM JOB (AT THE PLACE YOU CURRENTLY WORK) (EP.19)

They walk in line - They walk in line - They walk in line. Most people and most corporations just want you to walk in line, wait your turn, and do as you are told. They do things the way they do them because that's the way they've always been done. MR CORPO explains how to break through this stasis and actually get what YOU want - because the thing is - your boss is busy, your boss' boss is worried about their own job, their own promotion, their own life - so if you are sitting at your desk waiting for someone else to give you your dream job your butt is going to get really sore. MR CORPO explains how to get your dream job and why you don't have to leave your current company in order to get it.

You just have to do 2 easy things:

(1) Decide what you want

(2) Tell other people what you want

It's that easy. Listen to this episode to get all the details and tactics so you can take control of your life and get what you want.

 LISTEN HERE:

FULL TRANSCRIPT:

 How To Get Your Dream Job

JUSTIN: Full of a glory never seen, they made it through the whole machine to never question anymore hypnotic trance they never saw. They walked in line, they walked in line, they walked in line, they walked in line.

(Intro music)

JUSTIN: Hello and welcome to another episode of the Mr. Corpo podcast. Today's episode is going to be an interesting one. Maybe it's a little bit unexpected. We're going to talk about how to get your dream job at the place you already work. And you see, what's unexpected about this topic is the part that says, "At the place you already work." Because most people think if they wanna get their dream job, they have to go out and look for it somewhere else. They think they have to get their resume together, they think they have to go interview, they think they have to leave the place they're at to get what they want. But I am here today to talk about how to get your dream job at the place you already work.

Because here's the thing: most people and most companies just want you to walk in line. That's why I sang that song from Joy Division. They want you to do this job, stay in this role, wait your turn, get promoted, move up, straight lines. Wait your turn. I mean, look at me. I'm out of college at 21, I randomly interview at The Gap, it's my first interview, it's my first job offer, I took it. Fast forward 17 years, I'm still working in fashion. Talk about walking in line. I've walked in line. Now, I don't wanna get off topic and start complaining about my entire life, so let's get back on topic here. Let's stay focused, let's walk in line on this podcast. I wanna talk about how you can get your dream job at the place you already work. Now, if you already have your dream job, congratulations. You're basically a unicorn, and you can turn off this podcast, and I'm not gonna say I hate you. I will say I'm jealous of you. But for the rest of us, let's get to work.

(music)

Okay. There are three steps to getting your dream job at the place you already work. Number one, identify what you want. Number two, talk about it. Number three, propose it. Let's start with step one. What is your dream job? This is the hardest part of this whole process. You have to sit and quietly think. You have to consider, what do you actually want out of your life? You have to consider what makes you happy. These are not things that we like to do on a daily basis. It's easy to pull out your phone, check your Instagram, check your Twitter. You just checked it two minutes ago, let me tell you: the world didn't change. But it's not easy to avoid these distractions and actually give time and thought to: what makes me happy? What do I want to do? What brings me joy? How do I wanna live my life? That's why it's the hardest part. Cause you have to look at yourself. I want you to get this right. You've gotta get step one right, because when I go into step two and step three, here's the thing: you're actually gonna get what you want, so be careful what you wish for.

Let me give you some examples of things people might wish for. Maybe you always wanted to live abroad. Maybe you always wanted to work in marketing. Maybe you wish you would work from home at least one day a week so that you can send emails to your co-workers while you're sitting in your underwear. Whatever it is, decide what you want. That is the first step. The company isn't gonna magically walk up to you tomorrow and say, "Hey. That thing that you want that you haven't told anybody about? I know what it is, cause I'm a mind-reader." That's not gonna happen. Remember what I said about companies and people preferring for you to walk in line. It's a lot easier for them if you just stick in line. And guess what? Your boss is busy. Your boss is worried about their own job. Your boss is worried about their own career. Your boss is worried about their own happiness. There's no time, there's no place, there's no way that a company is set up to help you quote unquote "figure it out." You have to bring the fight to them.

And there's two things you need to do. Number one, you have to tell them what you want. And number two, you have to tell them why it's good for them. So that brings us to step two. It's simple: tell people what you want. That's it. It's that easy. Tell people what you want. 05:01 You're never going to get asked to move to Europe if your boss of HR doesn't know that your dream is to move to Amsterdam. Step two, it's just talking to people. I'm not even asking you to justify what you want. I'm not asking you to put a plan together. All I'm asking you to do is just tell other people that you work with what you want. You're planting the seed for future harvest.

Now look, I've done this twice in my career and both times it's worked out perfectly. The first time I was working at Levi's, I mentioned to my boss I would love an opportunity to live and work abroad. I had no bigger plans than that. I just said, "I would love to work abroad." I might have mentioned Europe, I don't even remember. The next thing I know, my boss comes to my desk, asks me to come into her office, and she says, "Hey Justin, we've got a chance, would you wanna go move to Tokyo for three months?" I mean, just like that, out of the clear blue sky, I woke up that morning, I had no idea my life was gonna change. But the reason it did change, the reason I did get a chance to go live abroad, the reason I did get a chance to go open a creative center in Tokyo for three months on the company's dime? It's cause I just told my boss, "Hey, I would love a chance to live abroad." And guess what happens? Conversation happen behind closed doors. People talk, ideas come and go. Someone mentioned that hey, we should open a creative studio in Japan. And guess what? My boss was sitting there and she said, "You know what? Justin mentioned he wanted to live abroad. He could be a great person to go do this." And all of a sudden, it happened. All I had to do was just say I wanted to live abroad. It was incredible. I didn't justify it, I didn't write it down. I didn't write a business plan. I just told my boss.

And remember what I said about planting of seeds? Well the seeds take time to grow, cause here's the thing: if my boss and the vice president and the vice president or the executive vice president had come out and said, "We're opening a position in Tokyo, who wants to go there?" All of a sudden I have a ton of competition, or I have to apply, or the job isn't even gonna happen. But the thing is, because I mentioned it early, I was at the front of the line. I was taking control. So you can take control, too. Tell them what you want.

Now, the second time this worked for me in my career, I can't go into the specifics for legal reasons, but I told my boss my goal one day was to run my own company. It was as simple as that. I said, "I really wanna marry the creative with the business side and I want a chance to run my own organization." Two months later, I get handed a special project and the biggest promotion of my entire life. And I can draw a direct line between that promotion and me simply saying to that boss, I want a chance to run my own company. If you tell people what you want, clearly and easily, you're giving them a chance to be a hero. Everyone wants to be a hero. Why do you think Marvel movies are so popular?

So now you're starting to see that getting or creating your dream job isn't as hard as you thought. The first step is deciding what you want. The second step is vocalizing it. Say it out loud. And the third step, let's move to the third step now, is a little bit more aggressive, it's a little bit more proactive, it means you have to specifically propose the job. Now, I realize most of you are gonna be too scared to do this. But for the brave few, for those of you who want to take control of your life and change its direction and actually go get your dream job, I salute you and this section is for you. And this is all you have to do. You have to write down a very simple proposal that fits on one page. It can't be two pages, it can't be three pages. It has to be one page.

And here's what that page looks like: there's five parts to that page. Number one, current situation. Write one to two sentences under a heading of current situation, and describe what the current situation is. Number two headline is opportunity. Write one to two sentences about what you see as the opportunity. It can't be three sentences, it can't be four, it can't be a paragraph. One or two sentences. The third heading is proposal. Now, under the proposal heading, I want you to organize yourself by bullet point. You probably should have three bullet points. Very simply, each bullet point is one sentence, and it cleanly and easily describes what is your proposal. "I want to move to Europe. I want to do this. Here's what I'm going to do." Now, the fourth headline is measurements. You've got to show the other people involved in this decision that you've thought this through and here's how you're going to measure success. 10:00 Or, here's what is going to come out of this proposal. Here's the very clear, very measurable big ideas that are gonna come from this. And then the last section, the fifth section, is a little bit more informal. The headline should be about me. And then you should write one to two sentences that best describe why you -- what's special about you, what have you accomplished, what do you want out of this, why is this your dream? That's it, so there's five sections. To run through them again, it's: describe the current situation, describe the opportunity, describe the proposal, describe how you'll measure success, and then the last one is, here's a little bit more about me, cause you wanna make this a human interaction. You wanna make people feel like they have a chance to help fulfill your dream. You're giving them a chance to be a hero.

Now, the whole thing about this page is, the less words the better. The more simple, the better. Your goal: make it easy for them to say yes. Most people, most companies have no imagination. It's the whole walk in line thing. They do things the way they do them because that's the way they've always been done. They're busy. They're worried about self-preservation. They're just trying to keep their nose above water. They just want to survive. Plus, to do things differently, it takes guts. It takes effort, and it's a risk. It's hard to change things. It means putting yourself out there. So you can see why it's natural for everyone to want to walk in line. They just want you to keep your head down, shut up, and walk in line. And that's why you have to do the work for them. You have to make it easy for them to say yes. That's why you have to create the proposal. That's why you have to create the measurables. That's why you're doing the work so that they don't have to.

Now, that's it. That is how you're gonna create your dream job, and I can guarantee you, I'm gonna say 90 percent of the time, the company's gonna say yes. Now, you better be shocked by that, cause you've been sitting in a job you don't love, you have ideas of what the company should be doing, but you sit there and you just wonder, "Why aren't they doing what I think they should be doing?" Well the reason is, cause you haven't said anything yet. So get out there and say something, okay? Now, go get your dream job and get on with your life.

Now, before I leave this topic, I just wanna throw a couple other things out there. Number one, the timeline. This might not happen right away. So don't think you're gonna make this proposal and the next day they're gonna say, "Hey, you're moving to Tokyo, we just decided." Remember that whole thing about planting a seed and it taking time to grow? There's no time to waste. Get it out there sooner rather than later. And even if you don't have the proposal and you don't wanna do step two, do step one. Talk about it. Just get it out there, let people know this might be something that you're interested in. You still have the right to say no. But if you don't say anything, then you can't complain, alright?

Now, here's the other thing I just wanna mention about this topic. You have to get in front of the right person. And the right person is gonna be different at every organization and every group. It doesn't mean it's gonna be your boss, it doesn't mean it's gonna be your boss's boss. It might mean that it's HR. It might mean that it's your mentor that you've taken on who's higher up in the organization who might have the vision or the power to actually get this idea considered by the right people. So you've gonna use networking, go back and listen to episode 18, How to Network. But figure out who's the right person that might be able to embrace this, understand it, and shoot you forward.

Now, you're not gonna want to go over your boss's head -- you never want to go over your boss's head -- but you can tell your boss what you're thinking and ask for their permission, or let them know you're gonna go talk to someone else about this. You don't need their permission. This is one of those things where you say, "I'm gonna go talk to this person cause I feel passionate about it." No one's gonna hate you. You're talking about what's your dream. So why does anyone wanna stand in front of your dreams? Nobody does. Make it easy for people to say yes.

Now, here's what's gonna happen. Number one, you're gonna hit a home run and you're gonna get the job right away. Congratulations. Number two, you've planted the seed for the future, you get people talking, you get people thinking, something good's gonna happen. Number three, you establish yourself as a change agent. All of a sudden, you're someone who can think differently. You have potential. And it may not be what you asked for, but it might be something else, because all of a sudden, you've taken initiative and shown, hey, this is someone we want on the team. They're gonna help is figure this out. Boom. You're awesome. That's all I have to say about how to create your dream job at the place you work. 15:01 Who knew it was so easy?

(music)

JUSTIN: Now, a few things before we wrap up today's podcast. Number one, we've been getting a ton of letters to our email, which is mrcorpopodcast@gmail.com. Keep all the information coming. Some of the topics in the next few weeks are gonna come directly from listeners. So keep your ideas coming, keep your questions coming. Even the anonymous ones, I'm answering them directly for people, even if they're not gonna get on the podcast, I wanna help you out. So hit us on the social channels, hit us on -- by email, whatever you want.

The second thing I wanna talk about is, we're looking for sponsors for the show. If you've got a small business, if you've got a big business, if you've got no business and you just want me to say your name on air during a podcast, I'll do it. Just pay me a little bit of money and I'll say anything, I'm cheap. So if you know anyone that wants to sponsor this show, you know anyone that wants to support us, or you love what you're hearing and you just wanna Venmo us money, I'd love it. You know what? It underwrites everything that we're doing.

And while I'm talking about that, you know, I wanna bring everyone's attention to, hopefully you've seen, if you follow us on the social channels, I just launched a new book, it's called Mr. Corpo Podcast Book. And actually, it's a transcription of the first two seasons of the show. It's 450 pages, word-for-word, of everything that was said on this show, including two episodes that never aired, so it's got exclusive content. And here's the thing: I was really passionate. I wanted to make sure that my podcast show was available to the hearing-impaired. You can't listen to my show? I'm gonna make sure you can read about it.

Now, there's a lot of podcasts out there in the world. I don't know that everyone holds themselves to such a great, equal standard as we do here at the Mr. Corpo podcast. But we're doing that. We're gonna continue to do that. You go to the Mr. Corpo website, mrcorpo.com, you can read the transcripts, you can click through any of the episodes, you can find everything that you need to be great at your job. So go check out mrcorpo.com.

And lastly, of course the book tours continue. I will go anywhere and talk to anyone for free. Hopefully you'll buy a few books. But I love to spread the gospel about what we're trying to do here, help everyone get further faster, with more money in their pocket, at the working world. So give me a shout. Let's figure something out.

That's it for today's episode. Rob, as always, I acknowledge you at the end, but you are an integral part throughout the show. Thanks for being here.

Alright, over and out.

(music)