That was the assumption I made when I stopped there for an iced coffee on a hot, sunny Saturday last month on my way to visit family in Connecticut.

The store was packed. A long line of customers in a hurry to be somewhere else snaked its way around the junk food displays, inching slowly toward the older woman on the other side of the counter.

“What an awfully hard job,” I thought, as I watched her selling lottery tickets and sodas.

The weather outside is beautiful, and you’re stuck inside. You’re on your feet all day, under constant pressure from impatient, sometimes rude people. You’re exhausted at the end of your shift and you don’t have much of in the way of material reward to show for it.

But even as I was creating this scenario in my head, I still was able to take in the attentive cheerfulness with which she waited on those who preceded me.

It doesn’t matter where you are working, what circumstances you are working under, or at what level you are working, as long as you are satisfying what is important to you.

This observation would later help me to understand how my storyline could be so off-base. Unfortunately it didn’t stop me from saying something intended as kind, but which was actually patronizing.

“I hope you’re able to find some relaxation and enjoyment today,” I said to the woman as she handed me my change. I pictured her freed at last from the tedium of the work, out of the uniform, under the shade of a tree sipping iced tea.

With the same patience that she had been showing toward everyone else in line, she said, “Oh, I’m enjoying myself now—I love this job!” She smiled and beckoned to the next customer.

WORK VALUES

“Wow!” I said to myself as I walked to my car. “What a lesson in humility.”

I had congratulated myself for trying to see myself in her shoes, but as it turned out, my musings were more akin to professional arrogance than empathy. Here I go about teaching others that work is what you make of it, and then I go and make such a stereotypical judgment about what does or does not constitute meaningful work for someone.

Back on the highway, I asked myself why a person might find working as a cashier satisfying, and I thought about the list of work values I use with my clients.

I ask them to consider work as: an activity, a community, competence, competition, a contribution, a home base, income, pleasure, self-actualization, and structure.

Then I ask them to place a value on these items by prioritizing them according to their importance.

As I reflected on my cashier’s choice of a job at the Mini-Mart in terms of work values, I began to see her situation differently.

Perhaps she values work as a community and she’s drawn to the social aspects—meeting the public or being part of a team. Maybe work as a contribution is important to her and she enjoys serving others. Maybe she’s retired, and a few shifts at the Mini-Mart provide needed extra income. Or maybe work as structure is a priority to her and she likes the Mini-Mart because it gets her out of the house.

Work values represent the internal motivation behind a career choice, and they are just as relevant to a Mini-Mart cashier as they are to a CEO.

It doesn’t matter where you are working, what circumstances you are working under, or at what level you are working, as long as you are satisfying what is important to you.

The US government reports two different unemployment statistics. The one we are most familiar with is the one most talked about in the news media, something called the “U-3 unemployment rate.” It currently hovers just under 10%.

There is also the less well-known “U-6″ rate, which is now over 17%. It includes what the Bureau of Labor Statistics calls “involuntary part time, underemployed workers” and “discouraged” workers who have stopped looking.

For people struggling to stay positive after a year or more of unemployment, I’m sure that even the higher number must seem too low.

Yet there are many who know what discouragement feels like and have chosen not to give up.

It was important for them to “drop the spiel and be real.” It’s the only way to make the genuine connections which are an invaluable help in both the immediate objective of finding work and the long-term goal of professional security.

I was honored to be able to spend a Saturday morning a few weeks ago with a group of them at St. Peter’s Episcopal Church in Weston, MA.

I had come there to lead them in a program I developed called, “Perseverance Strength Training.” Just by showing up, they had demonstrated an openness to accepting reality, learning new approaches to work-search, and building community.

Instead of the usual introduction (“Stand up and tell us your name and why you’re here”), I asked the participants to do two things.

The first was to reflect a moment on the definition of perseverance (determined continuation with something; steady continued action over a long period of time, especially despite obstacles and setbacks), focusing on a particular word or phrase.

Then I asked them to apply that word or phrase to their current circumstances. I wanted them to frame their stories within the context of perseverance.

“You mean you don’t want my elevator speech?” someone said, and I replied that sales pitches were not allowed.

I felt it was important for them to “drop the spiel and be real.” It’s the only way to make the genuine connections which are an invaluable help in both the immediate objective of finding work and the long-term goal of professional security.

By building a community of support, we are able to replace the career safeguards formerly provided by employers with those of our own creation.

PROFESSIONAL FITNESS
The people in the room that morning were already well versed in what I call the “aerobic exercise” of work search—scanning Internet postings, putting together and sending out resumes, going to networking events, researching potential employers, tracking down leads, etc.

However, just as aerobic activity is only the starting point for physical fitness, traditional job-search practices are only a part of an effective strategy for finding work. As weeks and months of unemployment pass and spirits flag, it becomes increasingly obvious that they are not enough to sustain us in the marathon that finding work has become.

The realities of a changing economy require that we build capacity from within by adding “strength training” to our “professional fitness” routine.
Only by consciously reinforcing our core sense of self-worth will we have the stamina to keep going through a long, drawn-out, uphill-and-down work-search.

PROFESSIONAL “STRENGTH TRAINING” BASICS
Recently NPR’s Scot Simon interviewed people who had been out of work for as long as two years.

Some of them were embarrassed, as if they thought their friends and relatives were saying to themselves, “What have you been doing all this time?”

Some longed to be out of the house, with people, to have a place to go to.

Some talked about how difficult it is to put a smile on your face, stick with it, maintain a positive attitude, especially on days when your spouse adds to the crushing weight you’re already carrying by asking, “Why you aren’t out there knocking on every door?”

The kind of “professional strength training” I advocate for them, as well as the participants at St Peter’s and the rest of the “U-6″ unemployed, includes exercises to reinforce their sense of possibility, self-worth, and belonging.

Here are a few:

• Spend time every day engaged in some form of new learning. Set up a curriculum of study around a particular topic, with readings and assignments.

 

• Actively cultivate a core group of supporters and make yourself accountable by sharing your goals with them and keeping them informed of your progress, or lack of it, on a regular basis.

 

• Find a volunteer activity, or perhaps someone to visit for whom your presence alone brightens their day. Nothing improves self-worth more than giving back.

 

• Find a way to put into the world what you most want. When John Lithgow was a struggling actor, he didn’t abandon his dream to do something more meaningful than a television commercial. He talked some of his friends into getting together on a regular basis to read Shakespeare.

 

• Balance every self-esteem risk (e.g. talking to the bank about past-due mortgage payments) with a self-esteem builder (e.g. helping a colleague prepare for an interview).

 

• Reduce the amount of busy work you do each day just to feel productive, and use the time to do some of the other things on this list or develop your own “strength training exercises.”

You won’t see benefits right away, but it’s like going to the gym—just the fact that you are doing something you know is good for you on a regular basis makes you feel better, and that’s the whole point.

August 2nd through 6th, I will once again serve as class assistant for Edith and Charles Seashore’s program, “Intentional Use of Self: Strategies and Skills for Consulting, Coaching and Change.” Edith Whitfield Seashore, M.A., specializes in Organizational Development and change and has over 40 years of experience training and consulting with corporations and government agencies as well as non-profits. Charles Seashore, Ph.D., is chair of the faculty of the doctoral program in Human and Organization Development of the Fielding Graduate Institute. Both are NTL pioneers and amazing people. This is my fourth time serving as their assistant.

Sometimes it comes on gradually—the pressure you feel to find work, get your business in the black again, or restore stability to your financial future accumulates, causing sleepless nights or mornings when you sit at your desk not knowing what to do next.

Or there may be a trigger—one rejection too many, a bill you can’t pay, or a depressing headline saps your belief in yourself and better days ahead, and you have that sinking sensation of fear taking you over for a few days or a week or longer.

Fear is a natural reaction to change, and you can expect it to be particularly active when your work-life, that part of your existence that provides sustenance, purpose and identity, has been shaken like a snow globe.

You’re most likely to slip into a funk when you allow your fears to merge. You can see this happening when someone asks you what’s wrong and you say, “Everything!” Then you rattle off a litany of problems and you feel yourself sinking ever deeper into them as you do.

There’s no sense in trying to avoid it, but you can shorten the time you spend in its immobilizing grip by naming it, normalizing it, and negotiating around it.

You can learn how to get fear out of the driver’s seat and strap it into the passenger seat so you can take it for a ride instead of the other way around.

Over the years I’ve used this image with clients whenever they start a session with, “I’m really having a hard time,” or “I haven’t done much.”

When they keep circling back to a worse-case scenario, it’s a sure sign that fear has its foot on the gas pedal.

To go anywhere they will first need to get themselves back behind the wheel, and so we begin with giving our full attention to addressing fear with a three step plan.

STEP 1—RELAX
Imagine you’re at a large party where the music is loud and people are all shouting at each other, trying to be heard.

Now think about how wonderful it feels when you decide to get away from the overpowering noise by stepping outside to enjoy the cool quiet of the evening.

Such moments of calm are equally accessible in a fear funk, when the noise and the loud voices are coming from inside your head. You simply have to be with someone who settles you down.

The decision of who to pick needs to be made consciously. You do this by asking yourself, “Who is my best resource for support around the fear I am experiencing now?”

You need someone who will both allow you vent your fears and help you gain perspective. When you seek out someone who cares about you with the clear intent of reducing fear’s grip, the conversation will be restorative.

STEP 2—REGROUP
You’re most likely to slip into a funk when you allow your fears to merge. You can see this happening when someone asks you what’s wrong and you say, “Everything!” Then you rattle off a litany of problems and you feel yourself sinking ever deeper into them as you do.

Once you become aware of being dominated by fear-driven negativity, you have a choice: you can either feed the fear by continuing to voice your woes indiscriminately, or you can look for ways to contain it.

The best practice I know of for containment is the creation of a master list.

Write down all the fears, anxieties, and stressors you are feeling and assign a point value to each one on a scale of 1 to 10. For example, running out of unemployment might be an 8; talking to your spouse about finances, a 7; out-of-date technical skills, a 5; not hearing back from someone you left several messages with, a 2.

Now add up all the numbers—in this simplified example the total is 22. Somewhere below that number is the tipping point which has caused you to you slip into a fear funk. It may be 20, 19, 17, or less. It’s there somewhere. The goal is to do whatever you can to reduce the total so that it falls below the fear funk threshold, whatever it is.

You can’t do anything about unemployment ending, but you could decide to make one last call to the person who didn’t get back to you and then scratch the name off your list. This would reduce the total to 20, and maybe that would be enough to help you re-establish your equilibrium.

If not, you could begin to upgrade your technical skills by using a tutorial or working with a friend, and that would reduce the total to 15. Maybe that would do it.

Now that you’ve started, you could make a breakfast date to talk about finances with your spouse, and that would reduce the total all the way down to 8.

STEP 3—RESUME
This has nothing to do with documenting your qualifications on an 8 1/2 x 11 sheet of paper. I mean re-ZOOM, begin again, restart.

Once you’ve reduced your fear to a manageable level, you can pick up where you left off with your work-search or business goals.

But you’re likely to be stopped in your tracks again if you charge up the hill with bravado, attempting to take it all back on at once.

The safest approach is to use a flanking maneuver of small steps forward, taking into consideration the fact that you are still under the influence of a receding fear funk, and understanding that, however small those steps may be, they are nevertheless courageous and important.

If you’re recovering from a serious illness or surgery, something like getting out of bed, preparing a simple meal, or walking out to get the newspaper may be a milestone.

Likewise, after you have come through a fear funk, so is writing a follow-up email, or setting up a meeting, or starting to play with ideas for a new proposal or presentation.

All we know about the woman in this photograph is that she was 80 years old in November, 1936, when Dorothea Lange took her picture, and at the time she was living in a camp for migrant workers outside Bakersfield, California.

If we think of her in the context of the times, we can deduce that she and her family were probably among the thousands of farmers forced to migrate from the Oklahoma Dust Bowl to California in search of work. This would mean that she had been enduring dislocation and acute poverty for some time.

Yet the old woman’s look is strong and her demeanor is positive. The shadow from the hand that shields her eyes from the bright sunlight obscures much of her face, but we can see enough to know that she is looking straight ahead and determined to keeping moving forward.

Everything about her embodies the courage expressed in the philosophy of life she shared with Lange in a brief dialogue just before the picture was taken. "If you lose your pluck," she said, "you lose the most there is in you—all you’ve got to live with."

SUSTAINING EACH OTHER
On the road and within their encampments, the Okies kept going by helping each other out. There is a scrap of writing that Lange found in the Imperial Valley in 1935 that reads:

Hooverville 2 year wintered here
If they’s been a cross word
I haven’t hear it. When one has
they all has. I can’t explain—
Each and every one has sympathy
for the other cause they’ve all been
the same

"Their culture required mutual help and generosity, no matter how severe their deprivation," writes Lange’s biographer, Linda Gordon, in Dorothea Lange: A Life Beyond Limits. Through their losses the migrant workers rediscovered a basic code of human kindness that helped them sustain the pluck in each other.

I like to imagine the influence this old woman had on the young mothers in the camp, how her very presence helped them get through each day, and how in turn they motivated her to keep going. They needed each other.

It reminds me of the Montgomery Bus Boycott of 1955, the first big demonstration in what would later become the Civil Rights movement. The people walking, in some cases miles, to work were sustained by the perseverance of one of the oldest members of the community, a woman known to everyone as Mother Pollard. When the movement’s leaders were having their doubts about the wisdom of continuing the boycott, her plucky refusal to accept rides and her insistence on walking restored their flagging resolve. Her words became a rallying cry for the movement. "My feets is tired, but my soul is rested," she said prophetically.

OUR GREAT RECESSION
Now, as we enter the second year of what is being called the "Great Recession" (in order not to evoke images of the Great Depression), the collapse of whole industries like publishing, construction, real estate, where people have made a good living for years, is a monumental change like the distress of farmers whose livelihood was stripped away by soil depletion, drought, and dust storms in the 1930s.

Yet, unlike the migrant workers of the 1930s, today’s displaced professionals have a wide range of options—as long as they are willing to do the courageous work of recreating themselves.

We no longer live in a culture where generation after generation is restricted to the trade they were born into. We now have the opportunity, as well as the access to education and support, to put together alternative ways of making a living and achieving professional fulfillment.

There is a marked difference between doing what you have to do to pay the mortgage and keep food in the refrigerator, and giving in to the downward spiral of feeling like, "This is all there is and all there will be in my future."

Like the woman in Lange’s photograph, it is critical that, no matter what our circumstances are, we have the pluck not to sell ourselves short by failing to take on the task of creating the vision of a better life for ourselves and working toward realizing that vision in incremental steps.

Yes, it may be necessary temporarily to find work which is less rewarding, financially and professionally, than we would like, but that does not mean we have to resign ourselves permanently to it.

One of my clients was laid off from a job which he had found lifeless for years—he admitted to me that the only thing fulfilling about it had been the paycheck.

In our work together he began to take actions toward a career in nursing and human services because he loved the idea of helping people.

Now, faced with the end of his unemployment checks, his challenge is to find the pluck within himself to keep moving forward on his plan, while at the same time doing whatever temporary work he can find to contribute to his family’s income.

As part of his overall strategy, temporary work is a means to an end, not a dead end.

On August 18 at 5 PM, I will facilitate a conversation about Daniel Pink’s book, Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us, at the second session of the Cape’s newly formed Business Book Club. The meeting will take place in the conference room of the Cape Cod Chamber of Commerce, 5 Shoot Flying Hill Rd, Centerville, MA. The group is open to the public. Come have your entrepreneurial energy revitalized by a lively discussion of the best practices for achieving success in any business venture.

Beverly Ryle will speak on the topic of Transition, May 11, 2010, 6:30-8 PM at:

Eastham Library
190 Samoset Road
Eastham, MA 02642-3145
(508) 240-5950

Listening to what was being said there, it became clear to me that the Cortlanders whose daily ritual I was observing were trying to make a living in a place where that is not always an easy thing to do—the town has an 11% unemployment rate and negative job growth.

People usually go about about dealing with work being hard to find in three distinct ways.

There’s a difference between someone who is honestly grieving the loss of income, or the fact that job-search has become a long, competitive, and difficult process, and someone who continuously uses these painful situations to justify being miserable and grumpy.

GIVE UP
Some don’t even bother. Parked outside the cafĂ©, there was a pickup truck which looked like it could have belonged to a dust-bowl farmer from the 1930s. It had a bumper sticker which read, “Cortland County: Largest Welfare Population and Proud of It.”

But giving up isn’t usually so overt. More often it takes the form of a gradual withdrawal.

We normally hear this expressed in the disclaimer that unemployment figures don’t reflect those who have stopped trying to find work.

Why? Have they run out of things to do? Do they feel so discouraged they’ve lost the energy to keep going?

For whatever reason, I suspect it was a decision they made alone. Isolation and giving up go hand in hand.

Fortunately, the mirror image is also true—the support of others helps people stay the course. Just as it “takes a village to raise a child,” it takes a community to find work.

GRUMBLE
Then there are those who are still grieving the loss of a change in their economic circumstances.

Their inability to accept what is results in a need to continuously give voice to their shock, disbelief, and anger that this could be happening to them. Often this comes out as a litany of complaints about working conditions or the job market.

I actually heard a professional woman in her fifties being interviewed on the PBS News Hour emphatically say she wanted her office and her staff back and she shouldn’t have to look for a job!

There’s a difference between someone who is honestly grieving the loss of income, or the fact that job-search has become a long, competitive, and difficult process, and someone who continuously uses these painful situations to justify being miserable and grumpy.

When you pay close attention to the words and faces of people around you, like I did in the coffee shop, you can readily identify those for whom "daily grind" refers to more than coffee.

Talking to others about our struggles, particularly when the loss is new and the feelings are raw, can play a useful part in our healing process, but we need to become aware of when the story of how we’re suffering goes on too long or we tell it too many times.

When we get in the habit of venting to people who are also stuck in negativity we end up expending our emotional energy in a way that moves us in the wrong direction, down, not up! The question then becomes, are the conversations we’re having helping us to move forward, or are they building a case for giving up?

MOVE FORWARD
In her biography of Dorthea Lange, the photographer whose images of the Great Depression have become iconic, Linda Gordon observes, “Economic depression had a literally depressing effect on many … but Lange’s response, by contrast, was a desire to do something.”

She did this by using her camera (she called it her “tool for seeing”) to record what she saw, first immediately outside the window of her studio in San Francisco, and then in the fields where migrant laborers worked and in the camps where they lived.

By shifting her focus from inside, where she made portraits of the rich and famous, to outside, where the hungry were lined up at soup kitchens in America’s cities and uprooted farmers from the middle of the country were trekking west desperately seeking work, she found her calling.

She changed direction without having the vaguest idea of how she would support herself financially. She had no idea that her choice to do this would lead to her being hired by government agencies and provide opportunities that would make her reputation as a photographer.

She connected to what was important to her instead of clinging to the past. Unlike her colleagues, who were lamenting the disappearance of work for artists, she put something creative into the economic void of the Depression—and when I speak of her creativity, I am not referring to her talent as a photographer. What she created was a purpose for herself within the reality of the times she lived in.

April 16, 2010, 9 AM to 1 PM
Northeastern University
Egan Center, Room 340, Boston, MA

This is a half-day career seminar with a special rate of just $85!