I’m on a once every five years ER schedule, roughly. Whether it’s taking an elbow to the eye during pick up basketball, a head collision during holiday hockey, or falling on a walk with my daughter, I seem to require some level of urgent care every half decade. Two Sunday’s ago, I hopped in my Camry, seeking care for a dog bite.

My parents tell me I’ve always been nervous around dogs. One bit my face as a kid. Nothing like a little canine kiss to instill a life long anxiety around mans’ best friend. I was not afraid that Sunday. Maybe I should have been.

I was out for a joyful jog, using my kettle donut breakfast to go further, faster like a juiced major leaguer in the 2000’s. I felt like a super hero, maybe even The Flash. I came upon a septagenarian man being dragged by five slightly tamed hell hounds across a parking lot. I certainly could flash by them, right?

Wrong! Unfortunately, I’m not the Flash. One little bastard jumped up and bit me like Forest Gump getting shot in the rump by “Charlie”, putting a nice gash in my leg.

Don’t worry, it was far from the femoral artery. I wasn’t in danger of bleeding out. Just a little worried about turning into a rabid zombie, leaving my daughters fatherless.

So, I went to the ER and spent much of my afternoon reading….THE NEWSPAPER. My phone died; I didn’t have a charger. It was either take a deep dive into the Friday, May 1st edition of The Columbus Dispatch or watch reruns of Lone Star Law on Animal Planet playing in the waiting room.

Don’t worry, this isn’t about horoscopes, which I always love reading, even though Adam Grant recently hated on them, or what the best Sunday comic is, it’s obviously Calvin & Hobbes.

This is just a few life and career related observations and missives from my “no choice” but read local print journalism or sit silently waiting my turn in the hospital.

But First…Be Nice to Your Nurses & Docs!

I asked the nurse who checked me in, “How are you?” Her answer surprised me.

“I’m ok, thank you sooooo much for asking!” Her ebullient tone surprised me, like if Shrek were a soprano. It was like people hadn’t asked her how she was for daaaayyyyys, maybe even weeks.

I was a little surprised. She told another inquiring nurse that everyone in the ER wasn’t REALLY that hard up. No stabbings. No acute respiratory distress. No gun victims. I figured that no one asked her how she was because everyone was too engrossed in their own needs.

So, remember to ask how others are, even when you are in distress. They’ll appreciate it. If you need a job or help in your career, ask others how you can help them. It’ll pay dividends now and in the future. It’s so easy to get lost in our own problems.

Second…Check out the Hive

On page 6A, I learned about the Hive, a workforce development initiative for K-12 students. COSI — the Center of Science and Industry — in Columbus, OH and Boeing have partnered to launch this two year, 20 city initiative to expose students to tech and advanced manufacturing careers.

I love COSI! My daughters and I visited the museum last month. We met a dragon, watched rats play basketball, learned many animation career options at Pixar, and more.

Discovering that The Hive is all about early and continuous immersion was music to my ears. It’s like tapas for tech jobs. We need more opportunities for people to experiment and explore.

Also, why should this stop with students? Why shouldn’t adults have access to programs like this? Discovery is a life long pursuit, whether your 9 or 90.

Third…Can You Imagine $1 Trillion Dollars?

I skimmed an article entitled, “Feed Fido or yourself” which covered the increase in malnourished pets. More people falling into poverty leads to more people having to make a painful choice.

Then, this headline caught my eye: “SpaceX ties Musk pay to Mars colonization goal”. It was next to an ad for Los Guachos Taqueria — which claims to have the best al pastor tacos in Columbus, OH.

SpaceX recently decided to incentivize Elon Musk with hundreds of billions possibly over $1 Trillion dollars to put a million person colony to man data centers on Mars.

At first, all I could think of was sheesh….$1 Trillion. How much money is that, really? Could it fill Scrooge McDuck’s mythic money bin? Short answer: Yes and No. It depends on the denomination of the bill.

When Elon gets paid all that cheese, it should be in 1’s and 20’s. Those are the bills of the people, what we normies use to buy eggs, milk, beer, and gas — when we forego credit and actually have good old fashioned paper dinero on hand.

Scrooge’s money bin is big, three cubic acres big, size of an average Amazon warehouse big. It can fit a lot of toilet paper, beans, retinol serums, books, and, in this case, cold, hard, cash.

If Elon gets paid in $20’s, his trillion would fill about 7% of the money bin. Now that would make diving into the money, like Scrooge did on Duck Tails, pretty unsafe. One might break their neck diving into the cash at that level.

Thus, Elon should elect to get paid in singles. 43 inch tall, $10 grand stacks of ones would fill Scrooges’s vault 1.4 times. I’m sure he’d be able to afford one upping Scrooge McDuck with a larger money bin for his cash.

Plus, getting paid in singles would have the added benefit of tipping the shuttle pilots and cybertruck drivers shuttling the money to and around Mars, assuming that’s where one would build a money bin.

Once I’d stopped calculating if the money would fit in Scrooge’s bin, I wondered, does anyone REALLY need to be incentivized with $1 trillion? Having that much money printed and housed in a big box would be lit. Yet, is a trillion dollars the real motivation to colonize Mars or the claim to be called first Martian or the ability to stake the SpaceX flag into the red rock 140 million miles away.

We are constantly faced with questions of motivation. Whether its as managers, members of a board, household, or team, or as individuals navigating our own path. Sometimes money is a great motivator. Other times it is not. Grand adventure, new personal experiences, pioneering, building new companies can be bigger motivators than a bunch of cash in Scrooge’s money bin.

Last…May 1 is A Pretty Big Deal

There were other interesting stories including one on the strategic benefits of chess and another detailing that more Columbus, Ohioans are finding it hard to make ends meet. But the Daily Almanac recap in the Life & Arts section caught my attention. Some pretty cool things have happened on the first of May.

Did you know…on May 1st…

• 1486 - Christopher Columbus pitched his big “western route to Asia” adventure to Spanish royalty?

• 1893 - The Chicago World’s Fair opened to the public in 1893 introducing the world to peanut butter, the Ferris wheel, and other novel items. (Side note > Read Devil in the White City, if you haven’t. A terrifying true account of a serial killer running amok on Chicago’s Southside while the fair was running.)

• 1915 - International Congress of Women adopted resolutions for peace and a women’s right to vote.

• 1926 - Ford Motor Company pioneered the idea of a 40-hour, 5-day work week. Thanks Henry!

Cool stuff!

Newspapers: Your Next Frontier

My Dad always bought and read the New York Times on Sundays. It was the one day each week he’d supplement our hometown Chicago Tribune with an additional paper periodical.

Times have changed. News papers are narrower, less tome-like. Many of us have foregone the thin, gray paper that leaves your fingers feeling dirty after you’ve consumed everything from national to local to arts & leisure to comics.

Yet, I still find them delightful. I love the feel of the black ink on my thumb. I love that my eyes aren’t as tired from staring at my device. Most importantly, I love that I read things I normally wouldn’t because an algorithm didn’t push it my way.

Thanks for reading!

Paul G. Fisher

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If you so desire…some notes on my $1T calcs

$10,000 in $20 bills is 2.15 inches tall and 0.02 cubic feet. That means $1T is 215,000,000 inches or 18,000,000 feet or 3,393 miles tall. That’ll reach past the international space station. It also means the stack is ~2M cubic feet.

$10,000 in $1 bills is 43 inches tall and 0.4 cubic feet. That means $1T is 4,300,000,000 inches tall 358,333,333 feet or 67,866 miles tall. That’ll reach about a quarter the way to the moon. It also means the stack is ~40M cubic feet.

Uncle Scrooge’s Money Bin is ~27.3M cubic feet.

Rough math on other things...

A Tesla Cybertruck has 121 cubic feet. It would take 16,529 Cybertrucks to hold $1T in $20 bills or 331,578 of them to hold $1T in $1 bills.

The NCAA Men’s College Basketball transfer portal officially closed on Tuesday, April 21 at midnight. Nearly 5,000 players decided to eschew their current team — presumably for greener pastures, be it money, fit, or a combination thereof — to find a new suitors, a greener pasture.

I won’t debate the wisdom of assuming leaving one team, or employer, for another is smart. Rather, I caution you, as a leader or future leader, to be careful in asking for big bucks and promising big results assuming the road to victory REQUIRES more.

When you do, you better deliver. Otherwise, you may find yourself beneath the sharp edge of a career guillotine, looking up at your bosses ready to release the blade. Quickly, you’ll be looking to reattach your head or find someone who will.

Within the past decade, the NCAA Men’s Transfer portal upended the traditional manner to assemble a college basketball team — recruiting high school students. Today, coaches still recruit high schoolers but also look to European pros and experienced college hoopers on other teams to build teams.

Now, coaches can pay the players in a variety of ways, beyond the traditional athletic scholarship. For example, top-tier players like AJ Dybantsa, who some project to be the #1 pick in this year’s NBA draft, can make millions of dollars while still walking the quad with a book bag.

This year, Michigan used the transfer portal with aplomb, assembling a national championship winning team with a few key moves. Some have suggested that this is a watershed moment. Now, coaches who convince their schools to go big will dominate. I’m not convinced.

Before Michigan won, I wondered if spending big money to buy a team was worth it. I wondered how much money was too much money. I wondered how long of a leash coaches will be given in this new world, one in which a coach can spend upward of $20M to build a team.

Given all my wondering, I decided to analyze it, with a little help from ChatGPT and Excel. ChatGPT isn’t writing this article. I don’t outsource my prose. Rather, it was my assistant to compile all the data I needed to effectively.

Here are my conclusions and how it ties back to career.

Miss the NCAA Tournament, Prepare Your Resume

In a world where spending more than $8M to assemble a team, you can bet ADs, University administrators, and, most importantly, fans will not tolerate missing the NCAA tournament.

Last year, the Indiana Hoosiers, Auburn Tigers, and Oregon Ducks all spent ~$8M or MORE on their teams.

Indiana reportedly spent $32M total on its operating budget, nearly $9M more than the next closest team! After finishing below .500 in the Big Ten, the Hoosiers missed the NCAA tournament even though they assembled one of the best transfer portal classes in 2025.

According to CBS Sports, Indiana currently has the #1 transfer portal class for next year. Who knows how much they are spending? One, unverified Facebook source estimates that Indiana is in the top five at ~$12M. I’d bet that if it’s anywhere near that, and IU doesn’t make and win at least 1 game in the 2027 NCAA tournament, Darian DeVries will be jettisoned from Bloomington.

Spend More Than $20M, Better Be Elite

Kentucky reportedly spent more than $20M on NIL in 2025!!! That’ll buy you a lot of bourbon in the Bluegrass. It certainly didn’t buy them success on the hardcourt. Kentucky lost in the second round, after luckily surviving an upste at the hands of Santa Clara in round one.

If UK plans to spend that kind of cheese thinking it can bring teams to their knees in 2026, it better make the Elite Eight.

More Money Doesn’t Guarantee A Championship

In some sports, spending the most may buy you a championship. The Dodgers won the World Series in 2025 with a gargantuan spend of $515M. I believe that is the exception, not the rule.

Michigan won the 2026 NCAA championship behind an all transfer portal starting five that cost ~$10M. The other final four teams — Illinois, UConn, and Arizona — probably spent somewhere between $9M and $12M on their rosters. The coaches managed to reach the Final Four — the NCAA’s annual gathering of college basketball Olympians — behind good roster assembly, strong X’s and O’s, and team chemistry.

I’d argue that any coach pushing for more guap may want to stop, to think, to consider that being the biggest spender who doesn’t bring home the bacon is a perfect formula for failure.

Applying This To Your Career

During my time in the corporate world I’ve heard leaders make the cliche “gotta spend money to make money” claim dozens of times. Like a medieval military leader stating, “Give me more infantry, cavalry, and long bows man and I shall take the citadel!”, business leaders use it as justification.

They say, “We have a supply flexibility problem! We can’t innovate at our competitors’ pace! Give us hundreds of millions of dollars for new production lines, that’ll fix it, grow our share, vanquish the enemy!”

Or, “We have a brand portfolio problem! Our competitors have portfolios of products across the value spectrum. Give me tens of millions of dollars to launch a new one, even if we need to rob our healthy brands. That’ll fix it, it’s the path to growth!”

It doesn’t fix it. It’s lighting money on fire, like taking a toddler to the opera. You may be able to get away with the gotta go big pitch a couple of times. If you don’t deliver on one, well, you probably won’t be subjected to the guillotine. But, you probably will need to update the resume and catalyze the personal network for a new gig.

Thanks for reading!

Paul G. Fisher

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PS - If you’d like to see the spreadsheet and methodology I used to analyze the NCAA tournament spending and my assumptions, SUBSCRIBE and shoot me an email. Happy to send it over.

Here’s a quick overview on my methodology.

First, I did my best to identify the top 25 teams in NIL spending. I had a range for each team and simply took the mid point. The Kentucky Wildcats were my highest spend at $22M. Four teams — Texas Tech, Ohio State, Michigan State, and Oregon — were the lowest at $7.5M

Second, I assigned a score for results. Michigan, the NCAA tournament champion, got 14 points. UConn, the runner up, got 12 points. Final Four teams got 10 points. Teams that missed the tournament got 0 points.

Last, I assessed performance. Teams were labeled “Big Over Performers”, “Over Performers” , “In Line”, and “Under Performers” based on a calculated ROI.

A few weeks ago I previewed the release of my Greater Cincinnati Career Opportunity Radar. Apologies for not releasing it sooner, as intended. It was a far greater undertaking than I anticipated, even with the luxury of powerful paid tools like LinkedIn Sales Navigator and Crunchbase at my disposal. Like someone tediously searching the carpet for a lost contact lens, I combed through data and refined my searches to make sure I found something “interesting.”

Drumroll please! It’s revelation time! Today, I will share 5 companies that seem to be on a nice growth trajectory. I will also provide 13 others on my “Also Ran” list.

Recall, I am doing this merely because I want to help others discover companies that may have more job opportunities. I do not have inside information. I am not being paid by any of these companies. I do not contend that this list is perfect.

This is all an educated guess using publicly available information — some of it is hidden behind tech paywalls — to try to guess where we might strike gold. It’s similar to a gold miner using geology and topographical maps to make an educated guess for where a major band of ore is.

Methodology Reminder

Here’s a quick reminder on how I compiled it. I went beyond looking for the green #HIRING symbol on LinkedIn, assuming that the biggest companies — by default — are the ripest spots to look, and counting current job listings. You’ll find that major Cincinnati multinationals — P&G, Kroger, Cintas, etc. —, save one, don’t dominate the top 20.

I used one table stakes floor and five key factors to filter a market of approximately 100,000 companies down to 100. Here are the factors:

• Headcount Growth >5% - In the past 3 to 6 months, the company must have grown by 5%. This was also the table stakes. You aren’t growing, you don’t make the list.

• Hiring on LinkedIn - They have to have the green hiring symbol

• Leadership Changes - There has to have been turnover at the top or in key positions

• 25% Change in Job Openings - Not only do they have to be hiring, but also must show an notable change in job openings

• Funding or Expansion Signals - They have to have received investment tranches or have data suggesting that they are making expansion pushes

• Crunchbase Growth / Heat Score - Reputable prediction on growth from a corroborating source

I also excluded small businesses and startups, companies with less than $1M in revenue and less than 10 employees. These companies don’t normally become MAJOR job providers until they are larger. It could be an oversight, however, joining these companies is filled with a ton of risk, trust me.

The Top 5 Companies Are…

After running my filters, refining my Google Sheets formulas, and resting my head on my hand like Rodin’s “Thinking Man” statue, I “discovered” five companies of note.

Are there guaranteed opportunities? Who knows? Yet, they appear to be ripening apples sweetening by the week.

This does not mean they are good places to work! It just means they may have jobs!

• DOCS Dermatology - Midwestern HQ’d Health Care Company

• ProAmpac - A Cincinnati based flexible packaging manufacturer

• 80 Acres Farms - A Southwestern Ohio based indoor farming operation

• Superior Environmental Services - Midwest-based environmental services

• Community First Solutions - Hamilton, OH based Non-Profit

Each of these companies struck the six criteria gold: headcount growth >5%, hiring on LinkedIn, Leadership Changes, +25% in Job Opening Growth, funding or expansion signals, & Crunch Base growth.

DOCS Dermatology

Last year, my dermatologist left his practice to join DOCS. Who knew I’d be writing about them now?!

Quick Highlights:

• Healthcare company with 300+ employees

• Revenues between $100M - $1B — but probably slightly more than $100M — fueled by locations across the Midwest, Mid-Atlantic, and Southern US

• Glass Door Score of 3.1

• 124 openings currently listed on the company website

• Penfund, a middle market focused investment company, invested $205M in DOCS this March to support the company’s growth.

ProAmpac

ProAmpac is a Cincinnati-based flexible packaging company focused on helping customers achieve their sustainability goals.

Quick Highlights:

• More than 2,000 employees

• Likely more than $1B in revenue

• Glass Door score of 3.1

• 6 month employee growth of 13%, 221 jobs currently listed on the company website

• December 2025, ProAmpac acquired TC Transcontinental Packaging for $1.5B to continue improvement of the company’s capabilities

80 Acres Farms

If you’ve shopped at Kroger lately, you’ve likely encountered 80 Acres, fresh, crisp, and no need to wash lettuce. My favorite is Butter Me Up, a delightfully sweet butter lettuce — the perfect topper for a summer cheeseburger. 80 Acres is an indoor farming company that uses 100% renewable electricity and avoids pesticides.

Quick Highlights:

• >200 employees listed on LinkedIn

• Estimated revenue over $100M

• Glass Door rating of 3.5

• >10% headcount growth and 38% growth in Job Openings the past 3 months, 26 jobs currently listed on the company’s website

• Focused on expansion outside of Cincinnati into markets like Texas and Colorado based on $115M in funding within the past 18 months

Superior Environmental Services

Provides environmental and industrial services to chemical, refining, energy, mining and other industries. Other than passing the company’s trucks on Cincinnati’s interstates, I don’t know much about the company.

Quick Highlights:

• >200 employees listed on LinkedIn

• Estimated revenue over $100M

• Glass Door rating of 2.9

• >10% headcount growth and 34% growth in Job Openings the past 3 months, 55 jobs listed on the company website

• Focused on growth through acquisition funded by Palladium Equity Partners

Community First Solutions

Community First is a non-profit focused on health and wellness services. They are located just north of Cincinnati in Butler County, OH. They are a group of non-profits pool resources to make an impact across a variety of sectors including older adult housing, behavioral health, early childhood ed, and more.

Quick Highlights:

• >200 employees listed on LinkedIn

• Estimated revenue between $50 and $100M

• Glass Door rating of 3.2

• >10% headcount growth and 27% growth in Job Openings the past 3 months, 48 jobs currently listed on the company website

• Growing through acquisition of Sr. Living facilities and partnered with Kettering Health in late 2023 for a long-term strategic partnership

Insights from the 5

• Companies aren’t startups or bigcos - All the companies have more than 200 employees but less than 5,000.

• 80% of the Companies had Crunch Base Growth Scores of approximately 80 out of 100 or more, signaling strong growth prospects

• Range of Industries Represented - Health Care to Manufacturing to Waste Management to Farming

The “Also Rans”

This isn’t an exact science. It’s strategic guessing. Of my list of 100, 18 companies had at least 4 out of 5 change signals.

Here’s a list of the 13 that hit the second tier — some combination of 4 of 5 change signals:

• GE Aerospace (Manufacturing; >$10B Revenue)

• Messer Construction (Construction; $100M - $1B Revenue)

• Taft, Stettinius, & Hollister (Legal; $100M - $1B Revenue)

• Dinsmore & Shohl (Legal; $100M - $1B Revenue)

• Standex Electronics (Appliances; $100M - $1B Revenue)

• DuBois Chemicals (Chemicals; $100M - $1B Revenue)

• Ultimus Fund Solutions (Financial Services; $100M - $1B Revenue)

• Empire Marketing Strategies (Food & Bev Services; $100M - $1B Revenue)

• University of Cincinnati Foundation (Fundraising; $100M - $1B Revenue)

• Silco Fire & Safety (Facilities Services; $10 - $100M Revenue)

• Jones Lake Management (Environmental Services; $10 - $100M Revenue)

• Baxters North America (Food & Beverage Services; $100M - $1B Revenue)

There’s some big fish in this pond. GE Aerospace just missed out on the top 5 because its job openings growth was 10% just below my arbitrary >25% cut off. Taft, a Cincinnati based law firm hasn’t had high job opening growth, but has had a key expansion signals via a number of strategic M&A deals. Jones Lake Management, a company that keeps aquatic environments healthy, has a 167% growth in job openings in the past 3 months — which I’m sure is significantly driven by seasonality — but is nothing to sneeze at.

Going Forward

I’m focused on refining my approach and speed. Methodology tweaks will need to be made. I’ll likely need to figure out how to build an AI agent to do this faster at scale.

I’ll continue to refine my sources. I leaned heavily upon LinkedIn Sales Navigator, Crunch Base, and various web / ChatGPT searches for revenue information (which normally referenced ZoomInfo, Growjo, Rocket Reach, or Prospeo)

Last, I’m planning to expand the list to other markets too. Would love to know which markets for a follow on focus are of most interest to you:

Special Reference Shoutout

I didn’t magically manifest the idea of signals of change / change signals. A gentleman named Chris Gibbons, the Founder of the National Center for Economic Gardening®, introduced me to the idea in helping Second Stage Companies (i.e. > Revenues between $1 - $50M; Employee Headcount between 10 - 100).

At the NCEG, signals of change are used to identify when prospective customers are modified to buy. The key is to reach them when they are motivated. They can show their motivation in many ways, many of which can be seen in the light of day. The same idea can apply to identifying career opportunities.

Thanks for reading!

Paul G. Fisher

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I routinely work with mid-sized companies across the country. The companies typically have between $1M and $200M in revenue and 10 and 100 employees.

Regardless of industry or business model, mid-sized companies share a common challenge: succeeding in markets dominated by Fortune 500 giants that have Herculean war chests at their disposal and are intent on crushing them in a giant steel vise.

Unlike corporate behemoths, mid-sized companies can’t afford to spend tens of millions of dollars on sales and marketing. The cards are stacked against them, like a 16 seed trying to vanquish a blue blood during March Madness.

Like a wide eyed, worried toddler at story time hoping the hero vanquishes the villain, you may ask “What can these little guys do? How can they channel David and take down their Goliaths?”

They can become masters of identifying signals of change, like a fortune teller reading tarot cards. Signals of change suggest and sometimes even predict when a buyer will act. They are things like new leadership hires, product launches, and more.

The other day I thought “Can’t the same logic apply to careers? Aren’t there core signals of change or momentum that can help us hunt for career opportunities where they are most likely to be? Might we be able to strategic listen in the market for key leading job indicators?”

Searching For Career Signals of Change

While I’m not currently on a job hunt, I know plenty of people who are. Over coffee and croissants, at least one person has told me, “I might have to look outside of Southwest Ohio to find a gig. I don’t want to leave, but I don’t know where the opportunities are.”

As friends or former coworkers have described their plight — the ticking clock to find a job to support their family before the liquid savings runs out — I wondered what I could do to help.

Then, a light bulb went off. Why not create an opportunity radar and publish the results here, on Career Adventurer! Next week, I will publish version 1 with a Top 10 list of firms in the Southwest Ohio, Greater Cincinnati MSA.

I’m starting with Southwestern Ohio for two reasons. First, I live here and am curious where the opportunities may lie. Second, I need to iron out the thinking, methodology, and process before expanding it to other cities and regions.

In the meantime, there is no harm in previewing some thinking on how you might use signals of change predict where opportunities are most likely to occur. They aren’t rocket science. In fact, you are probably already paying attention to some of these informally.

Thinking in signals of change will behoove you because it will help you look beyond the purple #Hiring symbol on LinkedIn. It will help you strategically target job opportunities where they are most likely to be. Hopefully, it will minimize the time you spend on going after opportunities that are fleeting.

The key challenge: how do you filter the entire US economy to a manageable list of companies to target. This is where signals of change come in. If we can identify the ideal current and leading indicators of job opportunities, we filter down the list.

5 Signals You Can Monitor

Revenue or Income Growth

Growth leads to jobs. “Duh,” right! When an industry or company is growing there is a greater likelihood that more jobs will exist. Sure, automation may eat into the growth, but I’m skeptical that AI and robots eliminate the desire for companies to hire behind growth.

Recent Leadership Changes

When you see people in positions of authority change oftentimes there is a chance for new job opportunities at the firm. It’s no different than coaching turnover in sports. New regimes are hiring machines. The leaders want to create new roles and to hire new people to bring the vision to life.

Funding Events

When companies secure new funding — be it venture investment, grants, debt, etc. — it’s a big precursor to growth. Companies are usually growth hunting in these scenarios. That means jobs. For some companies, securing scaling capital financing such as Series B or C rounds of capital, this could mean a nice little job watering hole for a while, at least until they’ve tapped out the primary markets and need to get more creative.

Expansion Announcements

This is another “no duh” kind of signal. When a company announces plans to enter into a new market — either product type or physical location — jobs are likely to follow. Pay attention to your local chamber of commerce and economic development organizations. They typically have a keen eye and interest in business expansion.

Company Size

Last but not least, company size is critical. Major corporations typically are not as big of engines of job growth as we may assume. We look to the Fortune 500 Bigcos first because we assume great size equals large number of job opportunities. Reputable sources like the US SBA, Kaufman Foundation, and US BLS, suggest companies under 500 employees but more than 10 typically are the biggest engines of growth.

Any one of these five factors is a decent job opportunity indicator. You could argue that focusing on growing companies of sufficient size is enough. However, in doing so, you may assume some companies are more likely to hire than they really are. I prefer considering at least company growth, leadership changes, and funding events as three good indicators in determining if there is a good opportunity.

Without knowing if the company is growing, the opportunity could be short lived. Assuming you aren’t in desperate need of a job, you want to know that there is runway for you. Thus, focusing on more than growth is a good idea.

Signals Can Help You Filter

Over the past week, I’ve used these factors to filter a list where I currently live in Cincinnati, OH. I’ve trimmed a list of 100,000 companies down to a top 100 list of firms more likely to hire. I’ve used a combination of tools you can also use to do this including LinkedIn Sales Navigator, Crunch Base, and more.

This list may not help you immediately. Instead, it’s like being a geologist hunting for oil using seismic surveys, mapping underground rock structures, and harnessing sound waves in the hope that they’ll improve the odds of discovering large fields of liquid gold for pumping.

Next week, I’ll share my findings. In the meantime, I wanted to get you thinking about career signals of change methodology, to consider how you might discover opportunities with the indicators at our fingertips.

Thanks for reading!

Paul G. Fisher

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I am amazed by an impossibility whenever I enter my local bookstore: it is impossible to read every book in the store over the course of a life, even if you are a voracious bibliophile. Assuming you want to expose yourself to new thinking, hypotheses, and stories, you may ask why would anyone reread a book?

Take my local Barnes & Noble. It likely has around 100,000 books. The average reader would need more than 8,000 years to read that many books. That’s more than 100 lifetimes!

So, why might anyone reread a book they once read? Why might they chose to spend their most valuable life asset — time — to revisit a text already discovered?

I thought about this question often last year. I was highly focused on exploring new literary spaces and genres with a keen eye toward Australian writers. I discovered the famed Aussie writer, Tim Winton and read two of his classic works: Cloudstreet and Breath.

Yet, a little voice kept whispering in my ear, like a singing sparrow incessantly trying to get my attention. Every time I finished a book, she’d call from the back of my mind in the voice of my high school english teacher. “You should reread this book when you’re older. Trust me! You’ll appreciate it more,” she’d say, encouraging me to reread a Dickens classic.

She was referring to Great Expectations, Charles Dickens famed work on becoming at any cost. In October, I decided to take heed to her calls, to make it one of the final books I’d read in 2025.

While the Dickens’s conclusion was still a little dissatisfying, my teacher was correct. I appreciated Pip, Ms. Havisham, and Estella’s story more as a 40+ father with a career than I did as a 15-year-old with blackheads who was still looking forward to entering the workforce.

Without delivering a full book report, Dickens’s themes of embracing career benefactors; trying to make it in a cruel world; finding love without sacrificing oneself; and more are timeless.

Rereading Great Expectations made me ask a simple question: what other books should I reread? What other books are worth the opportunity cost of selecting anew from the Borders infinite wall of discovery?

Paulo Coelho’s classic international bestseller, The Alchemist quickly bubbled up from my subconscious like CO2 rising from a scuba diver. I pulled it from my shelf and reacquainted myself with the journey of Santiago, the shepherd boy from Andalucia trying to realize his dream.

If you haven’t read The Alchemist, read it. If you have, read it again! At its core, it’s about following your dreams; balancing love for another with love for oneself; accepting unexpected help from others; maintaining focus during life’s inevitable pitstops; helping others embrace a growth mindset; reconciling where you’ve been with where you’ve started; and, most importantly, doing what others will not to achieve your dreams.

My favorite part of the book is that the climax, tension, and answers to the many unanswered questions doesn’t happen until the last sentence. It leaves you on edge with each turn of the closing pages wondering when or even if you will be satisfied.

Inspiring Alchemist Quotes

During this reading, I kept track of powerful quotes from the book that spoke to me. There is likely more wisdom in this book than any non-fiction career self-help book you will find on Amazon, at a conference, or in the self-help section at your local bookstore.

You’ll have to read the book to fully experience its timeless messages. To wet your appetite, here are a few that may speak to you as they did me.

Other Books to (Re)Read

Once I completed The Alchemist, I asked myself what other books I should reread? The first criteria for selection was, the book must be entertaining. Here’s three.

Mythos, Stephen Fry

I loathed my college classic civilizations courses, not because of disinterest in the Romans or Greeks. Rather, the readings were encyclopedic. Lectures were like listening to a live reading of the same encyclopedia. Snooze fest!

Decades later I discovered Mythos, Stephen Fry’s retelling of classic Greek Mythology. He starts with the origin stories of the First Order, Second Order, and Olympians before diving into classic tales, permutations of progeny, and which God slept with whom. He does it all with comedic wit to make the prose resemble narrative fiction and not Brittanica.

Catch 22, Joseph Heller

The classic tale about Yossarian trying not to get killed in World War II. I remember laughing out loud while reading this book on an airplane. My seat neighbor noticed the root of my chuckle and gave a “I love that book” nod of appreciation.

I recently encouraged a friend to free his copy from its job gathering dust on his bookshelf and read it. It doesn’t disappoint. Heller pokes at the absurdity of life, war, and bureaucracy all while coining the Catch 22 conundrum we can face in life and work, almost daily.

What If?, Randall Munroe

Do you like absurd questions? Would you like it if someone offered up a scientific approach to answering ridiculous queries? If so, you’ll enjoy What If?.

I routinely scan it before bed. The questions and answers are typically no more than a few pages making them delightfully calorie free late night snacks, when your eye lids get heavy and you shouldn’t be on your phone. Here’s an example: How hard would a puck have to be shot to be able to knock the goalie himself backward into the net? Munroe then provides a well thought out scientific answer to seemingly unanswerable questions. It’s fun and the questions will fuel your brain!

Read or ReRead, Just Read

We rewatch movies all the time. I’ve seen Harry Potter and The Chamber of Secrets a half dozen times in the past two months because my daughters continuously want to rewatch it.

Reading the same book six times in two months is likely a bit much. Yet, rereading it from time to time may boost your mood, help you remember important life lessons, or give you a more productive form of entertainment than watching Michael Scott bumble his way around The Office for the nineteenth time on Comedy Central.

So I ask, what books are part of your steady rotation? Or, which ones should be?

Thanks for reading!

Paul G. Fisher

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Ever wonder what owning a fitness franchise entails? How about the ins-and-outs of helping people find their next job opportunity?

Former corporate HR executive and current executive recruiter, Halley Cowden discusses her career trials, tribulations, and triumphs on the Career Adventurer Podcast.

After spending nearly 20 years at P&G, Halley sought a change. She decided to make a career out of her passion for fitness and became a franchise owner nine months prior to the Covid-19 pandemic.

She learned out how to keep a business focused on community connection afloat at a time when social distancing was the norm. She also learned that another pivot was in order. Serendipitously, one phone call lead to a new career as an executive recruiter.

Halley shares her wisdom on career pivots, mentorship, the importance of note-taking, and more built on 20+ years of experience in multiple fields.

Listen to the full episode. You’re sure to pick up a nugget or three for your own career adventures.

Interesting Nuggets

You’ll need to listen to the full episode to glean all of the interesting nuggets Halley has to share. While I’m biased, you’re going to want to hear what a job market expert has to say.

Regardless, if you don’t have time to listen to the episode while driving to work or gliding through the grocery store, here’s a few nuggets for you to know.

Personal CRM

Are you using a career contact relationship management system (CRM)? No, scrolling LinkedIn and interacting with your “closest friends’” posts is not the same thing. Rather, keeping a career CRM is a systemized approach to keeping track of people in your network.

For Halley, keeping a career CRM has made her better at her job as a recruiter. She contends, as do I, that it is a critical tool for all of us. You are more likely to find a job, whether it is with a new company or your existing one, by taping into your network vs. relying on some job application board.

Part of the power of keeping a CRM is notes. Many people have a journal where they keep a record of their interactions with people. Yet, formalizing this into a database (e.g. - within Google Docs) will be more effective. It’ll help you search and serve even more powerfully.

 “I want to be able to jump into every conversation and scan what had happened in our last conversation and be like, oh yeah, they’re just getting back from vacation or we have this shared contact. I didn’t fully appreciate how capturing every single one of those nuances about an individual would help me show up to be a better person for them, whether that’s in the recruiting role or a coach role, or a mentorship type role.”

Weed & Feed

When I was a corporate finance geek at P&G, we would conduct an annual exercise called the “By-Size.” We’d analyze the profitability and volume of every single product SKU in our portfolio. It was quite the Herculean task.

The activity was all about self improvement, about weeding out the underperforming SKUS and feeding the over performing SKUS. As you can imagine, no business wants to focus efforts on products that aren’t carrying their weight.

Halley discussed a similar type of activity she performs on her birthday. She reflects not only on the things that are going well, but also on the things she needs to trim from her life. Call it an annual personal Spring cleaning!

 “Every year on my birthday, I schedule two to three hours by myself. It’s such an informal process, but so meaningful to my life. I’ve been doing it since 2017 where I make a list of everything I’ve accomplished; everything I failed to accomplish; my goals for next year; the things in my life that are giving me energy and making me a better person; and what are the one or two people or things that I need to work out of my life.”

Don’t Let the Container Define You

In many respects, we’re all trained to be chameleons, to adapt to the environment in which we find ourselves. We enter a job. The rules of engagement and success are either expressly or ostensibly defined for us. If we want to succeed, to advance, to make a mark, to make more money, we must play by the rules.

When things are going well and we aren’t presented with any legal or moral quandaries, this is just dandy. Yet, at some point we may reach a crossroads, we may question success. That’s when knowing how YOU define success is most critical. The best of us do the work BEFORE a disorienting moment — death, divorce, marriage, children, job less, etc. — finds us.

 “The biggest challenge that I see with people trying to transition from long-term corporate careers to their own adventure is they’ve never defined success for themselves. They define it based in the container in which they’re currently residing. Success for me has been pretty constant regardless of what container I am in.”

Learn More About Halley’s Path

Halley and I discussed a range of other topics, from required reading to tradeoffs in life.

She discussed how parenting intersects with career success. She shares how executive recruiting is making her a more sound business person because of the range of business models and challenges she is exposed to.

Go beyond the aforementioned themes. Hear all of the lessons she has to offer. Listen to the full episode.

Enjoy! Thanks for you support!

Paul G. Fisher

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Indiana Hoosiers football is historically terrible. Before Curt Cignetti arrived two years ago, Bo McMillin was the last coach to have a winning record during his tenure. That was from 1934 - 1947. Excluding Cignetti’s tenure, IU has delivered only three winning seasons over the past twenty years.

Then, seemingly in an instant it all has changed. Cignetti was ostensibly gifted thunderbolts from Zeus to win IU’s first NCAA Football title on Monday evening. In the process, they vanquished Ohio State and Alabama, NCAA Football Olympians.

Cignetti and the Indiana Hoosiers, the perennial LOO, LOO, LOO, LOOSERS of the Big Ten and the NCAA Football world, used a few more thunderbolts from Heisman Trophy winning quarterback, Fernando Mendoza, to smite the Miami Hurricanes in Miami of all places! The Gods must have been on their side.

I got my MBA from IU. I’m not a huge IU Hoosiers fan, however. I traditionally route for the University of Illinois, one of IU’s rivals. While I’m not an IU fan, I was rooting for the Hoosiers last night. A victory would provide hope that more good coaches may see opportunity in reaching the pinnacle of Mount Olympus without feeling the need to do so with a sports blue blood.

The Hoosiers win is about more than a team that traditionally has stunk flipping the script. It’s about more than a team winning it’s first championship. It’s about creating something from next to nothing.

The Hoosiers were football nobodies merely two years ago. The cream and crimson were a once dynastic basketball blue blood that happened to have a football team. They were the annual doormat of teams like Michigan and Ohio State, a guaranteed victory in route to glory.

Hell, as a student at IU, I recall being told that the school always took the picture of the football stadium when Ohio State was in town. It guaranteed that the stadium would be filled to the brim with crimson or a close substitute.

Now, the team is truly somebody! Beyond winning this year’s champtionship, ESPN currently doesn’t expect them to simply vanish from contention in 2026. The Hoosiers are currently projected as the #1 team for 2026. Plus, the Hoosiers currently have a top 10 transfer portal class. The question I keep asking myself: Are we watching a new college football blue blood being built from nothing? There’s reason to believe we are.

Playing ‘Ole Miss is the only thing that could would have made the Hoosiers victory even better.

For those of you non-football fans, other than playing in the SEC and Big Ten, ‘Ole Miss and IU are not traditional rivals. The two teams have only met once in their history.

Nor are they equals. ‘Ole Miss won the 1960 National Championship. ‘Ole Miss has won 22 bowl games. Indiana has won 3. ‘Ole Miss has been ranked in the AP poll 366 total weeks in its history. Indiana 95 weeks. By most measures, ‘Ole Miss is a more storied college football program than Indiana.

So, “Why would playing ‘Ole Miss have made this better?” you may ask. Because Lane Kiffin, ‘Ole Miss’s coach for most of the season, recently ditched the team, that was on the doorstep of winning a national title, for the “greener pastures” of LSU. It’d be easy to wonder if he chose past glory and prestige over current opportunity. It’s the perfect career contrast of believing following the traditional route to success is the right one.

‘Ole Miss nearly played in the final game against Indiana. They lost to Miami in the semifinals. Kiffin decided to leave ‘Ole Miss to coach at LSU, a perennial college football blue blood that has won 5 national championships.

Some have said that LSU offers a coach better resources, career advancement, and more opportunities to win at the highest level. In the old world, it was impossible to win a national championship at programs like ‘Ole Miss and IUs.

Yet, in the new world it is possible! Cignetti just proved it. Sure, he had help. Billionaire IU alum Mark Cuban helped fund the Hoosiers. Cignetti wooed Mendoza — one of the top quarterbacks in the transfer portal — to the school.

It’s hard not to see IU’s success and wonder if Kiffin made the right call. Maybe he can return LSU to the mountain top. Maybe doing so with ‘Ole Miss truly is a pipe dream. However, with ‘Ole Miss, he had an opportunity to win the national championship this year, LSU did not. Plus, ‘Ole Miss has a projected Top-10 team next year. LSU does not. Only time will tell.

Remember, you can make something from nothing. Cignetti and Indiana are proof of this. Opportunities present themselves in a variety of ways. The game of life changes over time which puts the old rules into question. You don’t always have to jump ship or find where the grass is greener. Rather, you need a dream, purpose, help, dedication, and, most importantly, belief in making the impossible possible.

Thanks for reading!

Paul G. Fisher

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This year, while I made my coffee, I watched the so-called expert present her top tips to deliver in 2026. They presented some fancy checklist with daily calendar to help you stay on top of the resolution. It’s as simple as channeling the skills of your inner project manager, right? Pardon my skepticism.

Do a quick Google Search on failure rate of New Years resolutions. Guess what you’ll find? Failure galore. Only about 10% of people actually achieve their resolution. 80% of people have quit by mid-February. The phenomenon is so prevalent that there is even a day called “Quitters’ Day” in mid-January.

There’s many reasons why we fail. We dream too big. We don’t have a plan. We give up after a slip up. I’m sure you can identify more.

While I watched the “expert” share her personal SMART goal (i.e. - Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, Time-Bound) and Critical Path Schedule to master your resolution, I had an alternative thought. Maybe we should just change the word, change our perspective.

Is part of the reason for our failure because we’ve framed the challenge inappropriately? Is the word “resolution” too lofty? What might be a better angle at refocusing our brain to improve our results?

Let’s try a different word. One that can give ourselves a little grace and not put our goals on such a lofty pedestal. To me, the problem is in the word resolution. Maybe I’m jaded. I’ve heard too many claims that we’re going to balance the budget, bring peace to the Middle-East, or get in better shape. Yet, the problems remain.

Want to know why? SOLVE is the root of the word resolution. It immediately creates a binary success or failure mindset within our brains. We either lose ten pounds or we don’t.

For epic Hollywood quests, this is needed. Harry Potter must vanquish Voldermort or be defeated by him. There is no in between. People want closure and resolution. Yet, real life is dominated by shades of gray.

So, without losing the ping of the phrase New Years Resolution — it’s got a catchy ring to it — I’ve come up with few alternative words to consider. I’ve even come up with some to avoid.

Words BETTER than Resolution

There are SOOOOOOOOOOOOO MANY better words! Each of these fit the catchy ping of the generally accepted statement.

Contributions - Maybe all you have to ask yourself is what you will contribute your effort toward. Our greatest assets are money and time. How might you use this word to center the distribution of your ultimate resources?

Evolutions - Maybe it’s as simple as taking baby steps. This worked for Bill Murray in the movie What About Bob? Murray’s character baby stepped himself to a better life, overcoming the psychological barriers that held him back. What about saying I’m going to make this one small move this year. Instead of “Getting in Shape” maybe it’s I’m going to work out on Fridays or I’m going to take a ten-minute walk twice a day.

Institutions - Building on the same idea above, you could consider instituting something new. Want to be a writer? I recently met with someone who instituted a write at least one paragraph each day objective. Her big goal was to write a book. Yet, she wasn’t a “writer” per se. She instituted a step that built steam over time. By the end of the year, she had a book.

Substitutions - You could focus on substituting a bad habit for a good one. Let’s stay on the weight loss idea for a moment. Maybe you eat ice cream every night. Don’t give up ice cream! Maybe some nights you just substitute it for a delicious piece of fruit. You still assuage the sweet tooth but with a little more fiber and less saturated fat.

Absolution - How might you forgive? Simply identifying how you might absolve someone of their slights against you or yourself is a worthy thing to consider. You’ll sleep better.

There’s a few simple suggestions. Ditch the word RESOLUTION. Don’t expect to solve anything. Expect progress. Reconsider your focus against worthy goals with a small change in the word you anchor your year to.

One last thought. Unless you are a Darth Vader level sith, you may want to avoid the words retribution, prosecution, and diminution. The will focus you on the dark side of the force. Stay on the good side of the energy field. Channel your inner Princess Leia or Luke Skywalker and put your focus on good!

Thanks for reading!

Paul G. Fisher

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Why is creativity a crucial skill in today’s workforce, and how can it be harnessed for professional development?

In this episode of the Career Adventurer Podcast, I welcome Van Lai-Dumone, founder and CEO of worksmart Advantage. Van’s diverse background spans roles from a The Dailey Method bar practitioner to leading sales at GlaxoSmithKline. She is a certified Lego Serious Play practitioner, bringing a unique blend of creativity and team development into the corporate environment.

As a Vietnamese refugee, Van offers a unique perspective on courage and taking the leap to pursue one’s passions. She discusses her journey into entrepreneurship, driven by her passion for creativity, while navigating various obstacles. She highlights her transition from corporate roles to founding her own company, focusing on integrating creativity into leadership and team development programs.

One compelling aspect is her work with The Honor Foundation, using creative methodologies like Lego Serious Play to assist special forces operators transitioning to civilian careers. Major themes in this episode include the role of creativity in problem-solving, the importance of taking creative risks, and the power of following one’s passion despite societal expectations.

Listen to the full episode. You’re sure to pick up a nugget or three for your own career adventures.

Core Themes

Take note of these themes for your own career adventures.

Lego as Creative Fuel

How often do you dabble with Lego? Lately, I’ve dabbled with them a lot along side my children. When I’m building, assembling, and tinkering, my creativity spikes. I’m able to tap into thoughts, feeling, and potential possibilities that  have been trapped deep in my brain.

As a certified Lego Serious Play practitioner, part of Van’s job is using blocks to help people and teams connect, collaborate, and build with creativity. If you are looking to find new paths filled with potential in life and career, bust out a set of Lego!

“We know intuitively that great ideas come from when we’re not just sitting in front of our computer or in a tense meeting, it comes through, play, creativity, relaxation. Yet we do the complete opposite when we get into the workplace.” 

Doing What is Expected

We all carry the weight of expectations. We’re expected to provide, to be responsible, to exhibit self control 24-7-365. However, oftentimes we confuse our expectations, we abide by the expectations others have for us at our own expense.

Van talked about the weight of expectations in her own life. Deep down, she is a creative. Yet, societal expectations helped guide her down more practical paths. She felt the conflict of doing what she was supposed to do in other people’s minds against what her heart wanted.

“I’ve been doing things to impress other people, but I’ve had this dream, right? I’ve had this idea for so long, and I always think if ideas stay with you, they’re meant to be followed.”

Life’s Pivotal Moments

Most of the time we need disorienting moments to see through the fog of everyday life. We’re busy doing. We’re too busy to take a step back and pay real attention to doing something else. 

Van had one of these moments when her brother was in a coma after a motorcycle accident. At the time, she was also a new mother. In the UCLA, medical center, she waited and hoped he’d get better. It took this moment for her to realize something new was needed.

“There was a pivotal moment in my life that made me realize like you just got a jump, Van. Here I am with my eight week old baby, and we were just there, every day. Just roaming the halls of UCLA medical center waiting for him to get better.

It was really during that time where I was like, what am I waiting for? I want my baby to see him, see his mom do something she loves.”

(Curious about how disorienting moments fuel careers? Check out this prior episode!)

Who is More Important than What

Don’t lose sight of people. On at least two occasions  in my career, I’ve been doing work that I loved, but the people fit wasn’t great. Even though the tasks of the job aligned with my strengths and interests, the actual jobs were miserable. The best adventures are found when the quality of the work and the people overlap, like two circles in a Venn diagram.

While reflecting on the rewards of her creative entrepreneurial work, Van mentioned people first. The people she meets and has the pleasure of helping make the work truly rewarding.

“The people I have met along the way who have just kinda put I guess some wind underneath my wings, right? People will email me back and say, ‘Oh, I still have this thing.’ It always reminds me of the unique characteristics we came up with or what we learned. The creative artifacts, have drawn people back and it is interesting to see what they keep four or five years later.”

Go Before You’re Ready

In my work as a new product innovator, we always promoted sharing ideas when they are ‘half-baked.’ Sharing an idea before it was ready, in our minds, would actually help us move further faster. The constraint is always our own vulnerability.

Van shared this idea in her own life. She just jumped into the deep end of the pool in pursuit of a new client. She felt unprepared, but did put in a proposal for the work anyway. Not only did she win the job, the client turned into a valuable, long term customer.

“ I had just gotten certified. I’m like, there’s no way I’m ready for this. But, lemme just put my hat in the ring. I reached out my first conversation with the VP of Programming. He’s like I’m gonna send you our three month program. I’d like you to figure out where in this program you can incorporate Lego Serious Play and creativity.”

Hear More About Van’s Path

Van and I discussed the way she finally embraced entrepreneurship and propels herself forward today.

Beyond the aforementioned themes, we discuss how owning a bar studio helped her become a better entrepreneur. We discuss her background as a Vietnamese refugee and how life oftentimes comes full circle.

Go beyond these themes. Listen to the full episode.

Enjoy! Thanks for you support!

Paul G. Fisher

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Are you “aging gracefully”, casually letting time take its toll on your life and career? Hugo Mendez, the founder of Age Strong, has asked himself this and determined he’d rather channel his inner bison to charge into life after 40.

On this episode of the Career Adventurer Podcast, Hugo and I discuss eschewing life at Nestle for entrepreneurship. We discuss the challenge and reward of building a company and brand from scratch. We discuss recognizing and rejecting imposter syndrome. We discuss how Hugo found his way to becoming a personal trainer.

Hugo reflects on aligning his career with his values to help improve people’s lives.

Listen to the full episode. You’re sure to pick up a nugget or three for your own career adventures.

Core Themes

Take note of these themes for your own career adventures.

Building From Scratch

I had a mentor in the golf business who had the “dream job.” He was the Head Superintendent at a Top 100, US Open golf course. The course was magnificent, filled with history of great golfers who’d strolled its fairways. You felt something when you were on the grounds. Yet, one day he left to build a greener pasture.

He took a job that paid less and wasn’t as prestigious. It was the equivalent of a golf course startup. It was what you call a grow-in, a newly established golf course. He had always wanted to establish a golf course from scratch. This was his opportunity.

Hugo shares similar thinking. He talks about the challenge of and desire to create a brand from scratch. As a marketer, it is one career badge he always wanted to collect.

“Building a brand from scratch is hard. But it’s rewarding. Just putting yourself out, having courage to be like, yeah, this is me. At the beginning, people didn’t know who you are. Little by little they start recognizing the brand. Oh, Age Strong. They start wearing your t-shirts, they start talking about you.”

Don’t Give Up, Get Strong

I wish I had a dollar for everytime I’ve heard people say something to the effect of “Welp, this is where I am with my career. I’m just riding it out until retirement!” Remember, never give up. It’s never too late to try something new and to get career strong.

Hugo shared similar perspective regarding his company and improving your physical fitness. He doesn’t love the term, “Age Gracefully.” To him, it’s too passive and could run the risk of complacency. Instead, AGE STRONG! Get off the couch and build the muscles you need to be fit later in life.

“The logo that I use is a bison because one time I read something about the bison. When the bison is out there dealing with a strong snowstorm, they charge the storm before things get worse. So, you take action before things gets worse.”

Committed Based on Values

Doing something completely aligned with your values is hard. Normally, people just need to find a job, to provide for themselves or a family. Many people find a good, steady job that ideally has good enough benefits and a path up the pyramid. Yet, it’s common to realize that the “stable” path upward takes them further from their values.

Hugo talked about being on this path. He also talks about leaping into a good entrepreneurial idea as a potential solve. However, the idea he was working on didn’t align with his values. So, he went further.

“When I left corporate, I started a couple businesses. One business was a really good idea. It’s just that I was not really a hundred percent committed to it. Then I started one business with my wife that took off. It was in the craft beer category, which we ended up selling because we didn’t want beer to be part of our values.”

Improving People’s Lives

Sometimes, identifying your values is as simple as asking yourself if you’re improving people’s lives. We all want to have purpose and be valued. It’s easy to lose sight of the impact we are making on other’s livelihoods.

Hugo has sold a variety of product types, from baby care to pet food to beer, to name a few. Yet, he hasn’t always been able to connect what he is doing to improving other’s lives. Today, he does. He sees the results firsthand.

“The service I offer improves people’s lives. Knowing that what I sell to people helps them live longer lives, healthier lives, more proactive about the things that they do, live happier lives with their families, be better professionals…”

Where’s Your Courage Corner?

How do you develop courage? I’ve always tried to channel my inner bison and charge challenge head on. Also, I like to get counsel from people I trust, those who help pump me up. Fear is always there. You just need the right tools to channel the courage you need to overcome it.

Hugo talked about the ethos of strong kettlebell training. In that world, you need to create a courage space. Can’t the same be true for your career adventures?

“In the world of strong, they call it your courage corner. ‘cause you need is a small corner in your home and, to work out and the courage to show up and do the work.”

Hear More About Hugo’s Path

Hugo and I discussed the way he found entrepreneurship and how he continues to fuel his own personal journey.

We never fully overcome fear and imposter syndrome. We tackle challenges with strength and courage.

Go beyond these themes. Listen to the full episode.

Enjoy the episode! Thanks for you support!

Paul G. Fisher

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My wife and I have been rewatching HBO’s Silicon Valley. While we have no shortage of content at our fingertips, we decided to take a nostalgic trip back to a show we loved watching when it first aired. Aside from the characters’ oftentimes irreverent antics providing a nightly escape, rewatching the show got me wondering. Is it “ok” to return to a career adventure you’ve previously taken?

The short answer is an emphatic YES! We re-visit things all the time. We return to the same vacation spots. We re-read the same books. We re-watch the same shows. Psychologists claim revisiting shows is actually good “self care.”

Unless we are completely robotic and close minded, we oftentimes have a new experience in familiar places. The same can be true with our career adventures. Sometimes, returning to the same spot makes good sense.

3 Returns

I’m a little biased on the subject. I’ve revisited previous career trails three times. Yet, each time I’ve done so has been for a particular set of circumstances. None of them have been perfect returns. Each served a career purpose and pushed me in the right direction, nonetheless.

The first time I returned to a previous employer was at Procter & Gamble. I’d left originally to co-lead the restructuring of a E.J. Gallo Winery subsidiary. I was in finance during my initial tour of Procter. I returned in brand management as a Brand Leader.

The second time I returned to a previous employer was when I was getting my consulting business off the ground. I’d previously been a Director leading client strategy and innovation engagements. I returned to help the company establish a focused growth marketing plan as the fractional Head of Growth.

Finally, today I lead strategy engagements, as a consultant, for mid-sized growth oriented companies with a non-profit. I previously worked with the non-profit’s partner organization to find companies that needed the consultants’ help.

Some Commonalities

These three examples have at least three similarities.

First, I didn’t return to the exact same role with each one. They were all new adventures. Returning to P&G was all about shifting my career gaze from finance to marketing. It was about gaining the expertise and notoriety of working with one of the world’s foremost brand builders. Returning to the consulting company was all about establishing my credentials and client lineup for my own growth navigation business.

Second, I relied upon my strong relationships with the previous employer. During my exit interview when I left P&G the first time, my manager checked “Yes” for the “Would you rehire this person?” question. The same scenario existed for each of the other companies. The people that mattered thought highly of my work. Don’t just take my word for it. Former GE leader, Grant Hunter shares a similar situation in our podcast discussion last year.

Third, each return accommodated family needs at that time. Beyond learning branding, I returned to P&G to be in the same city as my then girlfriend, now spouse. As a solo-preneur, I work with previous, happy clients because it provides family flexibility with my wife and two kids.

Returning Takes a Mindset Shift

Whether you are contemplating a reboot with a prior career adventure or not, there are a few things to keep in mind.

First, you left for a reason. Maybe it was poor leadership, lack of upward mobility, team dynamics, or something else. Regardless of the reason you left, don’t expect the problems to have magically disappeared. Companies have a hard time changing, regardless of size. Thus, going into the redo with eyes wide open expecting to encounter the same sources of pain as before is generally a good idea.

Second, check your ego at the door. You’ll return with new knowledge and perspective. You’ll have additional external perspective to evangelize all the internally focused people you reencounter. Not everyone will care about what you found on your expedition in the new world. They stayed. You left and came back. In some respects, they may feel vindicated: they knew the grass wasn’t greener; you didn’t.

Last, you aren’t the only new kid in town. While some faces remain the same, many will be different. You can’t just rely on the relationships you forged before. You need to re-evangelize. You need to connect with new people. You need to work hard to show your value. You can’t count on on the good work you did in the past with your championing sponsor. More good work that moves the needle is required. Isn’t that why you would go back anyway?

Don’t Limit Opportunities for Growth

It may seem counter intuitive. People may tell you “Don’t look back.” I’d say, at least consider it. What’s the harm? Returning to a previous employer can actually be a path to growth that is good for you and your family.

You are well aware of the crappy job market. Many people are “job hugging.” Many likely want to find new gigs but may not consider an old career flame. This is ludicrous. You are immediately taking possibility off the table.

Without auditing my entire LinkedIn contacts list, I can name two people who’ve revisited old paths anew. One stepped away from his startup to rejoin the marketing organization he left. This time it was at a higher level to establish an entirely new line of business. The other relaunched his old business with a refreshed vigor and tweaked offering set.

They both did this because there was opportunity. Opportunity to try something new. Opportunity to leave a mark. Opportunity to see and learn new things on the old path.

When you rewatch an old show, retrace a hiked path, reread an old book, you almost always pick up something new. You experience the thing again and pick up on intricacies, delights, and challenges you didn’t pick up on the first time around. Under the right circumstances, can’t the same be true for our careers if we’re open to retrying on old path?

Thanks for reading!

Paul G. Fisher

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In the Northern Hemisphere, the dog days of summer are ending. The cool, pleasant crisp air of fall is coming. Maples, ginkgos, and aspen will soon delight us with their vibrant yellows, oranges, and reds in the afternoon sun. For many, fall is all about getting the special seasonal sip of a pumpkin spice latte.

To me, fall is about celebrating, reflecting and connecting before we curl up inside for winter. Across the world there are celebrations centered around beer, pumpkins, apples, and more. We harvest what nature has brought us this year with others, no matter how good or bad the year has been.

A Prior Life

I was a golf course superintendent in a past life. Fall was my favorite season. It was a time of reflection, construction, and connection. We no longer had the daily mundanity of mowing, trimming, and watering our precious turf. The grass wasn’t as needy. We could spend time on important projects. Most importantly, we could reconnect with the people we loved and find others with whom we could form stronger bonds.

In the GC superintendent biz, we called the time between Memorial Day and Labor Day the “hundred day war.” Heat domes formed over the Central US regularly pushing the mercury well into the 90s. There was one focus: don’t lose a precious green! Losing a few greens to heat stress or pests was one sure way to get fired as a superintendent.

This meant 80 hour weeks, few days off, no vacations, a dearth of human connection outside of the grounds crew, and little time to reflect and invest in course or personal improvement. You were simply hanging on for dear life, hoping you could weather the heat and humidity.

Yet, there was always fall to look forward to. Once the walnuts started dropping, we could bust out of our work shells. We could rejoin family, friends, and society. We could connect with other humans to share summer turf war stories. We could attend networking events. We could meet new people at said networking events.

3 Questions in Fall

In fall, we would celebrate with our crew during Friday afternoon cookouts. Most importantly, we would ask ourselves a three reflective questions:

We’d ask, “What are we most proud of this season?” Maybe we’d hosted a US Open Qualifier. Maybe we’d put on a member-guest tournament for the ages. Maybe we’d restored key areas of the course to their former glory. Or, maybe we’d just survived a tough year, one in which we lost a few greens and prayed to have a job come next season.

We’d ask, “What do we want to accomplish before the year was out?” There was only so much time before daylight savings time ended. There were only so many hours to plant new trees or rebuild bunker complexes. There were too many big projects to complete before we covered the greens, putting the course to bed until spring.

We’d ask, “Who do we want to reconnect with this fall and winter?” We’d spent 80, sometimes 90 hour weeks fighting the “hundred day war.” There wasn’t a lot of time to be with family, let alone friends and other colleagues. In fall, we could take a breath. We could reunite with the people who matter most. We could attend events that mattered most to us to meet more people.

How Might You Reflect?

Only you know if fall is the right time to invest in yourself. What matters is that you take a moment to do it when the time arises.

I have provided growth consulting services for dozens of companies from startup to corporate behemoth. Oftentimes, the leaders in these companies find it difficult to take time away from their businesses to work on their businesses. They are routinely wrapped up in wrangling the ever expanding To-Do list. There simply is no time to reflect and to connect, unless they force it.

One of the best ways to force it is simply blocking two hours of your time on a Friday afternoon. Dave Will, a serial entrepreneur and host of the Entrepreneurs Organization Podcast uses this technique to make sure he actually takes the appropriate time to reflect. He knows that magical reflection time will not just manifest itself.

Once you carve out the required time to reflect, ask yourself these three questions:

1. What am I most proud of? - What skills, team wins, career certifications would you put on a brag wall and want to tell others about? Why do these things fuel your soul?

2. What do I want to accomplish? - What epic goal or project have you put on hold? How must be true to simply get it started and moving in the right direction?

3. Who do I want to connect with? - Most importantly, who would you want to share a long road trip car ride with? This was a question for my B-School application essays. It’s a good one!

If you don’t see any time, you’ll have to make it. You’ll have to cancel some meetings. You’ll have to put a two - three hour block on your calendar and not let a soul take that time from you.

At a minimum, take some time to step away from your desk, cube, and to-do list this time of year. You won’t regret going for a quiet, reflective stroll amidst the vibrant colors of the season.

Thanks for reading!

Paul G. Fisher

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How has pain fueled your career? Are you outsourcing your magic to AI? What exactly is “Seeking Sukha?”

On this episode of the Career Adventurer Podcast, former Hollywood executive and current startup founder, Steven Puri and Paul Fisher discuss these questions and more.

They dive deep into Steven’s story including his current focus with Sukha, a productivity startup designed to help people reclaim their time. Steven harnesses his experience as a Hollywood executive to create innovative solutions for remote work.

He shares insights on how pain and curiosity fuel meaningful pursuits and discusses how storytelling techniques enhance productivity far beyond the entertainment industry. The conversation covers AI's role in amplifying human potential, the importance of focusing on core tasks, and the enduring principles of effective work habits.

Plus, Steven shares a few choice behind-the-scenes stories, personal anecdotes, and practical wisdom learned from working on Hollywood blockbusters.

Listen to the full episode. You’re sure to pick up a nugget or three for your own career adventures.

Core Themes

Take note of these themes for your own career adventures.

Power of Pain

Pain is a motivator. Consumers seek products to alleviate their pain. Companies spend billions and billions of dollars guessing what causes pain. Whether we are a consumer looking for a way to alleviate a headache or a worker looking to make it through the day without ripping our hair out, we all want to minimize pain. Given that we spend roughly a third of our lives at work, we’ve got great incentive to minimize the acute distress with our day jobs.

Steven encourages us to take a page out of the Hollywood storytelling playbook in our careers. Ask ourselves what is our source of pain and how can we solve it.

“A lot of the things that I've done, including my current company, are a lot like when you're developing a film. You have to really understand your character and say, “Why is she or he in pain? What is the internal pain that they have? What is the external pain? What's the problem they think that they can solve in the world?” Then, how do we exploit that where they are put in the worst possible situation when they have to make a decision? Am I going to solve my pain or not?”

We All Make Soap

A decade ago, a good childhood friend invited me and my mom to a reading for an episode of The Family Guy. He was a writer for the show. We networked with other writers, producers, and actors while we waited for the reading to begin. I asked my friend what life as a writer is like on such a famous show. His response surprised me. He cooly said, “Meetings.” At that moment I realized that every adventure involves the mundane, no matter how cool the work sounds.

Steven provided a good reminder that even in “sexy” spaces like Hollywood, we all are just making soap. We all have to churn out the product. We all have to answer to committees. We all are part of “the machine.” The point: keep the right perspective even when doing cool work. 

“Here's the thing that you don't see from the outside: It's soap. You are making soap after you've done it a while. You understand what Christmas soap smells like. You understand what July 4th soap smells like. It is a very regimented thing. You're not betting 50 bucks. You're betting $150 - $200 million a movie. It is a huge committee. It is a machine. It is sausage.”

The Problems are Timeless

It’s easy to believe that today’s novel technology solves new problems. We think there are new challenges or human jobs-to-be-done. The reality is most problems we face as humans are just new variations of the same issues we’ve always faced. How do I provide for my family? How do I make time for the one’s I love? How do I find meaning in life?

Steven saw thousands of stories in Hollywood. Yet, he observed most movies repackage the same story. The guy wants to win the girl. Or, the dad wants to protect his family. Or, the mom wants to have greater purpose. Further, he claims that many personal growth books tout the same principles in different ways.

“Read “Flow” by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi. Read James Clear. When you read Cal Newport’s, “Deep Work.” All these smart people have written about this. I'll be super blunt. Once you read those 12 books back-to-back, you realize the principles are basically the same. They use different lexicon to sell you their book. It's the same kind of ideas: flow states, focus, mono-tasking, block distractions, use music, organize.”

Don’t Outsource Your Magic

There’s a lot of talk about how AI could make us dumber. I hosted a panel of “experts” to discuss the Future of Work in an AI world recently. One thing that seems to be clear is that AI is here to stay, and we as humans need to figure out how to use it without giving up our humanity.

Steven talked about how his current company is focused on using AI to help you lean further into your strengths. It would behoove all of us to know the things we should and should not outsource to our helpers, tech or otherwise.

“If you were to go to Usain Bolt and say, “Hey man, we developed this AI robot that can run faster than you, so hey, you wanna just hang out? Let the robot run all good.” It would suck for Usain, it would suck for everyone in the stands watching, right? But if you were to say to him, “Hey man, we used AI to get this shoe to fit your toes just a little bit better. You might shave half a second off your a hundred.” That's super interesting ‘cause what it is it's about let me help you over perform.”

Work On Meaningful Things

“Duh,” you might say. “Of course I want to work on meaningful things.” Yet, that isn’t what the survey data says we care about. According to a 2022 Gallup study, the most important factor for a job is income. This isn’t “wrong” by any means. "(I’ve made career decisions based on the almighty buck a few times.) Yet, I would contend that if you want to have meaningful career adventures that give you purpose and you are already “well off”, consider asking yourself what will REALLY make you tic.

Steven shared how working on Mel Gibson’s Braveheart was a pinnacle moment of his career. He also said that it really doesn’t have many connections to what he does today as a startup founder. Yet, it was meaningful, important, and worthwhile, nonetheless.

“It was a movie that was about something. Super proud of it. I still watch it and appreciate it. The lessons on that movie were not necessarily applicable to what I do now, but man, you were working on that and you felt like I'm working on something that's actually meaningful and that's really nice.”

Hear More About Steven’s Meaningful Path

We had an energetic, thoughtful conversation about life, career, film, AI, and more.

Steven talked about more than these themes. He talked about getting personal messages from Hugh Jackman. He talked about how he decided to name his company Sukha. He talked about seeking happiness through pain and curiosity.

Go beyond these themes. Listen to the full episode.

Enjoy the episode! Thanks for you support!

Paul G. Fisher

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A former colleague reached out to me a few weeks ago. She wanted to catch up. We didn’t work that closely together, but I always enjoyed our conversations. Plus, I’m a friendly puppy who likes to chat. So, I decided to grab coffee with her.

Within minutes of us taking the first sips of our lattes and Earl Grays, she said she was looking for a new job. Her company had gone through a restructuring a few years earlier and she was forced into a role that wasn’t quite her.

At first, she’d been a good soldier and done the work diligently. Yet, in time, she’d realized she was a square peg in a round hole. She needed a change and wanted to return to the career space from which she was ejected.

Company leadership had reassured her that there was hope. She could return to the work she found most rewarding. It would just take a little time. However, a leadership change put someone she didn’t have a firm relationship with in charge. The new leader had different priorities and didn’t have room on the team for my former colleague.

So she took a package. She parted ways with her work home, a place she’d spent nearly two decades cutting her teeth, building friendships, and becoming an expert in her field.

Having been in her shoes, I asked, “How can I help you? Why did you think of me?” I didn’t know if I could or couldn’t be of aid in her time of need. I just wanted to make it a little easier for her to get on the path to what’s next.

Are you in Career Vegas?

Then, she said something interesting. She said, and I don’t have this verbatim, but you’ll get the gist, “Careers can be like Vegas. You lose track of time and direction.”

She is completely correct. It’s so easy to get lost. It’s even easier to forget what time it is and be unable to find a clock. Like Vegas, the company focuses us on what is in their best interest, not necessarily what’s in our own best interest. This is all well and good when we are both winning.

However, the moment the odds turn out of your favor, the relationship can unravel. Very quickly you can get fleeced by a charming one armed bandit with flashy lights. You think you can win the game, but in reality, the odds are stacked in the company’s favor. They control the game.

Networking Exposes You to More Options

This Vegas analogy led us to why she wanted to meet with me: networking. A friend of hers suggested she connect with me, not because I have all the answers. I don’t. Rather, I have a diverse network that spans a number of industries and company types. She did not. At a minimum, I could connect her with someone who might have a job.

I thought of at least one person and one network she should connect with. She talked about the futility of applying to jobs online. The LinkedIn “Easy Button” is anything but. She went further into how networking skills are not readily taught or encouraged by employers. We must choose to become good networkers, to focus our gaze outward while we stay present in the gig that pays the bills.

I encouraged her that in networking, she’s doing the right thing. While you feel like applying to jobs is getting things done, it isn’t. Your odds of landing that choice Director of Marketing gig at Hulu are pretty slim, unless you know the right person. Applying to it blind is like playing the lotto, the chances are slim.

Perspective from an Executive Recruiter

Which brings me to an additional conversation I had recently with a friend who’s an Executive Recruiter last week. She and I were talking about the most important skill most people let languish: our social connectedness.

It’s understandable. We all have lives to live. We have kids to raise. We have friendships to feed. We have partners to prioritize.

Yet, if you want to maximize your opportunities for adventure, then build your network consistently. You’ll find ways to connect with people. You’ll keep meaningful notes. You’ll stay connected. This sounds like a lot of work. In some respects, it is. Trust me, it’ll pay off.

Embrace a CRM for Your Career

My executive recruiter friend and I then discussed how everyone should have a personal customer relationship management system. You need a method and a place to stay on top of the relationships that are most worthy of nurturing.

She and I both have such a system. She uses a simple Google Sheet. It has the person’s name, the last time they connected, meaningful notes or things to remember, and any simple actions or help she can provide for the person. Pretty simple, right?

I use Hubspot, most of the time. Hubspot has a free version that allows you to connect it directly to your email. You can enter notes about your conversation, tasks to complete, and reminders for when to reach out again. I only started using this approach to make sure I didn’t drop the ball on important relationships. If I say I plan to help, I want to make sure I follow through with action.

In summary, it’s easy to get lost in time, to spend five, ten, fifteen years, or more in a space only to feel the shock of the sun when you go outside. Building on the Vegas analogy, ensuring you keep tabs on what is going on outside of your present casino is critical. This requires windows into other worlds. Making a commitment to network and using a personal CRM is one great way to ensure your chosen casino has windows that bring in the light.

Thanks for reading! Happy Labor Day!

Paul G. Fisher

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Rules are generally good. For example, rules like don’t lie, cheat, steal, or murder are generally good ones! Society needs rules to avoid devolving into a dystopian morass. It’s a good idea to follow the rules, most of the time.

That said, we all create arbitrary “rules” that should be broken from time to time. Breaking the less important personal “rules” we place on ourselves can open up our minds to new people, possibilities, and potential adventures. I broke one of my cardinal rules of flying on a flight to Tasmania recently.

Air travel is a situation ripe with both formal and informal rules. There’s no need to list the litany of formal rules we must obey. One of the informal rules I have on an airplane is to talk only briefly to my seat mate. I say hello, make a joke, and shut up before we’ve hit 10,000 feet. While I’m a talker and can chat up a rock, not everyone is.

Yet, on my flight to Hobart I broke this rule with Blair, my seat mate. Boy, I’m glad I did. I learned all about Blair’s career adventures and got a book recommendation that is helping a fictional book I’m writing.

My wife and I have two kids. These days, we’re normally split up on flights. She normally sits with one or both of our kids because they don’t want to separate from her. Often, that leaves me alone, as was the case with this flight.

I was sitting in my aisle seat when a slender man with a crew cut and a tattoo stopped next to me. He gave the usual loitering head lift with a half point to indicate he needed me to get up. He had the window seat. I let him in and said hello.

The crew completed boarding the rest of the passengers. The man and I ended up having a gap seat between us. I said a few things to my wife and daughters across the aisle giving away my foreign accent. Soon, we were taxiing to our launch point. The plane was only about two thirds of the way full.

As we lift off, the man introduced himself. He said his name is Blair. I told him mine. He asked if I was American. “You got me,” I said. I asked if it was the Chicago Bears hat I was wearing or the thick accent that gave me away. “Both,” he said with a chuckle.

We exchanged the typical pleasantries. Where you from? Why you going to Tassie? All that jazz. We passed 10,000 feet, the point at which I normally stop chatting and start reading. I asked him if he’d like more space, given that aisles in front of and behind us were both empty. He said, “Nah. I’m good.”

Then, he said, “I see that you’re reading Tim Winton. He’s classic Aussie.” I was reading Winton’s classic Cloudstreet. It’s a character driven novel about two families united in Western Australia following life altering tragedies. He told me I should read Breath next.

I asked him why he was heading to Tassie. He said to work on his boat. He is a sailor. He recently purchased a boat in Tasmania. It is cheaper to dock it there versus Melbourne, where he lives full time. Plus, the craftsmen he needs to restore it are better than on mainland Australia.

My normal domicile is in Cincinnati, OH. Given my normal Midwestern US habitat, I don’t know a lot of sailors. My ears perked up. I wanted to learn more about his story, how he got into sailing. Was he part of a sailing family who’d passed the skill down from generation to generation? I decided to forget my 10,000 foot conversation rule and engage.

For the next hour we discussed his background and mine. He told me that as a sailor he does two main things: teaches people to sail and transports boats. He teaches people to sale in Melbourne harbor. He transports people’s boats for hire all around the Asia Pacific region. Oftentimes he moves luxury vessels from Indonesia to Australia to Fiji or other epic voyages.

Blair also told me that he was not a natural born sailer. He doesn’t hail from a long line of mariners trained to conquer the seas. Rather, his first career was in the music industry. He’d been a musician when he was younger. That morphed into owning and operating a music production studio. Over the years, he’d started to find music production monotonous and knew a new path called. He sold his business and dove into sailing.

I asked him how he did it. His answer was simple: lessons and certifications. He first learned to sail, taking a variety of progressive more intensive classes. Then, he collected certifications. He didn’t list all the certifications he’d achieved. He figured getting certifications was the best way for him to not only learn but to also build the authority he’d need for his future in the sailing business, whatever it would be.

As we started our descent, I cooly asked him if he uses a sextant. A sextant is not some crazy device that makes bedroom adventures more enjoyable with your partner. Rather, it’s a tool used in ship and aircraft navigation. Sextants have been used for centuries. European explorers used them to determine their position in the seas as they pushed into new worlds. Yet, with modern technologies like GPS, it is less used today.

Blair was surprised and pleased by my question. He told me in fact he is using a sextant in navigation now. Even though it’s a technology of yesteryear, perfecting its use is making him a more skilled sailor. Plus, it’s giving him new ways to make life interesting when advanced sailing technologies have become the norm.

As the flight landed, we exchanged contact information. It was obvious we both enjoyed the conversation and learning more about each other.

Talking to anyone on an airplane for an extended period of time takes the right set of circumstances. You likely need the exact environment I had: a less than full flight that’s under two hours and without televisions. Plus, you need someone to engage willingly.

For me, meeting Blair and hearing his story was a simple example of how we all can navigate life and career. If you want to try something new and carve a new path, then take steps like getting certified in a new career space. If you want to try new things in a profession you love, explore various technologies and tools.

Remember, interesting stories are everywhere. Sometimes it just takes getting out of your comfort zone or breaking a personal, arbitrary rule for you to find them.

Thanks for reading!

Paul G. Fisher

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“I’d rather be lucky than good!” My dad and I say this routinely on the golf course. Whether it’s after a miss hit shot magically ends up on the green or a wayward shot strikes a tree and bounces back into the fairway, it’s a common utterance.

In reality, it isn’t a zero sum game. One might amend this self deprecating adage with “I’d rather be lucky AND good.” This is especially relevant in our careers.

Over the past weeks, luck has presented itself in numerous ways. Luck is such a large topic that I cannot possibly tackle its breath in this post. What I can do is present some of the lucky situations that have transpired, discuss the philosophy of luck in careers, and offer up some practical motivation and perspective.

Defining Luck

My parents visited us in Melbourne last week. They were delayed two days at the outset of their trip due to weather and an absent plane. Plus, my dad didn’t get his bag.

On the heels of this misfortune, we started discussing luck while we drove around South Victoria with my daughters. We quickly went beyond the rudimentary of good luck and bad. We discussed circumstantial luck, economic luck, racial luck, national luck. The list was seemingly endless and difficult to define. We gave up.

I’m not here to tackle national or racial luck. I know my nationality, my skin color, and my upbringing affords me a pre-filled tank of luck that many will never be afforded.

I am here to discuss how you can help increase your own luck in life and career, regardless of your starting point.

Inspiration for Luck

Beyond my parents aviation misfortunes, there were two other recent events that propelled my thinking on luck.

First, we luckily saw a pair of Southern Right Whales when we were in Bicheno, Tasmania. My wife saw a mom and calf gliding cooly through the Tasman Sea a mere 100 meters offshore.

We weren’t looking for whales. We were at the beach to see the Bicheno Blowhole. Think Old Faithful by the sea. As we left the parking lot, something dark and bigger than a dolphin breached the surface. My wife said, “I think I just saw a whale.”

“Bollocks!” I thought. I normally have the more keen observational powers. Plus, her view was obstructed by Tasmanian evergreens. How could she have seen a whale? Amidst the my disbelief, I stopped the car. Sure enough, there they were! Two whales cruising near the bay! We felt incredibly lucky to see them so close to shore.

Second, I magically found my lost credit card at a coffee shop after dropping it in the street hours earlier on my way to run the Run Melbourne Half Marathon. I sheepishly told my wife that I couldn’t find it and hoped it was in our apartment. It wasn’t. She was peeved. It meant we’d have to cancel the card.

Yet, I didn’t accept this bad luck. I took action, even though the possibilities of finding the card were slim. I retraced my pre-dawn steps to the tram station, the last place I remembered having it. I looked high and low. No luck. The card was likely gone.

Then, I decided to check coffee shops. Maybe some good samaritan dropped it off. I was resigned to the fact that the card was gone. But, it wasn’t! It was magically sitting on the counter at the first shop I visited. Neither my wife nor I could believe it. How fortunate!

Luck Helps Your Career

We all are lucky. Some are definitely more lucky than others. If you are one of the fortunate ones and think luck hasn’t helped you, I would encourage you to reassess that judgement. Even the most successful of us likely benefit from good fortune in some way. Accepting the fact that luck partially propels your success does not mean you are an imposter or unworthy of your lofty role.

Hard work is critical to success. Yet, it’s only part of the equation. Seneca said,

“Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity.”

The Economist columnist Bartleby furthers the idea that luck influences careers:

“The early way-stations in a career are often marked by chance: a particularly encouraging boss, say, or an assignment that leads you off in an unexpected but defining direction. Luck can affect the pathways of the most rational-minded professions.”

I would go further. Luck plays a critical role throughout our careers, regardless of the stage. Yet, career luck isn’t just some passive force we cannot influence. Rather, you can take specific actions to increase your opportunities to be lucky, to have a more adventurous career.

How to Increase Your Luck

If luck plays a big role in our careers, you might ask, “How can I improve my career luck?”

It’s a delicate formula that includes both active and passive elements. You must take action, work hard, and share your pursuits. You must also be able to accept when you are riding the wave of good luck.

Entrepreneur Jason Roberts coined the idea the “surface area of luck” over a decade ago. The idea is simple. It requires one to do and to tell. To Jason, the more you do something you are passionate about and tell people about it, the higher chances you have for good fortune.

I’d go a little further. To me, there are some key doing and telling behaviors that are key to increasingly your luck. There isn’t an exact formula to this. It’s an art.

Get Outside

First, the lucky don’t stay at their desks. They don’t keep their head down all the time. They get out and connect. At Gallo Winery, executives preached being with customers as much as possible. The more you were with your customers the less your competitors are. This theoretically increases your chances of good fortune.

The same applies to career. If you are out interacting with people at trade shows, networking events, and more, you increase your chances of random opportunities presenting themselves. Resist the urge to stay locked up in your work and life cages.

Be Bold

Second, the lucky do things that are scary. They recognize fear and do something anyway. We are in Australia because my wife merely suggested that the company should allow her to do an extended business trip to Australia.

At first, it felt too bold, borderline crazy to ask. Then, she did. To our surprise, the company said yes! How often are you afraid to make the bold ask? You think the answer will be no or you’ll be judged as unreasonable. When you think this way, remember the line from the famed Roman poet Virgil, “Fortune favors the bold.”

Accept Guidance

Third, the lucky know they can’t do it alone. We all need helpers. When someone makes an unexpected ask or makes a suggestion, we should at least listen. These helpers see things we cannot. They see other paths and possibilities that are within our grasp. They propel us to additional opportunities to do and to tell.

Plus, when we accept guidance, we recognize that we can’t do everything alone. We create stronger bonds. We increase the number of higher quality relationships. This in turn can lead to you being more top of mind for “lucky” opportunities.

Be Helpful

Fourth, the lucky are generous. Remember, it’s not all about you. We’re all part of a complex human community. If you focus solely on your own problems and seek to extract maximum value you are a tax on the system. They lucky know this. They invest back into the human system.

Whether you call this “Karma” or “The Golden Rule”, it applies. When you help others out they are more likely to help you in return. You don’t have to approach this as a quid pro quo. Rather, just do things now and again not expecting anything in return.

Shake Up Your Routine

Fifth, the lucky know that we need to try something different from time to time. Much of luck is about expanding your possibilities pool. Why do you think diversification is a thing in stock investing? The more investments you place in a variety of sources allows you to take advantage of the random probability of success.

When you stay in the same lane all the time, you only expose yourself to your known world. We saw the Souther Right Wales because we shook up our normal routine. I’m a morning person. My wife is not. Plus, getting kids up and moving is rough most of the time. That morning, we got up earlier to get a better light for pictures. If we hadn’t changed things up, we wouldn’t have had the good fortune of seeing the magical creatures.

Luck Is About Perspective

Sometimes luck is merely about mindset, too. While we followed the whales along the shoreline, trying to maximize our time with the beautiful beasts, I saw two fisherman in a dingy. Some people may have looked at the fisherman and thought, “How unlucky to have to get up so early every morning to make a meager living in a tin boat.” I didn’t.

The whales breeched the surface merely meters from their boat. In that moment I thought, “How lucky are they? They are soooo lucky to be fisherman living in this wonderful Tasman world.” This was the only time I’d ever seen a whale. Most people have to pay to be taken miles from shore for the off chance of seeing a whale. How many times have they seen these creatures only feet from them simply while doing their job? Dozens? Hundreds? I couldn’t help but feel envy and gratitude simultaneously.

I was lucky to be visiting “Down Under”, to see the mother and calf. The fisherman were lucky to live here. Part of luck is your perspective. It’s about knowing the rare moments of luck you experience and increasing their odds. It’s also about recognizing the ways you are consistently lucky with gratitude.

Thanks for reading!

Paul G. Fisher

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Bonus Reading on Luck

I’ve challenged myself to expand my horizons on our Aussie adventure. Reading Aussie books has been one of my main tools.

I visited a book store immediately after arriving in Melbourne to pick up some local books. The book store attendant emphatically recommended Cloudstreet, by Tim Winton, an iconic Aussie novelist.

The book is fabulous! It’s a character driven novel that exemplifies why fiction can teach you as much or more than non-fiction about life and career.

It’s a fictional story about two families, the Pickles and the Lambs, that come together after grave misfortune. Over twenty-years they grow inseparable and enjoy life’s beauty both via good and bad events. Luck plays a central theme in the book.

Sam, the Pickle’s family patriarch, believes luck guides your life and you cannot control it. He calls it the “Shifty Shadow.” To Sam, we are all passengers riding the wave of luck. When he loses his hand in an accident, it’s bad. When he makes tons of money at the races, it’s good.

By contrast, the Lambs show a different take on luck. They are drivers on the luck express. They make their own luck via hard work. They develop a successful general store and ice cream shop. They exemplify Jason Roberts’s formula on luck: Luck = Doing x Telling.

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Additional Sources on Luck -

The Economist Bartleby article

Sydney Herald article

Psychology Today Article

One of my favorite Kelley MBA classes was part of the first semester core curriculum. 20-years ago, my fellow MBAers and I spent the first term learning marketing, ops, finance, and strategy basics. Yet, none of these subjects has helped me more than the critical thinking component taught by an ex-attorney turned IU professor.

I entered B-school expecting to learn the finer points of brand marketing, corporate finance, and business strategy. I did not expect to be taught the ins and outs of fallacious reasoning. Recently, I was reminded of the importance of this course, especially in a GenAI world.

A Summer Down Under

We’ve been spending the summer in Australia for my wife’s job. When we first arrived “Down Under”, I came across Albert Park. It’s a large, beautiful park just a few kilometers from Downtown Melbourne. It’s a great place to enjoy a sunny day stroll and take in gorgeous views of the skyline. For me, its been a summer training ground for the Run Melbourne Half Marathon.

Like many iconic metro parks, Albert Park has a giant lake. As you’d expect, birds and people flock to the watering hole. Birds seek sustenance. People seek serenity.

Unlike most iconic metro parks, Albert hosts a Formula One race each year, the Australian Grand Prix. Yet, this isn’t what made the park stand out in my mind. It was the hundreds of black swans that cooly swim in the H2O.

Imagine Believing All Swans Are White

Take a moment to imagine you are a European explorer. You’ve been chartered to head to Australia. Claim riches. Expand the empire. Leaving Europe, your friend tells you absolutely, unequivocally ALL SWANS ARE WHITE! No exception.

As a well traveled explorer, you aren’t so sure. Common knowledge is that all swans are white, but you’ve seen some shit. You just got back from another treasure cruise to South America. One of your attendants was eaten by a crocodile in a river you thought was a great sea. You know some pretty funky creatures exist. You aren’t sure what other swans exist, but are pretty sure his absolute claim can’t be true.

Imagine your elation when your faith is proven correct. You hit Western Australia, drunk from many days at sea and the IPAs that took you there.

After claiming the land for God and country, never mind the native inhabitants who happily tended the land before you, you set off to find the nearest spring.

You summit some sand dunes and marshes when Eureka…fresh water! Finally your thirst can be quenched with something other than hoppy brown booze. But, you get far more than a refreshing sip of agua. You see thousands of black swans.

“Amazing!” you exclaim. Assuming you survive the return voyage, you’ve got a quite the story for your mates back at the pub: You’ve disproven the rule that all swans are white!

Black Swan Fallacy

Until Dutch explorer Willem de Vlamingh documented them in his 1697 expedition to Western Australia, Europeans believed that all swans were white. Talking about the black swan was merely a way to say something was impossible. Until Vlamingh’s black swan event, that is.

We discussed dozens of fallacies in my MBA critical thinking class. To name a few, there are:

• Straw man fallacy - One misrepresents another’s argument and then refutes the distorted version.

• Appeal to authority - The claim something is true simply because an authority figure said or claimed it.

• False cause - When one incorrectly assumes one event causes another simply because it came first.

However, my favorite has always been black swan fallacy.

Black swan fallacy is when one ignores evidence that contradicts their beliefs or assumptions. It’s basically when you stick your head in the sand and ignore the evidence smacking you in the face.

Black Swan is Critical in Any Era

Black swan thinking is especially important as you think about navigating life and career today. A few weeks back, I talked about the future of work with a few senior leaders. Beyond AI skills, critical thinking and decision making took center stage in our discussion.

Today, GenAI is smacking all of us in the face. It’s bringing to light the dangers of succumbing to black swan fallacy.

For example, maybe you’ve been in an industry for decades, surviving in good times and bad. To you, GenAI may just be ‘flash in the pan’. You’ve survived high and low career tides. Why wouldn’t you survive the current one? You might consider looking at the horse and buggy industry once the Model T was invented. We ride horses primarily for pleasure now.

You could also consider the trust you are putting in LLMs like ChatGPT, CoPilot, etc. You are choosing to have the LLM “think” for you whenever you use it. The LLM is using massive amounts of known data it has been trained on to guide you.

This puts the LLM at risk for assuming generally accepted norms as gospel. Theoretically, an LLM world requires people to identify black swan events to ensure the algorithms are reliable, especially as we all embrace these engines further.

One might conclude that it behooves all of us to do our best thinking and work outside of LLMs. When honed thoughtfully, our minds are powerful tools that can be put to use in identifying black swan events.

Continuously Challenge Thinking

I use ChatGPT routinely. It helps me like a dog helps a hunter. I tell it to find something. I then use my brain on whether or not I should trust it. In my career as a business strategist and career guru, I still take the helm on the highest level thinking. Lessons from my critical thinking class are still some of the most applicable today.

Reading clever critical thinking books helps me work out my mind. It keeps it sharp when faced with all of the assumptions life presents. Here are three that I routinely look back to for guidance or a laugh from time to time. Two are comedic escapes that poke fun at fallacies we often hear. One is all about irrational psychology in the business realm.

• Plato and a Platypus Walk into a Bar by Thomas Cathcart - Hilarious philosophical breakdown of jokes, one-liners, sayings, poems, and more. A reliable pre-bedtime reading for me.

• Aristotle and an Aardvark Go To Washington by Thomas Cathcart and David Klein - Politicians love praying on our assumptions with tongue twisting talk that is filled with fallacious reasoning. Will make you chuckle while honing your mind.

• Predictably Irrational by Dr. Dan Arielly - Uses common business challenges and predicaments to show how often irrational behavior guides humans.

Pick up one of these books! You won’t regret it.

Thanks for reading!

Paul G. Fisher

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Worth Additional Reading - Critical Thinking in Action

Katy Milkman writes . She is a behavioral science professor at the University of Pennsylvania. I came across her thinking at The Market Research Event last December. She talked about how our decisions are influenced by the choice architecture presented to us.

I found her recent article extolling a book by Dean Spears and Mike Geruso called After the Spike to be a great example of critical thinking in action. For decades, we’ve assumed that population growth will continue unabated. We’re at 8 billion people. Of course we’ll hit 10B, right?! Probably, but where does it go from there?

Dean and Mike challenge that assumption simply by digging into the math. I’m looking forward to reading their book!

I met after hearing her speak at the Insights Association Corporate Researchers Conference in September 2024. She was a keynote who talked about the importance of being a “Whole Brained Professional.”

After hearing her speak, I decided I had to have her on the Career Adventurer podcast. So, I blindly reached out to her on LinkedIn.

Nikkia is a former Sr. Insights Executive at Netflix, Twitter, and Colgate-Palmolive. After nearly two decades in Corporate CPG and Tech, she decided to go down another path. She is betting on herself with an entrepreneurial venture called Birds Uncaged.

On this episode, we discussed how she ultimately decided to eschew big corporate for her new venture. We dive into the natural dissonance she felt between rising the corporate ladder and potentially doing something more creative, more freeing. Nikkia shares how journaling and creating personal vows has helped her to think and to see what makes her feel most alive.

Plus, Nikkia talks the arts. She embraces creativity. Creativity embraces her. It makes her “Whole Brained”, a critical skill in the age of AI.

Listen to the full episode. You’re sure to pick up a nugget or three for your own career adventures.

Core Themes

Take note of these themes for your own career adventures.

Stability First

I’ve always struggled to balance my need for stability against my need for adventure. My dad always preached being useful. Do something that people will always want. It’s good advice, advice that most parents likely give their kids. As a father myself, we just want them to succeed, to not end up on the street.

Nikkia talked about her own conflict balancing the choice between the stable versus the creative route. The reality is that we all need money. Careers are really just an extension of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs. If you don’t have stability first, it’s far more difficult and more risky to throw caution to the wind and do something perceived as more risky.

“Early in our careers, often right outta school in our twenties few of us, I think are an exception where we have this clairvoyance about what we wanna do and we stay true to it and never waiver. But a lot of us are just like, ‘We need money, right?’ We're outta our parents' homes, have a degree, and it's either a kind of scrappy hustle kind of hunger for money or it's a, I need to apply this degree and have stability.”

Journal Every Day

Journaling is powerful. Doing it consistently unlocks thoughts from deep crevasses in your mind. You write and streams of potential pour onto the page. Opportunities to reinvent. Opportunities to understand yourself. Opportunities to process feelings. If you can journal everyday, you are doing better than most of us.

Nikkia found journaling as a way to understand herself better. She writes in it consistently. She uses prompts to help her. That allows her to have a conversation and process information. The more she does it, the more the purpose evolves.

 “I actually have, my journal in front of me, which I write in every morning, was a way for me to just have a relationship with myself. It was often based on question prompts. It morphed over time into gratitude.”

Most Alive?

“When have you felt most alive?” This is a question you should routinely ask yourself, especially regarding your career. It’s a question that has come up on other episodes. It’s easy to get lost in today’s to-do list tasks. It’s easy to pop the headphones in and start knocking your normal tasks out. It’s not easy to take a step back, to check in with how you feel about the tasks.

Nikkia talks about how the idea of aliveness helped her see that she loves presenting. She was a researcher by trade, but wanted to do more than just share data and facts. She wanted to tell thoughtful stories. She wanted to use multimedia to do it. Doing these things helped her feel alive. It’s a good question for everyone to ask themselves time and time again.

“That idea of aliveness, which is basically those rare moments when what you're doing and how you're expressing yourself, it's fully aligned with what you are feeling on the inside. It's almost like if in some sort of weird alternate universe the way that your cells would be operating, it's literally the same.”

You First

What do you want to do? What are you interested in? It’s so easy to put yourself on the back burner and only focus on what you think others want. We’re told “Give customers what they want.” Or, “Follow the money.” Sure, serving customers and revenue are critical backbones to any sustainable business. However, you are part of the equation too. If the work doesn’t make you proud and you have other options, why do it?

Nikkia shared how she thinks about doubling down on being herself. It has helped her go beyond being confident and gaining self-confidence. By looking deep, she is confident in her abilities. She looks to iconic creators like David Bowie, Andre 3000, Erykah Badu, in her own creative process. She makes sure to ask her younger self if it makes sense too.

“All of these people who I consider inspirations, one of the things that I learned, as I listen to their interviews, they all talk about the creative process being something that is for them at first. Don't develop the thing: the audience and the metrics and like some revenue number in mind, at the start. Do the thing and do it because the younger version of you will love it.”

What Vows Are You Making?

 How often do you make critical promises to yourself? Ones that focus on who you are or want to become. They don’t have to be complicated. They just need to be thoughtful exercises that guide you in life’s journey. Promises are simply vows, right. We make promises to God, to loved ones, and to coworkers, right? Why shouldn’t we make them to ourselves?

Nikkia keeps her vows alive and in close proximity. They are operational north stars. While we spoke, she picked one up and showed it to me. The vows remind her of who she wants to be. They provide guidance for her work. They also help her identify how she wants to operate 100% of the time.

“I created this little vow…this is one of the ways in which I am trying to infuse my life as a dancer into everything I do. I vow to transform life itself into a dance, an ongoing flow of creativity, authenticity, and presence. I put that there because it's not something that I set about to do 50% of the time, it is who I am.”

Hear More About Nikkia’s Meaningful Path

We had an energetic, thoughtful conversation. It spanned life, career, inspiration, and being true to yourself.

Nikkia shares more than just these themes. She talks about being an expat. She talks about how she focuses on raising her children. She talks about how to explore inside yourself to make the external you AMAZING!

Go beyond these themes. Listen to the full episode.

Enjoy the episode! Thanks for you support!

Paul G. Fisher

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Additional Resources To Check Out

Guests routinely share resources and tools they’ve found to be helpful in their own journey’s. They range from books to apps to thought leaders and more. Here’s a few additional resources discussed in this episode:

• Sapiens - #1 International Bestseller. A history of human evolution and cognition.

• Commanding Life - Rachel Brown’s tools to help people embrace their true power.

He was only 49. Dead. Slipped on a rock while hiking through the Tasmanian wilderness. Villagers found his body three days later. It’s sad, but he’s not a sad story.

Olegas Truchanas died too young. Many of us will. Olegas was a nature enthusiast and photographer from Tasmania. He brought the rugged, secluded beauty of Van Dieman’s land to life for Tasmanians, Australians, and the world to appreciate.

I came across Truchana’s story a couple weeks back. We are currently living in Melbourne, Australia, but took a holiday to “Tassie”, as the locals call Tasmania.

After five days of exploring former penal colonies, watching Tasmanian Devils feed, petting kangaroos, and hiking Cradle Mountain, we were looking for one last activity to do with our daughters before returning to our temporary Melbourne home. The Queen Victoria Museum at Inveresk in Launceston called.

I didn’t expect to learn about Olegas Truchanas. I expected to gawk at dinosaurs and taxidermied marsupials with my toddlers. Instead, we were immersed in a special exhibit on Truchanas’s life.

Side Hustle as Main Hustle

His story is fascinating. It’s one about side pursuits as main pursuits, starting over, solitude, beauty, and trailblazing. It’s one that resonated with me recently because I recently lost one of my best friends to brain cancer. He was only 52.

Olegas worked as a Engineering Clerk and Statistical Analyst with the Tasmanian Hydro-Electric Commission from 1951 to 1971. Yet, his travails helping Tasmanians generate energy from water is not how he made his mark. Instead, it was his side hustle.

Wikipedia “labels” him a conservationist and nature photographer. He loved his adopted Tasman home and spent decades exploring and capturing it visually. He captured raw Tassie on skis, kayaks, and foot. Isn’t it funny that he is known for his “side hustle” versus his paying gig?

We learned that Olegas started over multiple times. He was forced to flee Eastern Europe from the Nazis and the Soviets. During the Tasman bushfires in February 1967 he lost his house and his work. 10,000+ photos, decades of work disappeared. He had to rebuild the collection, attempting to do it in only 4 years.

He spent weeks alone exploring the Tasman wilderness, capturing rugged landscapes through his Nikon 35mm lens. He built his own canoe specifically fit to navigate back country streams.

Remote Tasmania was his muse. He pushed himself to bring its beauty to others. He showed people the beauty he saw, whether it was majestic peaks, placid lakes, or raging rivers, via lectures. The region’s beauty fueled his creativity and inspired other writers, artists, and photographers.

Last, he blazed new trails. He was the first person to solo climb Federation Peak. He was the first person to travel via canoe from Lake Pedder to Macquarie Harbour. This trip involved navigating the treacherous Gordon and Serpentine rivers.

Olegas led a full life even if it was cut short. He likely did more than most of us do in less time. He was a career adventurer that focused on his side pursuits. These side pursuits were remarkable. They were the way he left his mark on Earth, not via engineering.

My late friend Rich was similar to Olegas in many respects. He made money as a digital marketer. I remember him most for his side pursuits, however. Our conversations during marathon training or over beers rarely revolved around work. They revolved around epic experiences.

He completed the entire Appalachian Trail, ran marathons, and sailed the San Juan islands. Only two years ago, he summited Mount Rainier.

The Olegas exhibit reminded me of my friend Rich. It reminded me that we all are more than we get paid to do. Life’s about funding your way and leaving a mark whether that’s through our paid gig or side hustle. We need work and money to do things. We don’t need to be defined by our earned wage.

You’re Never Too Busy To Reflect

At the end of the Olegas Truchanas exhibit there is a small sign. Most people likely cruise right past it. The most important stuff has been seen. Yet, the sign poses a two very simple questions:

“What do you think is meant by the term ‘lasting legacy?’

“What would you like your life’s lasting legacy to be?”

We only have so much time. You never know when you’ll slip on a rock or be diagnosed with cancer. If you do nothing else today, take two minutes to write this down.

Thanks for reading!

Paul G. Fisher

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Additional Read

I came across a cool read from the other day. She writes Life, Improvised. In this recent post, she extols the benefits of road trips for exploration, spontaneity, and more.

Maybe it’s because I was just on a road trip with my family. Maybe it’s because I’ve done my fair share of road trips in the past. Whatever the reason, I loved the read and you should check it out!

Life, Improvised

Everybody Needs a Road Trip

Road trips have been on my mind this past week, as my mom, our collective three dogs, and I just embarked on a three-day drive up through the western part of the U.S.A…

Read more

a year ago · 3 likes · 5 comments · Mary Lemmer

What does the future hold? It’s a question that’s been asked for eons by rulers, philosophers, and farmers alike.

We look to seers and oracles to guide us. “They have the answers!” we say.

So, we put our trust in the futurists to tell us what will be.

The futurists and consultants use their magical tarot cards to prognosticate. They package their messages and warnings into acceptable tales.

But, how true are they? Do they really know what’s going to happen? That’s debatable.

We listen anyway. We download the latest 200 plus page reports from reputable consultants and NGOs. We take them as gospel. Should we?

World Economic Forum “Predicts” The Future of Work…

In January, The World Economic Forum released it’s latest fiction of the future.

Newsflash, AI is going to be big! You probably didn’t need a report to tell you that, right?

It’s a “good” report that you will likely never read. When they release it again in two years, you won’t read it then either.

It’s packed with predictions. It’s packed with stats. Plenty of LinkedIn leaders have already summarized it for you.

It tells you things like…

• 170 million new jobs will be created while 92 million will go away for a net increase of 7%.

• Geo-economic fragmentation / tension will likely require more than 1/3 or companies to upend their business models.

• AI and Big Data aren’t the only growth sectors. Farming, construction, sales, nursing, and counseling will grow too.

• There will be less cashiers, secretaries, and data entry clerks.

• Hard skills like tech literacy and the use of AI are critical.

• Soft skills like analytics, creativity, resilience, and agility are paramount to success.

• 60% of the workforce will need some level of re-skilling and up-skilling by 2030.

• 1 in 6 people will not receive the up-skilling they need

• Aging populations in developed economies will require us to think about using Generative AI as an enabler

• And….much more!!!

A Discussion Instead of A Summary

Instead of summarizing the executive summary for you, I decided to discuss it with experts, with real humans boldly tackling the future of work in their jobs today. They aren’t planning. They are doing.

We aren’t professional prognosticators but like to pontificate on what could and will be.

Using the Future of Jobs report as a guide, I hosted a few great thinkers and pros working at the forefront of AI to discuss the topic. They include…

• , a former P&G executive, host of The Workaround, and an experienced entrepreneur with a few exits under his belt.

• , CEO of KR Digital Agency, host of AI Simplified, and Co-Founder of Cincy AI for Humans

• Josette Riep, Assistant Vice President of Information Technology at University of Cincinnati and thought leader with Cincy AI Catalyst

We didn’t just regurgitate the report. We shared our candid insights on what resonated and what didn’t. We discuss what we’re doing with the information. We recommend what you should do.

We Discuss Themes Like…

1. The importance of passion and curiosity

2. The role of ethical leadership

3. The critical need for up-skilling across ALL age groups

4. The balance between leveraging AI for efficiency and maintaining human values

5. The potential biases in AI technology

Plus, We Each Share Real Stories…

You’ll hear Josette advise people to figure out what their passion is first…

 “We talk about AI like it's just something totally amorphous instead of thinking about it as a tool that allows us to get to our means in a different way. Part of it is getting out of the hype cycle with AI and understanding that it is a tool and it's an environment that we can use for whatever our passions are. My first piece of advice for folks is always to figure out what your passion is.”

Or, Bob remind us of the importance of hitching our career wagons to pro-human leaders…

 “There are leaders that love the idea of how do I get rid of more FTEs and bring it to AI? There are others that are more human, servant leaders who are worried about their people and have a duty and a loyalty to the individuals that power their company.

Those are the folks that are gonna take a path that's more of, “How can we use this to augment?” And I think, again, that idea of giving people time, giving people space, giving them the coaching, decreasing the fear that comes naturally in all these situations.

Who are you gonna hitch your wagon to?”

And Kendra remind us that we aren’t behind. We’re in this together…

“Being able to slow down, understanding how it applies to you personally and professionally. Playing with AI to see, like brainstorming some ideas and thoughts, brainstorming career paths. You can do that in AI as well. There's a ton of free resources to learn AI.

Microsoft has AI programs for free. Google has AI programs for free. There's just a wealth of knowledge, but I think it's one of those things of creating time and space to do that. Do not wait for your leadership to come to you and say, "Hey, now let's learn AI." Take that initiative.”

I add a few witty missives, too. But, I’m not the star, they are!

Hear More of Our Prognostications

Listen to the full episode. Bob, Kendra, and Josette rock! I help guide the discussion and not take us down too many tangents. In the end, it’s just four cool people talking careers and what the future holds.

Enjoy the episode! Thanks for you support!

Paul G. Fisher

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