Looking For The Right Job

Finding the right job is hard - especially as a young professional. A lot of people I know opt for a steady, full-time role or go down the risky path of being an entrepreneur. I think that working at a startup is an overlooked opportunity. 

I’ll start off by making the assumption that people are motivated by creating wealth. Paul Graham (from Hackers and Painters) defines wealth as creating something that people want. This contrasts with money, which is a product that helps you transfer wealth from one place to another.

People who are most likely to generate wealth are the ones who are good at making things.  


What Should I Work Towards? 

Choosing a job is a critical decision. It’ll determine the people you surround yourself with for most of your time and shape a large part of your identity. 

As a result, most people optimize for social recognition, which is often built on salary, company brand and job title. Based on my experience, the idea of chasing social recognition can lead to sub-optimal outcomes in the long term. 

As a young professional, the best thing you can do for yourself is to optimize for the ability to create something that people want. 

The more you create → the more problems you solve, making yourself invaluable to any company that you’d be a part of. 


Today’s Job Market

While unemployment is statistically at an all-time low, I believe that the number of careers with predictable outcomes have reduced drastically. Today’s job market offers a range of options from working at a large corporation to starting your own company. If you look at the distribution of the workforce, it tends to be one or the other - people opt to work at large companies or start their own. 

I believe that there’s another option that is overlooked - especially for young professionals. This is the option of working at a startup. 

At a startup, you’ll be forced to make something that people want - simply because that’s the only way a startup can survive. Unlike larger companies, they cannot afford to have unproductive employees. 


Why Should You Work at Startup?

I’d like to think of a startup as a way to compress your whole working life into a few years. You have the opportunity to try different roles that you would be otherwise unqualified to do. Over a short period of time, you’ll be forced to try new things and learn at a rapid rate. This is true whether the company succeeds or fails. 

In my case, I went from being a strategy and finance person to someone who is moderately versed in account management, customer success, sales and operations in a matter of two years. 

So what’s the catch? You need to work hard. When you’re working at a startup, your productivity and performance is a function of the time you put in. Your value will be a function of the number of problems you solve. 

With that being said, you should put a lot of effort into creating a situation where you find the right opportunity. 


What Should You Look For In A Job?

While I’ll be explaining this in the context of startup jobs, this framework applies to any job that you take on. The two factors you should assess for are: 

Measurement

You need to look for a job where your performance can be measured. This means that the company should have a clear set of measurable goals in the short, medium and long term. Ideally, you’re only working toward one specific goal/metric. The more goals/metrics that you’re assigned, the easier it is to get distracted.  

A great exercise during the interview process is to set up a mutual 30/60/90 day plan to set expectations without having to start working first. 

Leverage 

A question you need to ask yourself is whether your work will create value that is multiples greater than the effort you put in. If your value/effort ratio is 1:1 (or less than that), it is hard to make the case that you’re doing something that people actually want. This is true even if the value of your work is diminished due to factors outside of your control. 

The likelihood of doing activities that create leverage is a lot higher at a startup, where you’re forced to build new processes and tools that add disproportionate value. 

A great litmus test to know whether you’ve found the right job is when there is the possibility of failure. If you are in a job that feels safe, you are not going to get rich, because if there is no danger there is almost certainly no leverage. 

I know all of this sounds great in theory. However, it’s tough to get these kind of jobs without building a personal monopoly. 


What is a Personal Monopoly? How Do I Build One? 

In order to be given the type of opportunities that I described above, it is critical to do some self-reflection and figure out what you want to be known for. 

To do this, I’d go through the exercise of re-framing what you do and layer on skills until you are the only person that can do what you do. While it is easy to be self-critical and compare yourself to others, I’m fairly certain that each of you possess a unique set of skills and experiences. Here are some factors to look for when trying to define your monopoly: 

1) Unusual - combining left and right brain (art + data as an example) 

2) Complementary - skills really well together 

3) Experiential - can't read about it in books

4) Specific - the more narrow, the better 

As you start to get a sense of what your personal monopoly could look like, I would create things that people would want. A common mistake that people make is the idea of waiting to create something that everyone (or a large group of people) want. I’d recommend that you start small and practice creating new things. With all of the tools and platforms available today, you don’t need to wait for a specific problem or opportunity to create something for others. 

As you become really good, you can start to think about sharing your work with a larger audience. This will likely become easier as you’ll have an existing group of people who already vouch for your work.  

Once you’ve gotten into the habit of creating things and showcasing your work, you’ll find that interesting opportunities will come your way. At this point, you can start to push for opportunities that have a measurable impact and build leverage as you go. 

Conclusion 

Looking for the right job is hard. It’s frustrating when you can’t get considered for opportunities that you know you’re capable of doing. This is where the idea of creating new things, having a measurable impact, building leverage and developing a personal monopoly can change the nature of the conversation. A lot of the ideas I talked about are truly within our control if we’re willing to put in the work.  


By

Suthen Siva

October 20, 2019