It's Simple

At the risk of stating a wildly obvious fact, we humans don’t get along very well. Endless wars throughout recorded history are plenty of proof of this.

Just the same, our careers depend on exactly that: getting along, cooperating, working for mutual benefit.

Take a minute sometime and listen to someone’s complaint about their boss, their co-workers, their employees… you shouldn’t have any trouble finding someone to qualify.

The vast majority of the time, their complaint will boil down to some version of “So-and-so did X but I wanted / needed / had asked / had told / had paid / them to do Y. Damn it all anyway.”

What does this have to do with Career Sanity? Everything.

Nobody likes it this way.

Think about that: nobody likes it this way!

Nobody comes home from work delighted about the upcoming layoffs that will double their workload (or cost them their job).

Nobody raves about getting overcharged for shoddy work.

No employer hands out bonuses when an employee clobbers the company’s stock by posting something idiotic on YouTube.

What’s more – most people will jump at the chance to find an alternative that doesn’t involve their being disappointed, lied to, manipulated, or otherwise misused.

So … if you want to enter into an ongoing transaction with someone – such as an exchange of skills in return for compensation, otherwise known as a “job” or even a “career” –- be that alternative.

In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king. Be that one-eyed man.*

* Obviously a figure of speech, nothing to do with visual skills. Also gender-neutral, i.e. man here is short for human.