The Finch Effect E-Book

Nacie Carson

• Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
• Kategorie: Fachliteratur
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 276

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2012

Beschreibung

Evolve your work strategy and thrive in today's high-pressure economy As Darwin famously observed, the beaks of each generation of Galapagos Island finches change to accommodate shifting food resources, allowing the birds to survive by adapting their capabilities to the new environment. Today's business people should take note: In the post-crisis economy, traditional career strategies spell professional extinction, but the fluid new "gig economy" offers tremendous potential for anyone willing to adapt. Based on her popular blog and drawing on her leadership development experience, Nacie Carson explains what it takes to make it in today's world of work. * Outlines and explains five steps for ensuring professional success: adopt a gig mindset; identify your value; cultivate your skills; nurture your social network; and harness your entrepreneurial energy * Builds on Carson's experience as a popular blogger on Portfolio.com and author of the popular website The Life Uncommon (thelifeuncommon.net) * Features a Foreword from Craigslist founder Craig Newmark The Finch Effect offers the information professionals need to earn big, achieve their potential, and remain at the top of the work food chain.

Leseprobe

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Foreword

Chapter 1: Survival of the Fittest

The End of an Era

The Rise of the Gig Economy

The Search for a Way Forward

The Unexpected Opportunity of Vocational Darwinism

Chapter 2: Adopt a Gig Mindset

The Limiting Perspective of Confirmation Bias

Preparing for the Gig Mindset with Resilience Tactics

Asking the right Questions

Sliding into the Driver's Seat

Chapter 3: Identify your Professional Value

The Value of Crafting an Apb

The Components of an Apb

Putting the Pieces Together

Chapter 4: Cultivate your Skills

Promise and Delivery

Exceptional to the Rule

Differentiating Skills: Step up your Game

Brainstorming Skill Upgrades

Your Centerpiece Skill: Mastering Perfection

Managing Counterproductive Behaviors

Setting the Wheels in Motion

Chapter 5: Nurture your Social Network

It's not a Tweet; It's a Career Strategy

Where to Go for What

Rebranding your Social Media Pages

Making the Most of your Digital Presentation

Chapter 6: Harness your Entrepreneurial Energy

Entrepreneurial Energy and the F-Word

Using Entrepreneurial Energy Inside your Organization

Using Entrepreneurial Energy Outside your Organization

Using Entrepreneurial Energy while Unemployed

Using Entrepreneurial Energy to Build your Organization

Harnessing your Entrepreneurial Energy for Good

Chapter 7: The Finch Effect

The Challenges of Ongoing Evolution

Understanding the Finch Effect

Notes

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Index

Copyright © 2012 by Nacie Carson. All rights reserved.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Carson, Nacie, 1985—

The finch effect: the five strategies to adapt and thrive in your working life / Nacie Carson. – 1

p. cm.

Includes index.

ISBN 978-1-118-13428-3 (hardback)

ISBN 978-1-118-22521-9 (ebk.)

ISBN 978-1-118-23865-3 (ebk.)

ISBN 978-1-118-26330-3 (ebk.)

1. Success in business. 2. Career development. 3. Self-actualization (Psychology) I. Title.

HF5386.C332 2012

650.1—dc23

2012003658

This book is dedicated to the great teachers of my life: my father, David, who taught me how to succeed; my mother, Shelley, who taught me how to dream; my brother, Dave, who taught me how to laugh; and my dear Charles, who taught me how to love.

Foreword

I was surprised when Nacie Carson asked me to write the foreword for this book. After all, I'm a nerd; I don't consider myself an entrepreneur. Then she explained that she thought craigslist was a big part of something she called the “gig economy,” and it was helping people deal with the changes that have taken place in jobs and employment over the past several years. She even said she'd used the site herself as a source for clients when she was a freelancer.

That sounded familiar. After many years with IBM and then some with Charles Schwab, I was a computer systems freelancer myself when I started craigslist back in 1995. But I didn't start craigslist to find a job or clients. I started it as an email list to let people know about arts and technology events happening in San Francisco.

Things grew from there. I started getting emails from people for all kinds of things—apartments, jobs, stuff they wanted to sell or trade. I wrote code which turned the emails into web pages to make them easier to review. More and more of them came in, and I handled all of them from my San Francisco flat, although I had some volunteers helping me in 1998.

A lot of people who were new to the Internet came to our site and got something done. That showed people the Internet was actually useful and easy to use. Eventually people started telling me to monetize the site and charge for all the listings like other sites were doing. They didn't understand. A lot of people need a break. Giving most of them a free way to get something they need can make all the difference to them.

As I said before, I'm not an entrepreneur, and people have explained to me I'm not a great business manager. So I turned over management of craigslist to a great team in 2000 and got out of the way. But they kept to the same values we all shared: that you can do well by doing good.

As Nacie makes clear in this book, one of the things that's going on is that jobs are changing in this economy, and she offers a lot of solid guidance on how to meet those challenges. That's a good thing, because one of the best things you can do for someone is give them a job, or help them get one.

I also like the title, since I'm a bird lover.

Craig Newmark Founder of craigslist and craigconnects San Francisco December 2011 The Finch Effect

Chapter 1

Survival of the Fittest

I am going to be honest with you: this is not a career book.

This is not a book about how to polish your résumé—although we will touch on that. It is not a book about building your brand or refining your skills, even though we will explore both concepts in depth. Since we will work on changing your perspective, leveraging modern technology, and tapping into your entrepreneurial potential, you might think this book is about those topics. But it's not.

This is a book about something much larger. This is a book about professional evolution.

In 1831, Charles Darwin embarked on a five-year geological expedition on HMS Beagle around the world. While we all remember him as he was in his later years—a graying old man with an affinity for eccentric facial hair—at the time of the voyage he was just a 22-year-old university graduate who possessed an uncanny natural intelligence, a hunger for adventure, and a desire to see the world before he settled into his anticipated profession as a parson.

Young Charles was likely not so different from myself or other twenty-something college graduates: old enough to make his own choices, desperate to spread his wings and start really living, yet still inexperienced and naï1;ve in ways he couldn't yet understand. In a letter to his friend and mentor, John Stevens Henslow, the man who would be Charles Darwin shared a thought that most of us can relate to: “I dare hardly look forward to the future, for I do not know what will become of me.” When he wanted to sign up as a volunteer on the voyage of the to help with the recording of geological findings, his father said what most of our fathers would likely say if we pitched the idea of being on a boat in strange waters for half a decade: “Are you out of your mind?”