Chapter 2
Setting The Scene – The Career Game

‘You can't build a reputation on what you are going to do.’

– Henry Ford

Your primary objective – work on your terms

Your job and your work are a big part of your identity. What you do is who you are. Of course, you may be a parent, a friend and a whole load of other things. But work is important to you. It gives you meaning and fuels your lifestyle.

Being largely defined by your career and your job can be bad news if you lack choice and control. In other words, you're doing the job you have to rather than the work you want to. This book will help you achieve what should be your primary objective – work on your terms.

You're going to see that not everyone gets to choose what they want to do. Actually very few people even know what they want to do. This makes them even more frustrated and unhappy. If you'd like to have a say in your career, a stand-out reputation is going to be your biggest and best weapon.

Whether you realize it or not, you're in a game. How you play it will dictate the power and satisfaction you have with your life and career. In this book, you'll discover exactly what this game is and how it's played. You'll learn how you win and also how you lose.

You'll see that intangible collateral like your reputation and your connections are valuable weapons or commodities in this game. Without them, you're forced to feed off the employment scraps that others give you. You're obliged to take the job you have to, not the job you want to. If you don't want that, you must play to win. Winning means securing work on your terms.

The components of ‘work on your terms’

While the perfect job or career is so very subjective, let's assume this; that the objective in corporate or professional life is to move up and maybe even out. That means promotions into those careers or roles that you're envious of in your current company. You know, those jobs that you think you'd be good at and would really enjoy down the line.

Moving up and out may also mean having the options at some point to launch your own ship and run your own company. That's not going to happen ‘just like that’. You're going to need some skills, some track record, some backing and some reputational clout to make that kind of switch.

Work on your terms means landing that perfect job or following that dream career. What does that look like? You're effectively trying to secure work that gives you as many as possible of the following five characteristics.

1. Choice – you want the ability to choose work on your terms.
2. Creativity – you want work that is engaging, interesting and inspiring.
3. Impact – you want work that gives you meaning, significance and influence.
4. Control – you want work that gives you flexibility, life balance and autonomy.
5. Reward – you want work that compensates you well for your contribution.

How do you go about getting this kind of work? If you applied for such a job or role right now, would you get it? Not without a great CV or résumé. An impressive track record. A formidable reputation. Without this stuff to trade in return, you'll be rejected and even laughed at. You're not worth it. Yet. You must have something to trade.

Let's see what you can trade for these jobs by looking at the kind of things that make you valuable and give you career capital. Then you can figure out what kind of shape you're in to secure that next job, promotion, position or opening.

Introducing the career game

Life is a game. Work is a game. Success is a game. The Oxford English Dictionary defines a game as a form of competitive activity played according to rules. Webster's describes a game as a contest played according to rules with the players in direct opposition to each other.

You're in the Career Game. The board is the career landscape. The marketplace. The industry you're in. You win if you shape a great career or the job you want. You win if you can do the work you love on your terms.

When you ask someone what a great career looks like, they mostly say things like ‘work I can be passionate about’ and ‘work where I can make a difference’ or ‘work where I get really rewarded for my contribution’. Do you have this right now? Or is there a greater prize or position you're after?

The Career Game is a trading game. Like Monopoly or Settlers of Catalan or Civilization or Container. Many more are available from the app store. Trading is the action of buying and selling stuff, traditionally products and services, but also intangibles like reputation and connections.

If you don't like games, or you've not got the appetite to play, you might be wondering whether you can opt out. Be a pacifist. ‘I’m not fighting.' You could. You could pack it all in and become a nomad. You could set up your own game and become self-employed. But you're now in a different game. You're competing for clients and customers and attention. That's still a tough one to win. So you've really got no choice. If you're ambitious and want more than you've got work-wise, then you have to play.

A game with no opt-out

You can't opt-out of the Career Game UNLESS you're happy to have your whole work-life dictated by others. On their terms. In their best interests. If you don't play, everyone else carries on playing. You're quickly going to sink to the bottom of the pack. If you don't play, you lose.

Losing looks like redundancy, lack of options, the inability to earn what you are worth. Losing leads to regret, resentment, jealousy and discontent. That FOMO (fear of missing out) feeling that somehow you've been sidestepped when it comes to handing out the spoils of war.

Losing leads to lack of career choice. All you can do is take the job you're given, not have the job you want. If you can get a job. Losing means a lack of fulfilment and the feeling of having ‘settled’. Losing yields feelings of having missed out on your dream and not realizing your potential. Losing is not a nice feeling in any game. Bottom line, you can't opt-out. You're all in.

If you want to make partner or boss of your company, you're in a fight. To get that next promotion or a place on that leadership programme, it's winner takes all. It's logical. Not everyone gets these great jobs or careers. There aren't that many of them.

There are lots of jobs available to the masses that don't have the prestige, choice and control you desire. Many are mundane, repetitive and lacking in purpose. You get little control over your working hours, location, commute, package or choice of tasks.

You don't want this. That's why need a ticket to the game. ‘In it to win it’ is a cliché but in the Career Game, you know it's true. So if you're committed to playing the game, let's get you to the start line.

The object of the career game

Any ambitious career path is by nature adversarial. Not everyone can win. Not everyone can be top dog. Many can do well. Most can enjoy playing. But however you define the prize, only a few can lay their hands on it.

To win the Career Game, you want work on your terms. You want a fulfilling career. A great job. But great jobs are exceptional. They are prized and limited. Few people ever attain the power and satisfaction of a work-life dictated by their own choices and ambitions. Not everyone gets to live out a fulfilling mission. But it's possible. If you win.

Winning looks like career choice, perks and the most interesting projects. Winning means worthwhile work that you love; a mission and a purpose. Winning offers you wealth, significance and influence. Winning gives you security in tough economic times and bad job markets.

Nobody is going to give you career choice, control and meaning by right. Things like wealth, freedom and independence aren't a given. You've got to earn them. Trade something for them. You've got to be worth it. That is how you play the Career Game. You trade your stuff for their stuff.

If you desire control, influence and significance, you've got to become so valuable, worthy and skilled that you earn the right to ask for and get those things.

Without anything to trade with, you lose choice and power. You can't afford that. Make the decision to build your next job and your future career on purpose. Give yourself some options. Are you ready to play?

The four players in the career game

The biggest mistake in the Career Game comes if you don't or can't see you're actually in a game. If that's you, you've already lost. Your only strategy to win is luck, since you're doing nothing intentionally to skew the odds in your favour.

You're relying on the goodwill of others. You need their favour and advocacy. You're relying on the timing of circumstances. Being in the right place at the right time. And you're relying on the ineptitude of your fellow competitors. When they screw up or fall short, you're hopefully on hand to pick up the slack.

This ignorant approach is not advised. It's too reactive. You're relying on other people to dictate the speed of your ascension, the rate at which you acquire choice, control and wealth. Perhaps the bitterest pill to swallow in losing is to see other people succeed who are less talented, hardworking and even less nice than you. That bites! It's not fair and it's not right. But unless you're in the game, you can't really compete.

So let's assume you know you're in the game. There are four kinds of people who play the Career Game. Only one of them wins. Which one are you?

1. The Career Fatalist. Do you place your career in the hands of the gods? You're kind of aware there's a game going on, but your eternal optimism thinks you'll come out okay. You don't make much effort. You think that promotion, that top job, that great opportunity, will happen just by sticking around. By carrying on doing what you're doing. You're okay with people and you have a vague idea of where you want to go. But that doesn't take you far.

If you are a Career Fatalist, your pitfall is a lack of effort. There are two reasons why you might not be bothered. First is if you have a sense of entitlement. If you went to the right school or university, you may feel a glorious career of fulfilling and well-paid work is what you're worth. If you were brought up to expect good things, then not getting what you want will be something of a surprise to you.

You assume that things will work out for you. You look down on the herd. You feel the game is beneath you, and not worthy of you competing. You've fallen on your feet in the past, and you'll do it again. You're not used to failing

The second reason you might show no appetite for the fight is if you're just bone idle. You can't seem to find that drive to get off your ass and do something. You find motivation difficult. You know there's a game but you just don't want to be in it. You perhaps resent having to play at all. It's just, well, too much like hard work.

Either way, you're a Career Fatalist. You wait and see. You leave it to fate – whatever will be will be. But sooner or later, you're going to have to ‘show up’ and make a contribution of value. You're going to have to get your head in the game. Otherwise you'll get the job you don't want. Maybe even the job nobody wants.

2. The Career Hustler. You play hard, fast and loose. You're gutsy and opportunistic. You're also a poor planner and a bad strategist. You get lucky because you create a lot of your own luck. But you walk through the next door that opens rather than through the right door. You're usually persuasive and very proactive. You're probably a good sales person. But you're not a Career Pro.

If you are a Career Hustler, your pitfall is a lack of strategy. You've got passion and you've got drive. You've even got ideas to change the world, but you've got no game plan. You've got skills and you've got knowledge. You've even got connections. But you've got no strategy to compete and win.

You're maybe even brilliant, driven and well-meaning. But you haven't yet planned the route that will take you to where you want to be.

You're a classic Career Hustler. You exhibit ‘ignorance on fire’. Your symptoms are excitement, vision, idealism and optimism. Yet you make success unlikely with no playbook to chart your course. You're aggressive, ad-hoc and spur of the moment. You are people oriented and can light up a room and build armies of connections. You stalk corridors, are socially prolific and seem to be everywhere. You've got chutzpah – you're cheeky, courageous and ballsy. But you suffer from a lack of strategy.

However, there are some people who have a brilliant fool-proof plan and still fail …

3. The Career Planner. So you're an amazing strategist. Trouble is you do so much planning, you forget to take action. Or you're so paralysed by the game plan, you don't know exactly how to get moving. You're task focused yet not always good with people. It's this that slows you down.

If this is you, you're a classic Career Planner. You read all the books and do all the psychometric tests. You invest in the coaching and mentoring. You do the online programs. You map it all out. Your résumé or CV is kicking and you look great on paper. You're ultra-focused and super-organized. Yet you fail to take action.

Instead, you dither. You prefer planning to meeting. You go for strategizing over executing. You are busy with social media and you favour networking online over the face-to-face stuff. You love spreadsheets and career quizzes. You're not lazy. In fact, you're very industrious and often very productive. Maybe even creative. But ultimately you become paralysed into inaction.

You end up being timid, anxious and hopeful. Too scared to make a move and too cautious to take a chance. That's why you lose. The hustlers stream past you. Rivals seize the moment before they do. Opportunities come and go. Doors will open and close. And you'll fail to walk through them. Which is a fail.

4. The Career Pro. You're purposeful and strategic. You're also opportunistic and random. You understand how luck can play a part as long as you stay open to chance encounters and serendipity.

You want to stand out and are driven to make it happen. You have big career dreams plans and are taking steps to get there. You're focused and determined in your quest to build career capital.

Your reputation is important to you, and you know what currency it creates in the job market. You're hungry to be at the front of the line when they're handing out those dream jobs. You are coachable and ready to invest in yourself to trade up in the Career Game. If this is you, you're holding the playbook to make it all real.

One final word of warning. There are two subtle traps that you can still fall into, even if you are a Career Pro …

1. The trap of being brilliant but anonymous

You don't really believe that if you do a great job, you'll get noticed, get promoted and be given the keys to career heaven. You're not that naïve. You're reading this book, so you know it's not that easy.

Leading with your work or your output is a dangerous strategy. It will speak for you if it gets heard or noticed. But it won't speak for you quite like you can. For that you need personal marketing and reputation management. You need to position yourself well and raise your profile. Many a light has been hidden under a bushel or bowl. Inadvertently you keep your amazing qualities and your super-hero abilities secret from others.

You don't like to brag, of course. It's all very noble of you. But you're a well-kept secret, and that will not serve your purposes for a fulfilling, well-remunerated and worthy career of your choice. So many have gone before you, vainly hoping that they'll get spotted in the crowd. Plucked from the sea of mediocrity, dusted down and propelled to stardom. The keys to the boardroom are not always held by those people who see your best work. And unless they're compelled or inspired to talk about you, you'll remain in the pool of talent with everyone else.

Somewhere down the line you're going to have to get out there and sell your wares. You're going to need agents, sponsors, advocates and word of mouth allies. You're going to need connections and introductions. You're going to need a platform or shop window for your opinions and ideas. You're going to need a presence and a profile. You need a reputation.

Of course, marketing yourself brilliantly, interviewing effortlessly and being your own number-one fan is redundant if you're actually no good …

2. The trap of being ordinary or even just good

They say you can't polish a turd. It's no good being everywhere and being lousy. Advertising legend David Ogilvy claimed: ‘Great marketing only makes a bad product fail faster.’ You can market the crap out of anything, but if it's a lousy product, it's only going to get rejected by the marketplace.

Actually, forget being lousy. You can't even afford to be good. Everyone is good. Good gets you in the game. Great gets you on the podium. Being good used to be a differentiator. Now it's just a qualifier. It used to set you apart. Now it just gets you a ticket to the concert.

So the message is to be brilliant in some way. Seth Godin says: ‘You’re either remarkable or invisible.' If you're better, different, remarkable or great, you've got a chance to trade up. You've got an opportunity to win the game. You've got the career capital and the means to shape your career in the way YOU want it to go. And that's priceless.

The power of the plan and the action

The hustling part of the deal is important. You can build the most incredible car in the world, but it still needs driving. So what exactly does hustle mean? The mainstream dictionaries offer up the following:

• energetic action
• determination
• hard work
• rapid movement
• noise and activity
• to push or nudge things forward
• to make people or situations move quickly
• to grasp opportunities.

I like the more urban definitions, though let's leave the illegal stuff out of our game plan:

‘Anythin you need to do to make money … be it sellin cars, drugs, ya body. If you makin money, you hustlin. I been workin two jobs, tryna stay on my hustle and make this money, na mean?’

Hustling is action on steroids. The hustle is the dynamite, the impetus and the fuel that makes the plan happen. You need hustle to get up, get out and get ahead. Without it, doors will close in front of you. Your rivals will get ahead of you. Opportunities will appear brightly before you and then fade away. Take a step. Make a move. Get hustling!

The plan is the due diligence. The roadmap. The playbook. The blueprint. With hustle and no plan, you're just ignorance on fire.

There's huge power in the plan. Some heavy lifting and planning up front will chart your course. Strategy is the art of thinking. It's how you'll bring about your end goal. It works in war, politics, sports and business. It works in the Career Game too.

You need a proper strategy to create a credible and desirable reputation, and the action plan to lift it into the minds of your target audience. That way, when they need what you do, they think of you first, above and beyond all of their other choices. Together with your hustle, your game plan turns you into a Career Pro. It helps you play to win.

Playing to win the career game

So, we've looked at who you're up against. The Fatalist, the Planner and the Hustler. Hopefully none of them are you, which makes you a Career Pro. You're purposeful and strategic, yet opportunistic and random. You want to be the number-one choice for what you do. You've got big career plans and you want in. You're ready to play, and you're ready to do the practise it takes to play well.

‘If I don't practise like I know I should, I won't play like I know I can.’

– Ivan Lendl

You know the common mistakes and you're determined not to make them. You don't want to leave your career to chance. Hoping you'll get that promotion only gets you so far. Even being told you'll get it and sitting back waiting for the call is too reactive.

Only so many people get the best jobs. Only so many make partner or reach the boardroom. Only so many get the opportunity to do work they love and live out a fulfilled career. That's why most business structures are pyramids. Lots at the bottom, few at the top.

Ask your friends and colleagues how many of them really ‘get to do their job’ rather than ‘have to do their job’. Not many. But you can by being a Career Pro. Only the Career Pro has the right blend of proactivity and strategy, hustle and planning to create the best possible career trading positions.

If the object of the game is to win, then you've simply got to become so good they can't ignore you.

So good they can't ignore you

Cal Newport is a professor of computer science at Georgetown and author of the brilliant book So Good They Can't Ignore – Why Skills Trump Passion in the Quest for Work You Love. In it, he tells the story of comedian Steve Martin being interviewed on the Charlie Rose show in 2007 about his comedy career. Rose asked him for his advice to aspiring performers. His response was eloquent:

‘Nobody ever takes note of [my advice], because it's not the answer they wanted to hear. What they want to hear is “Here's how you get an agent, here's how you write a script,” but I always say, “Be so good they can't ignore you.”’

Newport elegantly calls this career capital – your currency to trade for the work, the opportunities and the stuff you love. It's your leverage. Without it, you'll never be in a position to trade up.

Seth Godin thinks along similar lines in LinchPin: Are You Indispensable? He states:

‘The only way to get what you're worth is to stand out, to exert emotional labor, to be seen as indispensable, and to produce interactions that organizations and people care deeply about.’

This book is your manual for not just acquiring that career capital, but marketing yourself in such a way that people know you're in the game. That's where your good name, your profile and your personal reputation come in. If you don't market yourself properly, you'll be brilliant but anonymous. Can you afford that?

A game worth playing

Is it worth fighting for a job you really enjoy? Or is it just a fact of life that work is work and ‘you just have to get on with it’? After all, you're lucky to have a job at all, right?

The truth is that work is not universally popular. Reports into job satisfaction and engagement tell us that most people are unhappy at work. Forbes cited a Gallup poll from 2013 of 25 million employees in 189 different countries with the news that unhappy employees outnumber happy ones by two to one worldwide. Google ‘job satisfaction surveys’ and you'll find that if you're less than satisfied with your current job or future career path, you're not alone.

Men tend to be slightly happier than women. Drudgery (boredom) and bad bosses are troublesome for many, but the most common worry is layoffs and job security. Insecurity runs deep. Almost nobody is safe. Private sector or public, good economy or bad, big company or small. You're in the soup with the rest of us, and it's your responsibility to ensure you can withstand the uncertainty of a turbulent employment landscape.

If these findings resonate with you, then the Career Game might be one worth playing. If your brilliance, your reputation and your career capital can be traded, you can engineer a career that gives you what makes employees happy in their jobs. Things like impactful and meaningful work, control and autonomy, creativity and interest, choice, decent compensation and benefits, respectful treatment and job security. These are what will make you connected and committed to your work and engaged with your career. Now isn't that worth buying a ticket to the game?

The ultimate rewards

We are all wired up differently and all motivated by different things. What causes you to do certain things may not have an effect on me. When you play and win the Career Game, you get to decide what you want in return for your valuable contribution and great reputation. In addition to work that you love and that inspires you. The following benefits are also on offer – popularity, prosperity and pleasure.

If you tend to be more driven by popularity (the public recognition and validation of others) then the following benefits accrue from a good reputation and doing a great job:

• love and adulation
• status and kudos
• admiration and acknowledgement
• fame and reverence
• approval and acceptance.

If you're more prosperity focused (motivated by money and material things), then these benefits are usually made available to those people with a successful career and a strong name:

• new business, sales, deals and clients
• income and wealth
• security and peace of mind
• possessions, trinkets and clothes
• holidays or vacations
• bonuses, rewards and commissions
• perks and privileges.

Finally, if your key drivers tend to be more pleasure-oriented (hedonistic and self-indulgent), then rest assured that an investment in your career and your reputation will likely result in more of these in your life:

• contentment and satisfaction
• excitement and passion
• enjoyment and happiness
• purpose and fulfilment
• time and space
• direction and purpose
• interesting projects, ventures and opportunities
• career options and job choice.

No guarantees

You know you've got to play. You're competing for a limited number of the best jobs and most fulfilling careers. You're fighting for choice, control and meaning in your work. But you could play right and still lose. There are no guarantees.

Here's a quick disclaimer on the Career Game. Just because you're in it, and even if you win it, nothing is guaranteed. So much is out of your control. This playbook inoculates you against the worst and sets you up for the best. Shit happens, right?

You can have a rewarding and varied career. But it might not happen for you. There are too many unknowns. What can be said is this. Protect yourself with a decent store of career capital, a powerful reputation and a formidable network. Put yourself in a strong trading position to win the Career Game.

When you become an authority in your field, surround yourself with powerful, useful people; you've got a lottery ticket. You've got a few lottery tickets! It's less likely you'll be laid off. It's more likely you'll find the right job quickly if you do. So buy a ticket and let's play the game!

Summary: Setting the scene – the career game

You're in a game, whether you like it or not. The stakes are your life and your career. There are rules to be followed and exploited to give you the best possible career choices. You can open doors and create choice if you can trade your brilliance and your great name for the career choice and fulfilment you desire. Good leaders have followers and advocates before they are promoted. You can do the same because this is all coachable.

Your ultimate career aim is work you love on your terms. Life on your terms sounds sweet. What might that look like? It comes down to one word. CHOICE. The ability to choose where and how you make your way is the single biggest driver in our lives. To have that kind of choice, you have to compete and win in this Career Game.

You know now that this is a trading game where you swap valuable career capital for the opportunity to do the kind of work that excites you, rewards you and fulfils you. You trade your contribution for choice. Cal Newport says that rare and valuable career characteristics, like creativity, impact, control, reward and choice, require rare and valuable traits that you can trade in return.

You now recognize the four types of career builder you might be. You've seen the mistakes that get made in the Career Game. To win any game, or even just to do well, it's vital to know the rules of the game. What works and what doesn't. What's allowed and what isn't.

You need to be that proactive, strategic Career Pro – the one with the great reputation, great connections and irresistible presence that people pay top dollar for. Only career capital and a powerful reputation will land you the career YOU choose, not somebody else.

As a Career Pro, you have two great weapons to make it happen for you. A strategy or game plan. And the hustle to execute. With these you can focus your time and effort on what will increase your chances of winning. Once you're in the game, you'll see the power of getting connected and making a telling contribution to the world. Building-blocks and commodities you'll trade up for more career options.

Let's get to work!