Over-50

Trapped in Loop of Catastrophic Thinking

Stuck. 

That's where so many in the investment community, media, and near retirement/semi-retirement have been this December.

The Dow kept on plummeting.

Economic indicators such as housing sales showed a slowdown.

And the visions about the future hardened into flashbacks of The Great Depression. 

But there are alternate ways of perceiving what is happening and creating just-in-time solutions. Essentially, that's what American Buddhist nun Pema Chodron makes accessible. Her tool in opening us up is the lightness of humor.

Here is a video of her talk "The Freedom to Choose Something Different."

The meme is the possibility of getting unstuck from habitual ways of experiencing events - for example, catastrophic mindsets. From the get-go she is funny in a gentle way. That contrasts with the high earnestness of the typical spiritual teacher or management change agent.

For example, she notes that nobody comes to a retreat seeking for life to become more stress-filled. And she indicates it's so typical for us to be totally shocked and disappointed in ourselves when we feel jealousy, even after a whole week of meditation.

Where I bear witness to stuck the most is among aging professionals. Most lack Chodron's lightness of humor when putting together fresh ways of earning a good buck. They take a reversal of fortune seriously, therefore get trapped in that loop. If they had perspective they could position and package the next few jobs or gig assignments as raw material for the Next. Not the forever. Here, free to download, is my book on that path for scaling back up Download Outwitting ageism.

The second most common example of stuck is the marketing communications campaign with diminishing returns. The focus is on how it used to work great. That situation is beyond a muted haha. It elicits a belly laugh about the absurdity. 

Of course, the expression "wound too tight" comes to mind. That might have been a tip off that former "Today" head Matt Lauer had been creating a toxic force field. 

Here, also free to download, is my book on shaking off comfort zones. 

Out of the Box Communications = Unexpected Results

Complimentary Consultation janegenova374@gmail.com – I help, not sell.

Nostalgia - Don't Pull That on Job Interviews

Cut the nostalgia.

From the get-go, that's what I advise those I coach - whether they are millennials or members of the Silent Gen. If they want access to well-paying work, any traveling along memory lane will position and package them as not in the moment. 

If you're young, employers will assume you haven't made that emotional leap out of college into the brutal realities of the world of work.

If you are older, the assumption will be that you are ossified.

A few months ago, in the email I had received photos from a retired senior director in the public affairs department of the former Gulf Oil (taken over by Chevron). The visual material was of the former head of that department.

I rolled my eyes and concluded that geezer had no intention of picking up contract work. After all, he was self-labeling as revering the past. In addition, I requested my name be removed from the emailing list. I didn't want to risk any guilt by association. Society is all too eager to slam us with age bias.

Actually, history itself has become suspect. We recognize that historical accounts really are one person's interpretation of what supposedly was. Sure, research is included. But still there is the overlay of a point of view. In most situations, we could care less about that perspective.

If we are going to read or view a documentary, usually we opt for current subject matter. For example, I would welcome an article, book, or video on the pros and cons of majoring in English in 2019. But, please, hold the flashbacks about how it had been to be an English major back in the 1960s. 

A few months ago I interviewed a iGen for a contract assignment in my communications boutique. Two years out of college, she narrated vividly a memory from her first year at X university. No, I didn't make her an offer. The narrative should have been about a recent work experience. Obviously, I reflected, this woman was stuck in the past.

Here, free to download, is my book on how to locate and take the ramp out of your comfort zone. Even five minutes ago is not Now.

Coaching and Thought Leadership Ghostwriting about Issues Associated with Careers.

Complimentary consultation, sliding scale fees. Please contact Jane Genova at janegenova374@gmail.com.

 

"The Blessings of Aging" - The New Yorker Documentary

Here you can view it.

Attention is the currency of the 21^st century. Jane Genova helps you get it for products, services, points of view, causes, branding, careers after-50, and college admission.

In addition, this blog welcomes sponsored content.

Free consultation janegenova374@gmail.com

 

Your Version of The Journey

Her mother's death in 2014 was a life-changer. 

After that, successful lawyer in Texas Lisa Jacobs quit her job. 

Her interim step before taking the really big leap was founding a green interior design company.

Then, in 2017, she took that leap. At the time it was not as a solo woman. There was a boyfriend in the picture. She bought a van for $15k. Together they reconverted it into cozy convenient living space. 

Then they hit the road. However, the relationship derailed. Living together in the small quarters of van and being challenged by the uncertainties of always traveling brought out the worst.

To regroup emotionally Jacobs returned to TX.

Then in March 2018, she restarted life on the road, this time as a solo act. She brings that act to the subscription based "Yes Monday" on the Vacay Vans YouTube Channel. Here are more details from Daily Mail. 

Of course, from the get-go of quitting her law job, Jacobs has been living out the fantasy of Everyman/SomeWomen (traveling solo in a van is not usual for females) to exit the conformity, stress, and need to win of professional life in the second decade of the 21st century.

As many might recall from those courses in western civilization, the journey has been an archetype since Biblical and ancient Greek times. It represented a test of human nature and, if passed, a growth experience.

In the Old Testament the Jews left all they knew in Egypt for their Promised Land. It was not easy.

Greek author Homer created the "Odyssey" to chronicle the ordeals a war hero must endure to reach the next level.

More recently, there is Jacobs' "Yes Monday." She survived. She has learned how to thrive. And she shares her experiences with her subscribers.

Other professionals yearning for another kind of lifestyle can use this as a template for putting together their own kind of journey out of X and toward whatever. Change is possible. 

Attention is the currency of the 21^st century. Jane Genova helps you get it for products, services, points of view, causes, branding, careers after-50, and college admission.

In addition, this blog welcomes sponsored content.

Free consultation janegenova374@gmail.com

 

We Baby Boomers Have Been Through This Before

The Internet has failed to live up to the early promise that it would create a level playing field in just about everything.

Instead, the Barbarians are at gate.

That everything the internet was suppose to usher in ranged from universal access to media attention to being able to succeed in business without a huge budget or even a gold-plated network. 

Like the leaders of the emerging counterculture in the late 1960s, the front lines of the internet - the Netizens - were positioned and packaged as spiritually, socially, and intellectually evolved. 

And, the obstacles of class, gender, language, and geography in connecting with other human beings would no longer exist. 

Little of that has come to pass.

In Vanity Fair, Maya Kosoff documents the failure.

Sure, all voices can be heard. But the loudest ones on the internet tend to promote hate or seek to confuse.

Businesses using supposedly low-cost Facebook advertising are now suing Facebook for allegedly inflating, up to 900%, the user metrics associated with video. The higher the metrics, the more Facebook billed. And, how many lawyers have been badly burned by web con artists? 

As in Orwell's  "Animal Farm," many of the Netizens considered themselves more equal that other Netizens.

Some of those more equal than others seem to have the darkness and myopia of human nature of William Shakespeare's classic characters like King Lear. 

Yeah, as the counterculture movement hardened it seemed to mutate into propaganda endorsing sex-on-demand, drug-taking, cult thinking, violence, and throwing away a career. 

The impediments to connecting seem to be increasing, not melting away like the Wicked Witch in "The Wizard of Oz."

Who hasn't been flamed on the internet because they were different from those who had figured out how to attract, hold, and grow followers?

The gang of earnest freelancers at Mediabistro.com put me under attack for two days.

The fans of Gawker explicitly tormented me for about four years. Included were weekly executions in which the decision would be made if I would be granted clemency. 

Unfortunately, being on the internet, both web and mobile, is a necessary evil. The snail mail mode of developing business is dead. Attending conferences in-person to network and job hunt has become too expensive at this time of stagnant wages and fees.

Yes, google has become the resume for individuals. That's what Richard Bolles hammers in the 2019 edition of "What Color Is Your Parachute?"

Google also has become the homepage for businesses. It overrides websites. And in his book "The Four," Scott Galloway predicts it will eliminate the concept of branding. Instead of sticking with brand choice Planet Fitness when we move to Ohio, we know to key in on google "fitness centers - Eastern OH." A lower-cost fit might pop up on the first page of google. 

Here's an analogy to the wonderous potential of the internet: baby boomers' access to a college education.

That seemed like the exit from being regulated to low-status, low-earning work.

Then, soon enough, it became obvious that not all school credentials were equal. That is exactly what the current trial "Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard" is about.

The stink that stuck on our realization that the game was still rigged hasn't diminished. But, we tell our grandchildren that they must go to college - and beyond in higher education. 

Likewise, we are locked into the internet. 

Attention is the currency of the 21^st century. Jane Genova helps you get it for products, services, points of view, causes, branding, careers after-50, and college admission.

In addition, this blog welcomes sponsored content.

Free consultation janegenova374@gmail.com

No, Baby Boomers, Words Aren't Dead

Initially, "LLE ONE, et al. v. Facebook" had been filed in U.S. District Court in Northern California in 2015.

On Tuesday, plaintiffs Crowd Siren, an ad firm, and Jonathan Murdough, who had purchased video ads, amended the complaint based on what they had learned during discovery. They are seeking damages and class action status.  Here is the coverage from the LA Times.

At the heart of the lawsuit is the allegation that Facebook misrepresented the amount of time users were spending viewing a video on the social platform. Originally it was believed that that figures were inflated 60% to 80%. The longer the user was supposedly viewing the video the more Facebook could charge advertisers.

Funny business was allegedly going on such as not counting in any video on which the user spent little time. 

Now, the plaintiffs contend the misrepresentation ranged from 150% to 900%. During that time period Facebook was telling advertisers to "pivot to video." Many advertisers did just that. As a result, many jobs were lost in textual communications. Now Facebook has backed off pushing the "pivot to video." 

Overall, in the communications industry, we content providers were hammered with the same message: Everything was going video. That shift didn't happen.

Sure, there is more video currently than there had been before. But there is also growing demand for textual material such as white papers, reports, print books, e-books, long-form articles, blogs, manuals, resumes, and cover letters. To get, hold, and grow attention, all organizations have to put more and more material out there. 

Question: What will it take for Facebook to regain its credibility? Alleged fraud aside, does it really know what engages? My hunch is that it won't be able to shake the stink.

Attention is the currency of the 21^st century. Jane Genova helps you get it for products, services, points of view, causes, branding, careers after-50, and college admission.

In addition, this blog welcomes sponsored content.

Free consultation janegenova374@gmail.com

 

PR Agencies - Are the Digital Natives Stealing Your Business? - Push Back on Halloween

One of the time/interactional burdens of being in professional services, such as public relations, is the requirement to attend or host so many client events.

Yet, it's at those in which new business is developed, client churn is prevented, and fresh strategies are floated for feedback - and acceptance.

That's why what costumes public relations players put together for their clients' (probably multiple) parties are critical to the agency's survival and scaling.

According the Holmes Report, in the U.S., the public relations industry only grew 2.6% in 2017 versus 4.6% in 2016.

Right now, the game is mutating into a zero-sum one. 

Competition is coming not from only other established agencies.

Digital natives graduating from the Ivies with degrees in communications are hanging out shingles. With their influencer sites and social media fast talk, they are dazzling clients. That's pulling market share from traditional firms. 

Halloween parties demand the performance of a lifetime.

Here are the 5 coolest costumes. They align with the key flashpoints in the public relations industry.

The Ghost of Branding Past. Should a client invest so much in building a brand?

After all, the current loudest voice in communications is Scott Galloway, author of "The Four."  Search engines and Alexa, Galloway hammers, have killed branding. The best at search engine optimization (SEO) and who's embedded in the Amazon empire get the business, influence, and power, not the biggest brandname. So goes the gospel according to Galloway.

The public relations representative's elevator speech at the party must contain statistics. They must deal with both the positive outcomes from branding and the results achieved through the great SEO firm the agency partners with. 

Robot-Like Figure. As the current cliché goes, today Don Draper from "Mad Men" would be a data guy.

Artificial intelligence (AI) is a must-have. Both for predicting how and when clients could get into trouble and for identifying opportunities for influence and sales. 

In addition, it's imperative that a public relations agency indicates it knows its way around this tool.  

That demonstration entails chatting up at the Halloween party both the pros and the limitations of AI.

Hype scares. Overselling, forget it. The most effective approach is starting the conversation with the question: Have you been wondering if your competitors are using AI?

Logo of Digital Media. There is plenty of confusion about earned media vs. paid media (including sponsored content), old-line news centers such as The New York Times vs. digital hotties such as Axios, and focusing on media vs. just turning whatever over to influencers. 

Being dressed with the Axios logo opens up the issue of emerging realities in influence and marketing. No one wants to be sold to. After all, trust is so 20th century.

Therefore, the discussion dances around concrete examples of outcomes. That provides an opening for prospects or clients to confide their own angst. Have prepared a loosely constructed proposal. Keep stopping for yes-buts.

Symbol for Frugality. That could be coming to the party dressed as Ebenezer Scrooge before he had been born again Christmas eve. Or it could be as a budget graphic.

A dog fight is going on over pricing. A few agencies at the top of the food chain can still bill like everyone did pre-crash. But even that comfort zone can be blown into a million pieces by upstarts leveraging low-cost digital tactics and bypassing expensive traditional media strategies. Their signature is that they are the go-to people for over-performing and under-billing. 

More requests for proposals are stating: Individuals only, no agencies. 

Crisis Shaman. The costume will require some imagination. The challenge is to be able to communicate instantly that the public relations representative can cast spells on all those bearing down on the client. Yes, the game is the art of voodoo and the science of perception management.

One outfit could simply consist of a Gene Grabowski mask. A partner at kglobal, he has established the aura of being able to transform an organization's problems into opportunity.

That's not new, of course. Turbulence as platform for scaling dates back to management consultant Peter Drucker in the 1980s.  

What is new is being totally present in the moment. That's what establishes the platform for how organizations can emerge more than whole from the crisis. So, forget templates from a less volatile era, as Grabowski explains here in PR Week.  

Another outfit could be George Bailey's guardian angel Clarence Odbody from "It's a Wonderful Life."

That's a wrap on costumes. And, no, you can't wear the same costume to multiple parties. 

Along those lines of opportunity, focused public relations professionals can extract seminal case studies from the Halloween parties as how-tos for orchestrating special events. 

Attention is the currency of the 21^st century. Jane Genova helps you get it for products, services, points of view, causes, branding, careers after-50, and college admission.

In addition, this blog welcomes sponsored content.

Free consultation janegenova374@gmail.com

 

Donald Trump: Role Model for Career Paths Post-70

The American Way of Careers has become The Start Over.

X doesn't work out, try Y.

In prison, like Watergate lawyer Chuck Colson, find something inside there to be a platform for a fresh career path.

Shame. That doesn't live in America any more. 

So, no one expects Donald Trump to disappear or even lay low if he is impeached.

In fact, for an entrepreneurial guy like him, that negative development can be leveraged into an on ramp to whatever.

His mindset likely will be: I tried being U.S. president. I really didn't like it much. And eventually I became the victim of fake news and false friends. 

As a coach for the over-50, I see even greater success for Trump than he enjoyed previously. After all, since he toyed with the idea of a political career he has been experimenting with new strategies and tactics.

That's exactly how good things are brought to life. The billionaires in Silicon Valley embraced the voodoo of A/B testing. Their brash confidence cast a spell on investors. 

Among the options for Next is to organize those who remain loyal to him into a movement for something, anything. Movements are fun. People enjoy joining them if someone else creates them.

A person whom I regret being in my life - Sally Conroy Fullman - now in her late 70s, has a little movement going for awareness about bone density. Likely meeting with powerful leaders about bone density brings her and her followers a sense of importance and accomplishment. Do we need a lot more awareness about the density of our bones? Hell, that doesn't matter. What does matter is the aura of making a difference. You go, Sally. 

Another option for Trump is to recruit top talent in documentary-making and capture what's wrong with the world. America as a focus will be small potatoes compared to making planet earth great again. It's a visual era and many will be all eyeballs. We watch. Trump, et al. can invent a new version of National Geographic or become a Margaret Mead without the grass skirt. 

A third option is to do a Bill Gates and become a full-time philanthropist. Yeah, sell all the real estate and other assets to fund a foundation.

It has been the Gates foundation which underwrote the just-released study on the hazards of alcohol. It is published in Lancet Medical Journal. What a global game-changer that could be: Human beings stop consuming alcohol since it's now known even small amounts can be dangerous. The kind of do-gooding Trump puts together can have even greater impact. That Noble Prize can finally come.

It will help The Next that members of the media will be curious. Trump is one lucky guy when it comes to careers.

Let's salute second, third, and fourth chances in America. That's exactly why the aging never ever have to retire. There are always more opportunities to prove oneself or improve the world via capitalism. No one is ever finished. Endings are new beginnings.

Full Disclosure: Eight months ago I created a new profit center among my enterprises. The world took notice. 

Communications Strategy/Services and Career Coaching. Special areas of expertise include professionals over-50 and students applying to degree programs in higher education.

 

Complimentary initial consultation. Sliding scale fees. Contact Jane Genova for an appointment janegenova374@gmail.com.

 

“Over-50: Outsmarting Your Comfort Zone” http://over-50.typepad.com/over-50/2018/05/outsmarting-your-comfort-zone-free-book.html

 “Over-50: The Four Monsters in the Mind” http://over-50.typepad.com/over-50/2018/04/ageism-bites-.html

 

 

Let Fred Rogers Help You Land, Hold, & Move on to Better Work

In movie theatres is the documentary "Won't You Be My Neighbor."

It recounts how Fred Rogers, a minister in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, created and sustained a very new kind of television show for children. Unlike the action-packed mindless cartoons produced for television, it took the risk of being slow-paced - and embedded with message.

That programming was "Mister Rogers' Neighborhood."

Among its memes was that every child is special without any need to be famous. Too bad there isn't a current analogue of the "Neighborhood" to assure stressed-out iGens and Millennials that they can just be.

Another poignant theme was that no matter how different a person may be, no human being is a "mistake." At that point in the documentary, tears were flowing among members of the audience in Northeast Ohio. Overweight as a child, Rogers had been bullied. In recovery groups for substance abuses the statement "I feel like a mistake" is tragically common.

But, what could be the key takeaway from the documentary was how Rogers gave slow unique power. He didn't only walk, move, and talk slowly in order that little children could digest his message. In all his public speaking his delivery was slow.

Here you can watch his nurturance of slow in front of a hostile Senate intent on snatching away funding for public television. That supported the "Neighborhood."

Usually that kind of setting would push most human beings to rush through their remarks. Right on the spot, Rogers was told he could hold on to the $20 million grant.

Of course, no fools, many whose business is in the field of oral presentations do slow.

That's a hallmark of how the popular "Dateline" is narrated and interviews conducted.

Also, even in what is the fast-paced evening news, on ABC, David Muir simulates slow, thoughtful delivery. That could be why his branding has become Thought Leader.

In my coaching those over-50, I have learned how effective slow is. That includes those critical pauses of silence.

Rogers treasured silent pauses. Currently, more professionals are attending day and weekend silent retreats. At one at the Zen Center in New Haven, Connecticut, I got it that words were getting in the way of the success of my two enterprises.

For those older human beings who come to me for career coaching silence reinforces the reality that they have most of he the answers within themselves. Once they allow themselves to become unstuck they are able to go on to being their own coaches. That's part of the specialness of every human being.

Here, free to download, is a guide on locating the ramp out of stuck. 

All the episodes of "Mister Rogers' Neighborhood" should be available online at colleges and for the unemployed in outplacement. They open the door to letting the light back in. 

Communications Strategy/Services and Career Coaching. Special areas of expertise include professionals over-50 and students applying to degree programs in higher education.

 

Complimentary initial consultation. Sliding scale fees. Contact Jane Genova for an appointment janegenova374@gmail.com.

One Thing We Learned in the Old Neighborhood Was Wrong

The message society is getting is: Yes, be a rat. Forget the old-neighborhood ethos that the snitch winds up in the ditch. 

The emerging success formula is to position oneself in a setting to pick up information that can later be ratted out. Along with fame, money, and power, there's the fun of watching the brandname players scared. 

Omarosa M. Newman is an amazing rat.

Her book "Unhinged" is #2 on Amazon.

It has received 52 customer reviews, earning a 4.6 ranking. That's extreme success even for books in The Rat Genre. And, as we all know, The Rat Genre is one of the few categories of books which had been brisk sellers in this post-book era. 

In media, thanks to the book, along with her many tapes, Omarosa is receiving even more attention than the supposed genius in that art - Donald Trump. Some watchers of this war even are speculating that Trump might now be punching above his weight.

Given that ratting is generating such outstanding outcomes, all of us must now become entirely circumspect.

There is no confiding.

No speaking our mind, not in public.

No being bad and then boasting of it to others.

We have to assume that the followers of the Omarosa model are recording. It could not only be on audio. It could also be on video. 

A clever entrepreneur will launch an online Rat School for the ambitious to learn how to retrieve, package, and distribute damaging data. 

Communications Strategy/Services and Career Coaching. Special areas of expertise include professionals over-50 and students applying to degree programs in higher education.

 

Complimentary initial consultation. Sliding scale fees. Contact Jane Genova for an appointment janegenova374@gmail.com.