You Better Have a Fucking Plan!
Building the plane on the way down isn't a plan.
Note: I originally wrote this in October 2021 for a short-lived Substack newsletter. It didn't get very far because I was very far down a bottle when I started, and I wrote it for all the wrong reasons. Today, I want to revisit the newsletter's concepts because there was a kernel of something there. This first piece was the kickoff, and I spent no more than 30 minutes on it, and it feels like it.
The next five years are going to be a bloodbath in the industries I call home, thanks to the exponential advancements in large language models coupled with computer-generated voices. Staying ahead of those might be a fool's errand. I think about where the world is headed and where I want to be standing when it arrives. Do I want to fight to get work in an ever-contracting field, or is it time to start laying the groundwork for a total shift in how the bills get paid? That concept was at the heart of The Pivoteer, so it's worth dusting it off and re-publishing it here.
Tomorrow is the last day of preparation before I launch a new podcast that's completely different from anything I've worked on before. I'll share more about that very soon, but for now, please enjoy the very first issue of The Pivoteer.
Do I have your attention? That's good because we're discussing some critical stuff, so keep your eyes front and pencils at the ready.
The pandemic has affected everyone. It has changed the nature of work and life for the rest of our lives.
Quit culture is the new hotness, with newspapers like the New York Times running pieces on people unsatisfied with their jobs and lives who are ready to make a drastic change. This situation is dangerous because most people have no idea how to pivot their life or career successfully. They're relying on the old wives' tale of Silicon Valley: "Jump off the cliff and build the airplane on the way down."
Have you ever heard of survivorship bias?
According to Wikipedia, survivorship bias is the logical error of concentrating on the people or things that made it past some selection process and overlooking those that did not, typically because of their lack of visibility.
Believe it or not, most people don't know how to build an airplane, and most people also don't know how to pivot properly. They've read the success stories but never peeked over the cliff to see the piles of bodies of would-be aviators that crashed and burned.
Changing careers, whether due to tragedy, boredom, adventure-seeking, whatever, takes a plan if you want to pull it off and not end up homeless in the process. Or worse yet, for some, back on your parents' couch.
The Pivoteer covers, you guessed it, pivoting. I'm interested in life-long pivots and the skills required to make you anti-fragile and an asset to society. I want people to become more self-reliant and have the skills to roll with the punches and land on their feet, whether in life or work.
That all starts with a simple plan. Stay tuned for the next installment of the Pivoteer and remember the iconic words of Colonel John "Hannibal" Smith, "I love it when a plan comes together."
