How to Get and Keep Your Dream Job, Part 1

In a keynote to a university sports banquet recently, I talked about something every graduate wants to know about: How to Get and Keep Your Dream Job.  Here is what what I told the students and coaches.  Feel free to pass it on to your children, grandchildren, nieces and nephews.  I wish someone had handed it to me at 18 or 22 years of age.  

*Do What You Love
*Soar With Your Strengths
*Choose to Have a Great Attitude
*Smile
*Show Up Early & Stay Late
*Volunteer and Stretch Your Comfort Zones
*Update Your Goals On Your Birthday
*Commit to Becoming a Lifelong Learner
*Ask Open Ended Questions and Dominate the Listening
*It’s Not About You!

Do What You Love
Follow your bliss.  20 Years ago I found mine. I was 32 years old before I determined what my bliss truly was; speaking and writing.  Helping others achieve their goals.  After reading over 1,000 books, certain questions began to emerge:
1.    If all the jobs paid a dollar, which job would you do?
2.    What did you love to do at age seven? (ask your mom)
3.    What specific activity, that when you are engaged in it, are lost in the joy of the activity?
4.    If a Doctor told you that you had six months to live, how would you spend your time?
5.    If you suddenly inherited $10,000,ooo what would you do differently?

Once you answer these questions honestly and thoroughly, simply ask yourself, “What are the common denominators?  What is the common thread?”  The answer to that question is your bliss.

Shakespeare wrote in Hamlet, “To thine own self be true.”  Most people live their whole lives and never surrender to that simple truth.

Soar With Your Strengths
My bliss and my strengths fall into two categories, writing and speaking.  Everything else is a misuse of my time and energy.  I outsource and delegate most everything else. My favorite professional question is “What is the best and highest use of my time?”  If you took the time to answer the five bliss questions, you probably know what your bliss is. Surrender to it.  Embrace it.  Set Goals around it. Study it. Master it.  

Choose to Have a Great Attitude
Optimists live longer than pessimists do.  Guess what?  They have a better time along the way. Hang around positive people.  Make a list of the people with whom you spend most of your time and write down as many people as you can think of.  Parents, friends, teammates, acquaintances, teachers, coaches, etc.  Now put a (+) or a (-) next to their name.  The plus (+) people are speedboats.  They pull you forward.  The negative (-) people are anchors.  They drag you down to the bottom with them.  Calculate how much time you give each person each week.  What percentage of your day or week do you give them?  Invest more time with the speedboats and less time with the anchors!  It’s simple.  You will be the same person in five years but for two things, the people you with whom you choose to associate, and the books you read.  Read classic self-help literature, inspirational books like: Acres of Diamonds, by Russell Conwell;  How to Win Friends and Influence People,   by Dale Carnegie; Think and Grow Rich, by Napoleon Hill; The Richest Man in Babylon, by George Clason; and of course Freedom from Fear, by yours truly.  Books and people, people and books.

Smile
It takes 13 facial muscles to smile, 47 to frown.  Evidently, some people don’t mind the extra work!  If you smile long enough, you’ll come up with a reason.  Is a bird happy because he sings or does he sing because he is happy?  Act and the feelings will follow.  The late Harvard professor and father of American psychology William James wrote, “Action seems to follow feeling, but really, action and feeling go together; and by regulating the action, which is under the more direct control of the will, we can indirectly regulate the feeling, which is not.”  In short, develop the habit of smiling four times an hour....just because.

Show Up Early, Stay Late
An airplane goes full throttle until it gets to 30,000 feet.  Then the pilot backs off.  If he didn’t he would burn up the engine or use up his fuel.  When starting out your career, go full throttle.  The late, great businesss philospher Jim Rohn said, “A young person brand new to sales can make up in numbers what she lacks in skill.”  My first year in sales, I worked 70 to 80 hours a week.  I went full throttle.  My close ratio was only 25%.  However, I was proposing five agreements a week.  Twice as many as my peers.  I ended the year at 150% of sales plan.  My sales manager was delighted.  The next year I began to really study the art and science of selling.  I asked 20 successful sales professionals in my industry 20 questions.  The answers changed my close ratio to 50%.  I worked about 50 hours a week that second year.  I kept studying sales books, going to seminars, listening to audio programs while I drove and worked out.  My third year my close ratio jumped to 75% and I was 300% of plan, while working about 35 hours a week.  You get the idea. In any new endeavor, go full throttle until you get to 30,000 feet.


Mark Matteson is the founder and President of Pinnacle Service Group, Inc., Lynnwood, WA. He is author of three books and four e-books, including the International Best Seller, Freedom from Fear; with over 100,000 copies sold worldwide, it has been translated into Japanese & French.  Mark’s newest book, A Simple Choice was released in November, 2009. Mark will be the Keynote speaker at the Friday morning session at Comfortech 2010 in Baltimore, MD. To reach Mark call 206/697-0454 or email at mark@mattesonavenue.com.