351: Advancing Your Career When You’re Forced to Change

Dave Stachowiak 0:02
The other part of that is setting aside some things that you've been doing for a while, both professionally and personally, that more value added or you're realizing aren't value added, or maybe you didn't want to be doing anyway. And now here's an opportunity to make a change.

Introduction 0:20
This is the Happen To Your Career podcast, with Scott Anthony Barlow. We help you stop doing work that doesn't fit you, figure out what it does and make it happen. We help you define the work as unapologetically you and then go get it. If you're ready to make a change. Keep listening. Here's Scott. Here, Scott. Here's Scott.

Scott Anthony Barlow 00:44
There are these situations that happen in our lives that cause us to change our schedules or routines, things like getting married or having kids, extended illnesses, injuries, even things like widespread quarantines, I don't know. But here's the crazy thing about this, these changes in routine often lead us to evaluate our priorities and these interruptions in our life, cause us to evaluate what's most important to us, and they raise a lot of questions. Like, does my life or work line up with what I want in priorities to be? And what's the cost of not having them synced up? Am I willing to keep paying that price? Do I really want to go back to the way things were? Like, what was great about it? What's great about now, in the changes? How can I take advantage of these types of opportunities? Okay, so of course, we feel like when we need to make a change, when we're in these situations, you always wonder, is now the right time? You know, maybe I should wait until things settle down. And that's something that comes up a lot. This whole question of, "do I really want to go back to the way things were? And if not, what does that look like moving forward?" Is something I wanted to evaluate today. And I thought there'd be no better person in the world. Then somebody who has been a guest on Happen To Your Career before to come on and talk with me about this exact situation. So I wanted to actually bring my friend Dave. Dave has... Dave Stachowiak has been on the podcast in Episode 126, you can go back in here, his entire story there, but he's a world thought leader on leadership through his work and his podcast on coaching for leaders and he's someone who I also have a tremendous amount of respect for. And that's part of the reason why he's been on the show several times before this. But a little bit of context here, Dave and I meet every morning for roughly 15 minutes to clarify what the most important commitments we need to make are for that particular day. This helps me personally be accountable to some of the hardest things in life and work and focus on what's most important. And he and I have gotten to share a little well, little tidbits here and there of how life has changed. And what are the amazing things about it? What are the hard things about it? But we haven't been able to have a full discussion. So is with that level of excitement that I get to bring him on the show today. Welcome back to the Happen To Your Career podcast, Dave.

Dave Stachowiak 03:26
My friend, what an honor. Thank you so much for the invitation. I've been excited about our conversation all day.

Scott Anthony Barlow 03:32
When we got to chat briefly about this earlier, but here's what I'm curious to kick off this conversation with, that you and I haven't, we haven't talked about extensively. We've been able to just, you know, in our 15 minute time frames, yeah, each day, been able to understand a little bit. But how has your world changed? In the last, I don't know, 30 days, 45 days or so here? How has your world changed?

Dave Stachowiak 04:00
Well, in some ways, it hasn't changed very much. And in some ways, it has changed a tremendous amount. So I have worked from home for the last eight years. And I run a business that is almost entirely virtual. And so where I show up to work, the way I do my work, the kinds of business we're in, has not changed substantially or really much at all during that time frame. However, context has changed all around me. And a change has happened for a lot of other people. And of course, we have young children, our kids are home. And so that's a big change. Both good and challenging, as I'm sure we'll get into, in and of itself. But I'm thinking about the change that's happened in the last month, both that like a macro level and then a micro level. On a macro level, I am doing wonderfully, and our family is doing wonderfully. We're not in the restaurant industry. Nobody in our immediate family is in a high risk group, thankfully. I am gainfully employed, in fact, probably a bit more so than the normal. And so all of those are good things if I step back and look at like the big picture stuff as far as just thinking about my situation, to be selfish for a moment, I'm doing well and I'm very privileged in a lot of ways. That said, it doesn't mean that it hasn't come with stress. And if I think about not only today, but the going forward, there's, you know, I haven't slept well, I don't know if you and I've talked about this, I didn't sleep-

Scott Anthony Barlow 05:46
We haven't talked about it. That's interesting.

Dave Stachowiak 05:50
And better now, but now that we're a month into this, but probably the first week or two, I didn't sleep well. And part of that was it's always hard when you're dealing with stress, like how much of it is stress about yourself and your immediate family and how much of it is about the world. And for me, I think a lot of it was just like what's going on in the world, probably 60 to 70% of it. But I found it really hard to sleep the first couple of weeks as all this was going on. And so that's a stress and then kids being home and on one level kids being home is amazing, get to spend more time with our kids and do fun things that we wouldn't get to do in a normal situation. At the same time, both Bonnie and I work and so that's created all kinds of challenges now with like, well, how do we both work at a time that both of us are being asked to do more? And at the same time, be elementary school teachers for a while and attempt to a little bit step into the the skills that the amazing teachers at their school do every day. That's been really hard and it's very much been day by day when I'm often thinking weeks and months ahead on things and sometimes it's just having to adjust hourly.

Scott Anthony Barlow 07:03
Would you say that, that is the hardest part for you? What you mentioned last about and now all of a sudden you're having to literally adjust hourly when you have been accustomed too, I don't know if that's the right word, but much more used to thinking about and even adjusting your schedule on a much longer scale, much longer timeframe. What has been the hardest part for you?

Dave Stachowiak 07:28
I would say it is that. It is the... not having any margin or doing anything proactive right now, as far as business, as far as serving people, in a way I'd like to do a bit more. But because of that reality of, you know, schools being closed and all that happening and us all being home, there's that reality. The other part that is hard for me is and it's not really about me, but it's about carrying the weight of people around me a bit, is we have this amazing, wonderful global Academy community of leaders who work tirelessly with each other for a year to support each other and this crisis has tended to send people one of two directions depending on the stage of life they're in, depending on the kind of business or industry they're in. Either people have gone down the route of all of a sudden business has gotten crazy, work has gotten super busy. I'm being asked to do more than I've ever done before because of the nature of my work. Or they've gone the exact opposite route, which is, you know, I've been laying off people or I'm home without work or some version of that. And that is really hard to see, when we've worked together in some cases for a while to help people to create wonderful work for their businesses and create visions and have a lot of movement happening. And then all of a sudden, all that contextually change very quickly, is really hard. And I grieve for those real losses of some endings that have happened already.

Scott Anthony Barlow 09:14
I've really struggled with pinpointing the source of the extra stress. That's been a really challenge for me and for some reason, and this may not actually amount to anything useful but for some reason I continuously try to identify what is that extra source of the stress. And, you know, you mentioned having extra stress that comes along with this. And to some degree, I think that, you know, hearing you talk about your community, I have internalized some of the stress that comes along with so many members of our community, HTYC community going through these different types of changes too, because both me and my team have found ourselves in that camp that you described, where we're working more hours than we have in a long time, in many different ways, because we've had so many people turn to us and consequently, we're having a lot more conversations and we feel very obligated to support people through this type of time. Also, though, I think that's one of the ways for me personally, I've been internalizing a lot of that extra stress. And that's one of the ways that my world has changed. But I'm curious for you, you know, when you think about those pieces that have caused you extra stress in one way or another, how have you been able to work through them? What has worked for you, personally?

Dave Stachowiak 11:00
Well, I think staying busy has helped and keeping things moving has helped and thankfully, that hasn't been a problem and that there's no shortage of things to do between teaching and the work. My wife is a tenured professor at a university and oversees online learning for her University. So she is very popular right now on her campus and has no shortage of work and people asking for help. So that has helped both of us to just, you know, neither of us are sitting around thinking very much about, like, or and getting into the state of like not having stuff, you know, getting too overwhelmed by our thoughts. That said, what's there certainly have been the times I know for me that I've gotten into that funk. And I think most people have... that I've talked to have been through this last few weeks of like, just feeling really dark and blue for a day or two or three or more in some cases. And I've certainly been there in the last month, two or three times already where that lasts a day or two. And I'm sure it is all of the things going on in the world. And you know, which thing triggered it on that particular moment like which client mentioned something, or which person in our personal lives lost a job or, you know, it's sometimes it's hard to point to like it. It's some combination of all those on any given day. And some days like you can be, I can be really resilient with that I'm like, okay, you know, I know those things are going on. And I hear those stories and I can still move forward and other days, not so much. And the thing that's worked for me is to sleep. I mean, as weird as that sounds, coming down to just making sure I'm getting rest when I don't get rest, I don't do as well recovering from that. Because I don't think it's so much avoiding that, nor would I want to as a human being.

Scott Anthony Barlow 13:04
Yeah.

Dave Stachowiak 13:04
Because the world is going through some really tough stuff right now. And by the way, the world is always going through tough stuff. It's just really aparent right now. And it's more people and it happened really quickly. So even in the best of times, we all know people who are struggling, right? So, but because it's so apparent right now, it's hitting a lot of us and so the question for me is less about the, "how do I keep from feeling sad or blue or getting depressed a bit? And how do I move through it? And then come out of that." And for me it's sleep, and making sure I'm resting well. And getting outside and working out and eating well, and all the things that I try to do well, normally anyway, so I'm more conscious of that now than I have been, and our whole family is. And then the other thing is just moving. And I don't mean moving physically, I mean, moving, getting things done and trying things and encouraging others to take steps and even in the toughest situations of really helping myself and others to take the next step forward. And sometimes you can't see beyond the next step. And the step isn't even in the right direction. But I think most of the time, it's better to move than it is to stay stagnant because that's the place that I think fear and frustration and challenge really takes over.

Scott Anthony Barlow 14:39
We did an episode forever ago, like seven years ago. I think it was where when we had Richie Norton Ritchie's an author, he's written a couple books now. However, you know, one of the things that stuck out to me that he said is, "movement is where the magic happens." And I think that's very appropriate here, maybe even more so appropriate than it was seven years ago. And I think that you're right. I was trying to evaluate for myself to where it's helped because I think you raised such a great point about, do you want to, you didn't use the word avoid it necessarily, but do you want to just immediately move past it as opposed to experiencing it, and I always think about post traumatic growth. I don't know if you and I have ever had any conversation about post traumatic growth. I'm fascinated by it. We talked all the time about in our society about Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome. And that's people hear about that all the time. But traumatic events in our lives are the best opportunity for growth sometimes. And it's where what stimulates a lot and I've been thinking a lot about what are the opportunities for growth during these types of times. I don't know that I've arrived at the answer, but I'm curious, what are some of your thoughts about that? And how that lens to what you're describing about being able to work through it?

Dave Stachowiak 16:25
Yeah, I mean, it's such a difficult thing to think about being because, on one hand, none of us wanted this, no one asked for it. The people who have lost family members already and have lost jobs would never have wanted this to happen. So, there's that. And then there's the, okay, given that this is all happened. Now what? And so given that we've got this scenario is and I think the phrase that became popular in 2008, during the last financial crisis was, let no crisis go on wasted. So…

Scott Anthony Barlow 17:10
Forgot about that one.

Dave Stachowiak 17:11
Yeah. So given that this situation is what it is. What can we do to come out of it, and not only weather it but perhaps even have the opportunity to create a bit of a different reality going forward? And I do think that, that is something that I'm certainly encouraging the leaders in our community to be thinking about is, what's the kind of movement that you might do right now that you may not have been able to do before, but actually would move you in a really wonderful direction? So one example that is earlier today, I was talking with one of our academy members who has been an advocate in his organization, to get people to work from home and to allow for a more flexible work schedule. And as you know, in your work, Scott, the organizations that have a better framework for that, and give people more options tend to retain people more and especially these days, and he was running into tons of resistance within his organization that tends to be more traditional on that point. And now, a surprise, everyone's working from home. And so what would probably have taken him years to roll out literally happened in 72 hours. And so here's an opportunity for him to do something, not just, it's not even really for him, in fact. It's for his organization, for his people, for his team and his part of the organization to now do something that he already thought was going to be a good idea anyway, but it was gonna take a long time and a lot of politics to go through and literally overnight, to be able to move forward. And almost all of us have situations happening like that in our lives right now, where because of contextual changes around us because of organizations doing things differently. There are windows that have opened up and will open up in the coming weeks and months, but I don't think years, were something that would have taken a year or two and have to go through seven committees and the organizational politics that all of a sudden, if it's a good idea, and it's worth trying, you might be able to move on in days or weeks. And I think it's incumbent upon a lot of especially those of us who lead and influence in organizations to step back a bit in the midst of all this stuff going on, and to notice that and to do some thinking on, what could I do suggest, propose, maybe even just start moving on that normally I'd have to get all these approvals or normally I'd have to ask permission from 20 people? And I could just try out, because we're all in this period of things having unfroze for a while, there's a wonderful organizational change model by, oh it's a Lewin's force field analysis. And he talks about, you know, freezing and unfreezing, and a lot of things just got on frozen. And there's a ton of opportunity to move things around at this moment. And things are going to freeze again, at some point not too long from now, maybe it's weeks, maybe it's months. Depends on the organization, the situation, but this doesn't stay the way it is for long. And so if you were ever going to change and to try something new, now's the time, right? And not to say any of us should be reckless and try things that we don't think are really good. But to thoughtfully take some time to think, okay, if I was going to do something different as a leader in my career as a business owner to try something, here's a great opportunity to try it where I may not have had that opportunity before.

Scott Anthony Barlow 21:01
I think that's my favorite thing. That probably sounds really weird. My favorite thing about recessions. Yes, I have a favorite thing about recessions. I'm just realizing now as I say that out loud. But I think really, my favorite thing is that it accelerates change, it accelerates the rate at which innovation can happen, as well. And I think that, that is so cool. And the hard part is often it comes after a series of bad events, or events, like you said that we wouldn't wish upon anyone. However, after those happen, and since you can't control those events in the first place, I have a tendency to just the type of person I am focused on, okay, well, we've experienced that, can't do anything about that. Now, what? How do we make the best out of this? Let's get ready for lemonade. And I think it's so cool that it allows for this massively accelerated set of change, opportunities, innovation, insert your word of choice here. But actually, here's another example, you know, you were talking about, you know, the example where one of the people in your community had now rolled out in 72 hours, what would have taken many years for remote work?

Dave Stachowiak 22:25
Yeah.

Scott Anthony Barlow 22:25
And it made me think of a situation that we just had recently inside our career change boot camp community. And we had somebody who we've been helping in there and she has... she had co-shared a leadership role with someone else. And that person left just before this crisis happened, just before the pandemic, really hit. And talk about horrific timing and she was looking at the situation as almost any of us probably would have been embedded in it as, oh my goodness, now there is so much work to do. There's a huge amount of work to do. And I know it needs to be done. I want to make sure that my organization is getting it done. I want to make sure I'm taking care of the organization and my boss and the other people. I also don't want to be taken advantage of and, you know, that's a perfectly reasonable set of reactions and statements. And I thought so as she asked that question. However, I think the other side to it is what you're saying like that creates a ton of opportunity that wasn't there before. And I think, you know, even in that situation where it feels like oh my goodness, there's so much work to do. Being able to go and approach your boss and being able to say, "hey, I've got all of these different things on my plate, but I'm only one person, so half of them are gonna have to go." And here's the half that I recommend stay and get an opportunity to mold the role and what you're focused on right now or being able to take an opportunity to take on projects that are much more desirable, but also fit what the organization needs right now and essentially become that, I'm going to call it a hero, for lack of better words, within the organization and be an additional value to your boss or leader. I think that there's so much opportunity there and I love the way that you phrased it up, you know, let's say that "hey, this is, now things are possible that were possible before in the same way. So that's really interesting. What are some of the other possibilities that you've seen or experienced for either yourself or in the world right now? We haven't had this discussion. I'm super, super interested.

Dave Stachowiak 24:50
Yeah. Well, the other side of that too, what you just said, so the getting to do some things you haven't tried before. The other part of that is setting aside some things that you've been doing for a while, both professionally and personally, that word value added or you're realizing aren't value added, or maybe you didn't want to be doing anyway. And now here's an opportunity to make a change. We're all do... we're all being forced to do that right now. Right? Like, there's a whole lot of things we don't get to do. We don't get to go to sporting events. We don't get to go to conferences, we don't get to travel. And so we're all getting used to a world were all of a sudden by, you know, we're being basically forced to say, "hey, we can't do a whole lot of things that we would like to do." And we're doing that for a really good reason, right? We want to save people's lives, we want to help protect our brothers and sisters among us who are most vulnerable. So it's all good. It's all the right thing to do. And I hope that all of us are noticing some of those things that we say, "wow, I can't wait till that comes back." And I really get to engage again, with taking my kids to swimming, which is one of the things we're missing right now or getting to go to the park or doing all the things. And I'm also noticing that there's some things that dropped off, that I don't miss that much. And I think it's an opportunity for us to all reevaluate a bit too, and maybe to have some endings happen intentionally, both what we do, maybe some of the things we do for work, obviously asking for permission, if it's part of our work already or our expectation but maybe even some relationships, the kinds of things we spend our time doing, of really reframing a bit of that and looking at that very objectively and saying, "okay, you know, where are am I as an individual, we as a family, as an organization" spending time doing things that maybe don't make as much sense in the light of all this. I think one thing that's going to change a ton Scott, after this is you're going to have to make a bigger case in most organizations going forward for the expense and time of travel and in person events. And there's always going to be a place for in person events and conferences and travel and it will continue to be super important, but I think it's also going to be questioned more going forward than it is now. One, because the economic reality of everything, at least in the short term, but also because now that everyone's worked online virtually, and you know, people like that or don't like that, depending on where they're at, but more people are used to that now, you know, people are gonna rightfully ask, "well, do we need to do this meeting in person? Do we all need to fly to Denver to do this, you know, for four days? Or is this something we could do some virtual component of it?" That's going to change. And so I think there's a whole lot of places also to potentially look at where my I set things aside that I don't want to engage in anymore because I realized now that I couldn't do it for a while. Yeah, I'm not missing it that much. And, of course, there's some economic fallout that comes with all that too, which we could talk about at the macro level but on a personal level on a individual and career level, I think it's really worth us all spending some time thinking about that and what we may set aside.

Scott Anthony Barlow 28:05
I think that is exactly the opportunity. One of the best opportunities right here is not necessarily to simply just change and look for what is new but reassess, what is most important and drop off the things that aren't. Whether it's in work, whether it's personally and otherwise. And as you said, observe what has been missed, as well. Oh my goodness, I had a realization the other day, that now that I no longer drive back and forth to the coffee shop to do writing, I don't have a built in time to listen to audiobooks. And that I didn't realize how big of a deal that, that was for me, since there's no commute, there's no time to listen to audiobooks, which means that over a period of about two weeks, I became way less creative, because I wasn't getting new inputs that I was used to having coming into my life, which generated new thoughts, which generated new ways to think of things and generate a new learning and it was exciting and all the other wonderful things that came along with it. So it made me realize, oh, man I've got to find a new way to be able to bring this back and that might seem small, but I've observed quite a few things that are just slightly different based on my routines changing and based on availability of what was there before, and already set up and already systematic in some ways, just changing. So I think that's a great point. What else falls into that priorities category for you? I heard you say that, you know, being able to take the kids to school and being able to, like, take them someplace to school is something that is valuable. What else falls into that category for you, personally?

Dave Stachowiak 30:04
Yeah, I think it's a great time to experiment, both professionally and personally. For us, I mean, we're experimenting with what we do with our kids right now. And we're, I think, probably it's likely that all the summer camps and things we were planning for our kids for the summer and they've done last few summers, will not go this year. And so we're all ready. In fact, Bonnie and I were just talking the other night like, well, assuming there's no summer camps, and kids are with us home all summer and not having activities to do and maybe not even being able to go to the pool and things like that. What would we do? What would that look like? And that sounds that seems really hard. And it also seems like a really fun opportunity for some creativity. So for example, today at our house is penguin day, we, Bonnie just-

Scott Anthony Barlow 30:51
As it should be.

Dave Stachowiak 30:52
As it should be just about any day. Bonnie just decided last week, like, okay, this today is going to be penguin day at our house. And so we had learning activities for the kids set up of watching a National Geographic thing on penguins, and doing one of their school projects with a penguin twist to it. And we had, I took the kids out to the park earlier today and we played penguin tag, which I would not recommend for grownups but it was fun for them. And it was like just…

Scott Anthony Barlow 31:24
Hold on. Backup. Why wouldn't you recommend penguin tag for grownups?

Dave Stachowiak 31:27
So the way penguin tag because I know that inquiring minds want to know is you hold your wrists at your hips or your waist, and you're not allowed to move your hands and you got to tag with keeping your hands really close to your waist. And for kids, this is not hard because they are fast. For me, who is a middle aged guy, who's getting slower, this is not fun. Because you can reach out and tag your kids as much as you can when you're playing regular tag, but we had a blast. And so it was just thinking about like, what would we do differently, and I already can see missing when they go back to school. And as much as I want them to return to normalcy and for all kinds of reasons, both for them, for us, for our family, for society. It is way better for them to be at school, and be with their teachers and all the great social relationships and all the resources that they have there and I will miss that a bit when they eventually go back to school because we're having such a good time doing things we would normally never do. And so I think it's a chance to try something different and to just take a step. And even if you don't know what the step two or step three is, just to take a step to try something and just, you know, the cliche, get out of the box, you know, get out of the box a little bit, think outside the box is helpful and just to try something and just see what happens. And, in fact, the thing that I am going to loop back down to the professional side of it, the thing I find myself talking with people about more than anything else, Scott in our academy is trying to get people to do less, but to just take a very specific small step, because the tendency for a lot of people in our community at least is to try to be doing 17 things at once. And move on all these different professional development priorities and the trial different things as leaders, and the reality is most of us do that very poorly for trying to do all that at once. But if we get down to just doing one thing, and actually clear the bar on it, and make it something really small, but take a first step, almost always that illuminates a second or third step, and then you clear the bar on that, and you clear the bar on that. And so I find myself coaching, on taking small steps, but being really consistent about it. And that consistency often leads to the next thing. And I think now, because of this environment, taking new steps leads to things probably even faster on learning, not necessarily success, you know, but learning for sure, of just trying new things, and whether that's trying out how I interact differently with my kids in some way, or how I interact with a client, or what I might propose to my boss about are my roles and responsibilities changing a bit, or a new initiative that maybe it was in the back of my mind for the last seven months. But now the organization could really use it and I could just go for it. And since a lot of things are changing anyway, let's just try it out and see if we can get some traction on it. There's a ton of opportunity for all of us to do that right now, that I think in normal situations, we don't get as much privilege to do.

Scott Anthony Barlow 34:37
Dave, I think that's my favorite thing that I've heard, as far as advice, during this time. I've heard a lot of advice that on some level, I think is incomplete or I disagree with and I've heard a lot of people say, you just need to be content with getting done a lot less. And I think that sounds a little bit in my head. Like it makes me think of, you know, the advice like hey, you just need to find work that you're passionate about. It's bad advice, partially because it's incomplete. And I think the way that you phrased it up is much more complete and being able to focus on less. And I think the part that was implied that I heard in there are some of the most important things that about less overall, less of those things, and stop trying to do 17 different things, instead focus on just one, the one that is maybe going to be the most important, but then move consistently in small ways on that one thing, I think that is so much more effective, and no even not during times like this, where change can move and happen more rapidly. There's a lot of research to support that, that is what works and that's how you can move forward in many different ways, whatever that looks like, whether it's professionally or personally or something in between. So I really appreciate that advice. And thank you by the way for making the time and coming on. I know we get to chat briefly every single morning. We don't always get the chat long form like this, sometimes that is more of a rarity. So I really appreciate it. Especially in light of all the extra things that I know are on your plate.

Dave Stachowiak 36:33
Well, I appreciate it too. And what you just said, comes back to something you and I said earlier today, in fact, we were talking about Adam Grant's book 'Originals' which you're reading, right? And that book, relates directly to taking steps and his research on how entrepreneurs whether they're successful or not, because the assumption is this okay, if I just had more time, more budget, more margin, that I could do more, and then this time of having to be constrained a lot more, that that's going to be really hard and I need to get comfortable with doing less. And yes, that is true. We all are going to get to have to do less. We're all under more constraints and we are going to need to adapt to that. And it turns out, that's one of the best times and ways to be creative and when you look at Adam Grant's research on entrepreneurs, and who are the ones that succeed over time. It's not the people that take massive bets and put... go all in on something. It's the people who do small test things along the way. It's what Mark Barden found in his research of his book 'A Beautiful Constraint' that the people who tend to be the most creative and come up with new ideas tend to be the ones that have lots of constraints placed on them both time budget wise, and find a way in the midst of those constraints to actually drive them to be more creative. I saw it at Carnegie for years of teaching people public speaking skills. Carnegie was brilliant at this, he would get people with public speaking class. The first session of the class, we get people to just stand up and say their names. And then at the second session, we'd have them get up and say their name and say a sentence. And you do that consistently of adding on a little bit each time making small bets, making small changes along the way. And you can do a lot with that in the long term. So, the constraints are real, and they're painful. And they're depressing. And they are perhaps the very thing that will get us thinking creatively. And the research says, that will help us to think differently and push us in ways that we never would have been pushed before, if we didn't have those constraints.

Scott Anthony Barlow 38:54
This podcast, and this company Happen To Your Career was founded out of constraints. So proof positive right there. It wouldn't have happened if there weren't a ton of constraints in time and bandwidth and energy and everything else. And I totally appreciate you pointing that out. Because right now we have different constraints than many of us had, 45 days ago, 30 days ago, and I think it can be useful. I think it can be enabling in all the positive ways. Dave, I'd love to end there and just say thank you again. I really appreciate. Anytime we get to chat, but especially now.

Dave Stachowiak 39:45
I appreciate it a ton my friend and thank you so much for allowing me the time to think through this with you and let's all keep moving.

Scott Anthony Barlow 39:54
Hey, I really hope you enjoyed that episode with Dave. Dave become a great friend over the last, jeez, I guess it's been about five-ish years or so, and was really excited to have him back on the show. Also, I want to acknowledge something that we've seen a lot, especially as we've had all of the... all the interesting either crazy busy times or downtime, and all the weirdness that has come along with COVID-19, Coronavirus and all of the events that have transpired. And that's... we've had so many people reach out to us. Because they've realized that they either don't want to go back to the way it was before in one way or another or they have realized pieces that they have needed but are not getting in one way or another. And we keep getting that type of question along with a series of questions. After people have realized, you know what, I need and I want to do something different for my career, something that is more fulfilling, something that aligns with my values. And with an organization that really fits as well. And we've been getting those types of questions like, “how do I transfer my existing skills and experience to a new role that does fit my values, while still at the same salary level? Because I want to be much more intentional this time around.” A lot of... and this is probably you too, if you're listening to this, you're probably interested in doing good work that aligns with your values. And you're probably also making... interested in making sure that the work that you're doing is much more meaningful if you're going to spend time and effort into it. And chances are pretty high that you can get a job, that's not your problem. It is doing work that is consistent with the salary level you've become accustomed to, as well as being able to have it aligned with what you really want out of life. That's where we'd love to help. We've just opened up applications for our signature coaching program, which is our custom coaching program where we tailor each part of it specifically to the type of help and support and journey that you need, you need to go through. In order to make the type of career change that you really want to because as it turns out, it looks different for everyone. And that premium level of support is adjusted based on your situation, your current role or your goal, that you have. Here's what I want you to do. If that sounds like something you want to find out, if this type of support is right for your situation, then go ahead and I want you to just text: My Coach to 44222 text My Coach, that's (M.Y coach C.O.A.C.H) to 44222 just pause this and send that text. And then it'll ask you for your name and email address. And it'll send you a direct link to our application for our signature coaching program. And then from there, you can just tell us a little bit about your situation. And it'll allow you to schedule a call with our team. And we'll pair you up with the very best type of help that fits exactly what you need. And it's completely free. It's no obligation. And no matter what, you're going to get a ton of help out of the conversation in the first place. That's what people always say when they talk to us. And then if it's a great match, we'll be able to help but you're needing to take the first step first. So text, MYCOACH (M.Y C.O.A.C.H) to 44222. Or you can go to happentoyourcareer.com and click on coaching and to be able to apply there as well. Hey, we will see you right here on Happen To Your Career next time. We have so much more in store for you. Until then. I am out.