This transcript has been edited for clarity and checked against the available source transcript and recording. Filler, false starts, and obvious transcription errors have been corrected without changing the speaker’s meaning.
Intro#
James: Hello and welcome to episode 50 of Graduate Theory. What a fantastic milestone: 50 episodes. It’s been a fantastic journey so far, so thanks so much for tuning in.
Today’s episode is part two of this miniseries recapping all the episodes we’ve done. Just like the last episode, we’re looking at episodes 26 to 48. In each of these episodes, I asked the guest, “What advice would you give yourself if you were finishing university and starting your career today?” This episode is a compilation of responses from across those episodes.
Some of the answers here are incredible, and it’s really cool to compile them in such a nice way. I hope you enjoy this one. If you want to see more and get involved further, subscribe to the Graduate Theory newsletter via the first link in the description. You’ll get an email update whenever something happens. In fact, there have been some interesting developments in the last few days, so I encourage you to subscribe to the email list to hear more about that.
Without further ado, let’s get started.
26 - Abhi Maran#
James: If you had to wind back the clock to when you were just finishing uni and starting in the world of work, what do you know now that you wish you knew at that stage?
Abhi: I think I’d probably experiment a lot more with my career. What I should have done back then was talk to a lot of people in the ecosystem and figure out ways to get involved. Even if it didn’t seem like I’d be able to get involved from the outside, I should have been a bit more proactive.
I was daunted by how experienced everyone seemed and wondered who would talk to me. But they probably would have been kind enough to do so, and I should have tried.
I think there are a lot more opportunities for experimentation, and I say this from a privileged point of view as well. Some uni students are very privileged because they still live at home. They don’t have to pay rent or pay for food.
Those students can take riskier options in their careers. They can work at different startups for two- or three-month periods and intern at different places without worrying about securing a graduate job. But other people aren’t as fortunate or privileged.
For them, it’s important to secure a graduate job initially and then use it to leverage other opportunities. I think this is becoming more accepted now because companies are desperate for good talent.
You’re able to negotiate your start date with them. Push your graduate start date back six months or a year. In that time, experiment with working for a startup or doing something you’ve always wanted to do. If that’s travelling all over the world, go and do that. If that’s starting your own business, go and do that. You’ve got some security in that graduate job, and you can always bring the start date forward. I’m fairly certain that, if you just talk to people, they’re willing to help you as much as possible.
I should probably have talked to people and experimented much earlier in my career.
27 - Kerry Callenbach#
James: One question I ask every guest is: if you had to restart and go back to when you were first starting out, what would you do differently or tell yourself? Given your experience with so many graduates, you can take this in a different direction if you’d like.
Kerry: I know this because I’ve changed careers myself multiple times. It can feel really overwhelming when you start something. Our education system is designed to go: primary school, high school, university, job. If you don’t follow that pathway, you think, “I must have done something wrong,” or, “I haven’t succeeded to the point that I should have.”
I experienced that myself. I finished my sport, went into nursing and realised I didn’t want to do nursing. What should I do? You can have a bit of an identity crisis around that.
My advice would be: it is okay not to know what you want to do. It is totally okay. Your life is not over; your life is just beginning. You’re simply at a fork in the road where you need to choose. Be okay if you don’t know.
Also, if you go into a role or company and it doesn’t feel right—if you’re not being your best self—don’t stay. If you’re giving eight, nine or sometimes 10 hours of your life to a company, you want to enjoy being there. You want to say, “I’m really excited to get up for work today. I’m excited to spend time with my colleagues.”
If you don’t feel like that, take a moment to pause and ask, “Why not? Where am I not feeling fulfilled? Is there something about the role? Is there something about the way their culture works?” If you don’t like it, don’t stay. It’s too many hours of your life to spend somewhere you’re not getting fulfilment.
29 - Lacey Filipich#
James: I’ve got one more question for you today, Lacey. Obviously, Graduate Theory is a career-focused podcast. If you had to restart your career and wind back to when you first started working, is there anything you would approach differently in your career progression or finances, knowing what you know now?
Lacey: There’s one small financial thing I didn’t understand as a graduate that now makes me think, “Shoot, I should have done something about that.”
When I was working for Western Mining, BHP took us over. That was in my second year as a graduate. We had been given options with Western Mining, and I didn’t understand what options meant, so I didn’t exercise them. Now that I understand options, I think, “Ah, that’s $8,000 I could have had.”
When something financial happens at work—perhaps they have a share plan or talk about salary sacrificing or superannuation matching—take the time to get support if you don’t understand it so you can make a good decision. If you get an offer from work, it’s important to understand whether it’s right for you and take the opportunities you can. Share and options plans are often designed to keep you with the company, but they’re a leg-up. They are an advantage. If you sign without understanding them or ignore them because they’re too hard, you can give up a lot. My advice is to take the time to learn.
The other thing I would encourage people to do is something I hadn’t thought about at the time. You can tell from our discussion that I’m quite forthright and will fight for what’s right for me.
In my second year as a graduate, I was one of seven graduates, two of whom were female. The five men and we two women were at a site with 10 women out of 300 employees in Kalgoorlie, Western Australia. That was the reality of going into mining in a remote location back then.
It’s very different now. The next site I went to was 20 per cent female, compared with 10 women out of 300 employees. The first situation wasn’t normal, but when you’re the only woman on a site, or one of a few, you often get the women’s jobs.
In this case, during the 18 months I’d been there, my general manager had lost five executive assistants. That’s not normal. Clearly, it was a difficult role, but they couldn’t find someone and really needed someone. They asked me to fill in, and I had a massive tantrum. I wasn’t throwing my fists around, but I went into my boss’s office and said, “You’re asking me to do this because I’m a woman, and I’m not happy about that. There are five other graduates who are male. Any of them could do that role. Why did you pick me?”
I had a real bee in my bonnet about this. We always give women the job of taking notes, and they always have to get the frigging tea and all that stuff. It was a real issue I’d heard so much about, and I was very sensitive to it.
I overreacted, but it was a fair call. My boss said, “That’s a fair thing for you to say because this does happen. But I promise you, Lacey, that’s not why you were chosen. Can you take my word for it that you’re going to learn something really important and that you want to take this role?”
I thought, “Okay, fine.” I really liked the boss; JP was fantastic. I said, “All right, fine, I’ll do it. But I’m not happy that you’ve picked me because I’m a girl.” He said, “I’m not picking you because you’re a girl. Stop it.” I said, “Okay, fine.”
It turned out that BHP was looking to buy Western Mining. I got to be part of the war room set up for the merger and acquisition. I was in discussions with the executive team and heard how they’d pitch the company and persuade another company to buy them. I learnt about M&A.
Learning that at 22 is unusual for a graduate engineer who has just come off the furnace in a scruffy, dirt-covered outfit. I was in these meetings because I could make graphs and type. They needed that. Hearing those conversations, understanding how the war room was set up and learning about the process were some of the most invaluable experiences I got in that graduate program. You couldn’t have planned it.
My boss had noted that I wanted to be a CEO because I’d told him. He had asked, “Where do you want to go eventually?” and I said, “I’d like to be a CEO eventually, so I want to do management stuff.” He put me in the role so I could get this amazing experience, because I was the graduate who’d said she was interested in it.
He was doing the right thing by me. The fact that I was female was neither here nor there. I’m lucky that, when I didn’t listen to him, he didn’t say, “Fine, I’ll give it to someone else,” just to spite me. I’m very lucky that he understood my response. That’s the difference between having a good boss and a bad boss.
What did I learn from that? Sometimes you’ll think something happened for a reason when it didn’t. I had a bee in my bonnet. I looked at everything and thought, “They’re asking me to do that because I’m a girl. I’m refusing on principle because I’m a feminist, and thou shalt not make me.” That’s not always the case; it’s just your frame of reference. You need to be willing to listen when people tell you you’re wrong. Sometimes you’ll be right, and sometimes you won’t. I think that’s the most important thing.
The second thing I learnt from this experience, which has carried me through my whole career, is to pick your boss wisely. No one will have a bigger impact on how happy you are at work than your boss. The end. I reckon 80 per cent of your satisfaction at work comes from whether you have a good boss or a not-so-good boss.
You have to have had not-so-good bosses to understand what a good boss is, I think. I’ve had only a couple of bad ones in my time. I’ve been very lucky and had fantastic bosses, but I became very choosy early on about who I’d work for.
When I was younger, there were times when I worked for—I’m going to be blunt—a bad boss. He was shocking and shouldn’t have been allowed to manage people. Everything was cookie-cutter, with no consideration of anyone’s personal views, circumstances or preferences. It was just, “No, this is how we do it. You will do it this way,” or, “We never give people that high mark. Everybody gets an average.” He shouldn’t have been allowed to manage people.
Recognise that that’s not necessarily you; it’s not your fault. When you’re new in the workplace, you don’t understand whether you’re not meeting expectations or have just been lumped with a bad boss. Sometimes it’s a little of both, so you have to be honest with yourself. But if you have a bad boss, accept that they’re not right for you. Maybe they’re good for other people, but they’re not right for you, so become choosy.
That’s something I learnt from my experience in my youth: I’ve got to be really picky about who I work for. Don’t work for arseholes. The end.
30 - Yaniv Bernstein#
James: If you could rewind the clock to when you were first starting work, knowing what you know now, is there any advice you’d give yourself or anything you’d do differently?
Yaniv: I think I’d back myself more and be more entrepreneurial. I suspect there’s a generational element to this. A couple of generations back, there was a lifetime-employment model. My generation had much more mobility in people’s careers, but they still tended to follow a path of full-time jobs from one to another. Now I’m seeing the kinds of communities you’re serving, where people are really trying to be the architects of their own careers.
When I say entrepreneurialism, some of the time that means starting your own business. It might mean starting a side hustle or podcast, or building a personal brand. But it also means taking more active control of your career and not being as passive as saying, “I’ve got my job now. I need to work towards my next promotion,” or whatnot. It’s about being the architect of your own career and understanding, of course, that the future is very difficult to predict, but having a set of goals and principles you proactively set and then trying to design your career around them.
I’m seeing much more of that with the current generation of graduates and early-career people. I’m in awe of that and a bit envious. I think, “If I’d been more intentional in designing my career, where could I have got to? Could I have got to where I am earlier?” That’s the advice I’d give myself: be intentional in planning a career.
The tools available these days are incredible. They range from things like this podcast and communities like Earlywork to the vast number of resources online, the ability to start side hustles fairly easily and the availability of capital for early-stage startups. There’s a lot around now that didn’t used to exist. If I were starting now, I’d hope to make more use of it and be intentional and mindful in designing my career.
31 - Gene Rice#
James: If you could rewind the clock and go back to when you’d just finished university and were going out into the world, knowing what you know now and all the advice you’ve written, what would you do differently? What advice would you give yourself in that situation?
Gene: It’s funny, James. I don’t know whether I’ve shared this with you, but my career was very different. I started by owning rock-and-roll clubs in New York. I owned two clubs that booked only original music and had bands such as the Ramones, the Stray Cats, Joan Jett, Bo Diddley and Richie Havens.
I left that business because the first club was extremely successful, the second was a failure, and my wife would marry me only if I got out of that business. I then went into corporate America and worked for a division of Alcatel, a French company and an international Fortune 100 firm.
In seven years, I was promoted five times. I went from sales representative to sales manager, general manager and district manager. My last job was heading all East Coast operations, with over a thousand people reporting to me. I left that job, even though I was making a heck of a lot of money, for one reason.
I was never home at night. I travelled a great deal, we had a young family and I wanted some work–life balance. I went into executive search because I’d used search firms myself. I knew I could bring some value to it, but I never knew what I would find. I did it because I could be home at night.
It became extremely successful very quickly. What I would do differently relates to the purpose I found in executive search. Even when my firm became one of the largest retained search firms in the world, I never stopped leading searches because I found purpose in talking to executives and clients and putting a good match together.
Half the people I placed in C-level jobs had to pick up their families and move from one city to another for the role. I felt that, if I was going to move this person’s family, I had to make sure it was a good match.
I found purpose in that. I had passion and was excited. I woke up in the morning and couldn’t wait to go to work. If I could go back, I think I would try to identify that passion and purpose early on and be a little more strategic in looking for it.
I was very lucky and fortunate; many other people are not. The other thing is that every financial reward I receive from this book will be donated directly to the charity my wife and I started, the Plant a Seed Inspire a Dream Foundation, to help more children pursue their passions.
I’m a big believer in pursuing your passions and finding purpose in your life. If you can find that and make a career by working out how to pursue those things, you’ll be healthier, happier and smile more. That’s the message I want to leave your audience with.
34 - Robby Wade#
James: If you were looking at the Robby who’s just finished university and is about to go out into the world and tackle his job, what advice would you give him, knowing what you know now and all the experiences you’ve had?
Robby Wade: Easy: read and run every day. If you read books every day and run every day, I guarantee your life will change forever. If you just do those two things, even if you start with a kilometre and a page, those two things are unique in their capacity.
I’ll be brief. Reading gives you mentors, knowledge and understanding; it levels up your education. Running gets you outside, which is important for your circadian rhythm and mental wellbeing.
When you run through space and your eyes move, it relaxes you and makes you calm. Cardiovascular exercise can promote neurogenesis in your hippocampus, giving you a “fluffy” hippocampus and improving your memory.
If you’re running every day, your memory is going to be better. If your memory is better, you’re going to be learning more. If you’re learning more, you’re very likely going to be fit and educated. It’s pretty hard for your life to go south if you just focus on those two things.
Everyone can give you all these weird anecdotes, statements and those kinds of things, but practically, try to read and run at least once a day. I think your life would transform from there. You’ll learn what you need to do next just by doing those two things.
35 - Cheran Ketheesuran#
James: If you could go back to when you were first starting university and beginning this journey of discovering the different opportunities awaiting you, what advice would you give to someone who’s now just starting their journey?
Cheran: I’ve always had three things—I have to keep it very structured as a future consultant.
The first one would be: do things your own way. I’ve mentioned the phrase “hedonic treadmill” a few times now, but it’s very easy—and I know I impose this on others—to see other people’s LinkedIn profiles and say, “By doing this, they got here. By doing that, they got there.” Be conscious that there are a million ways to get where you want to be. Be driven enough to pursue goals. If you’re pursuing roles, titles or whatever it is, that’s fine, but don’t be so driven that you forget to stop and smell the roses on the way.
Don’t forget the reasons you’ve taken that journey. I’m not ending up in banking, but I’m still glad I spent one and a half years in banking because it taught me a whole set of skills. If I were so focused on the outcome, I’d think that time was a waste, which it certainly wasn’t. Do things your way.
Second: nobody cares. That sounds rather flippant. What I mean is that genuinely, nobody cares about so many of the failures we have on a daily basis. I remember seeing this visualisation once. If you imagine two concentric circles—one circle with a small circle in the middle—that small circle is how much other people think about you, and all the space around it is how much you think about other people thinking about you.
That’s just the reality. Literally nobody cares. Everyone has their own issues and problems to sort through. It’s very liberating once you realise that because, all of a sudden, you’re focused on your own happiness and your personal pursuit of your goals. That’s all you need in life. Life is already tough enough without worrying about what other people think, the impact of not getting X or not being at a certain stage in life. It’s especially easy to fall into that mental trap when you surround yourself with students and cohorts from high-achieving academic backgrounds, as at the universities you and I have attended.
The last thing I would say is that life will generally be okay. This links back to “nobody cares”. I’ve said this a lot. It’s graduate season at the moment. A lot of students in the years below, including some students I tutor at university, have been really stressed and worried about applications.
Remember that everybody peaks at a certain time, and it won’t be 22 for everybody. It would be rather sad if you peaked at 22. The vast majority of your listeners and the people in this community have lived in a time better than any before it.
Second, generally, if you work hard enough and don’t leave everything in your life to luck, you’ll be okay. You’ll get where you want to go eventually. There’s no rush to reach certain goals. Just because the vast majority of people seem to reach goals within a certain period doesn’t mean you have to do the same. Countless people—Reid Hoffman is a prime example—reached their peak successes and their first successes in their forties and fifties.
Those would be my three pieces of advice: do things your own way, nobody cares and it’ll all be okay, James. It’ll all be okay.
36 - Max Marchione#
James: You’re currently at university, but let’s rewind to when you’d just left school and were starting university. Knowing what you know now, and considering everything you’ve done and experienced, what advice would you give your younger self?
Max: Be more courageous, take more risks, break the rules and treat university as internships. In other words, use that time to do internships. Then be even more courageous. That’s the advice I’d give myself.
James: The idea of courage is interesting. I can certainly become better at applying it, as I think many of us can.
Max: I still think it’s a weakness of mine. I don’t take enough risks and could be more courageous. It’s iterative: the more you put yourself out there and do courageous things, the more you build a thick skin. Eventually, it no longer feels courageous; it simply feels normal.
That’s another reason I love Next Chapter. Being around the people there makes things that once seemed courageous feel normal. They continue to raise the bar for what’s normal.
To return to independent thought, our innate state as humans is to copy others. If you put two babies in a room with a thousand toys, they’ll fight over one toy. Given that information, I want to be around people or in a community where copying others leads me to a very good place.
I think that’s true of courage as well. If you’re around people who raise the bar on ambition, courage and proactivity, even starting a podcast—as you have—becomes normal. About a third of the community have their own podcasts. Starting one is courageous: it’s a bold move that puts you out into the world.
As a final piece of advice, be deliberate about finding people who lift you up. Join communities or collectives that create a culture in which exceptional is normal.
38 - Juliana Owen#
James: A lot of the audience are graduates or early-career people looking to start their careers in the right manner. Thinking about your journey, if you could wind back the clock to when you first graduated from uni and went out into the world of work, knowing what you know now and all the things you teach, what advice would you give yourself?
Juliana: Going back to my first point, look for someone who will guide you and give you the full picture, because it’s so much easier when you know where you’re going. I say this because I’ve gone through that process myself here in Australia. I tried a couple of times to get into the market with the knowledge I had back in the day. I was 23 or 24 years old, and I wasn’t getting anywhere.
Once I hired someone, I said, “Look, this is where I come from. This is the experience I have so far. This is where I want to go, and this is what I would like to achieve. How can I prepare to face the challenge and actually get there?”
“Okay, we’re going to have to work on your CV, cover letter and LinkedIn profile. We’re going to have to work on a mock interview. What’s your interview style?” The interview is one of the crucial points here. The majority of people think, “Do you have a questionnaire that I can look at, or do you have a video on YouTube?”
Not really, because the worst thing you can do in an interview process is memorise questions and answers. When you’re in an interview, you’ll know more or less what they’re going to ask you. More than that, you need to build your thought process. You need to learn how to build it because, if the interviewer asks you something outside your preparation, you’re going to go blank. You’ll just answer whatever comes to mind.
After all the excitement dies down, you’ll think, “I shouldn’t have answered that. I didn’t prepare for that. The question I memorised wasn’t asked.” It isn’t about memorising; it’s about learning how to create credibility through your thought process. How do you build that thought process? How do you tell your story? That also comes through mentorship.
If you know what you’re doing, good on you. Get yourself ready, go for it and all the best of luck. If you don’t know, or if you’re in doubt, search for a professional—someone who will clear the road for you so you can drive through and get to your final destination.
39 - Elizabeth Knight#
James: Let’s say someone has finished high school and is starting their journey in the big wide world. Reflecting on your own journey, what advice would you give someone going through that right now?
Elizabeth: The first thing that comes to mind is: be emotional, which is kind of strange. When I was younger, I thought it was bad to be passionate in a way. Young people get this bad rap for being too angry and fired up—or the opposite, not caring enough.
It’s important not to worry about perfection when you’re young because it’s impossible to achieve. Just feel things, act somewhat impulsively and appreciate the good and bad that come with being a young person. You have to go through all of that.
It’s all a really positive thing. That would be my first piece of advice. Secondly, be bold. Again, how far are you willing to go alone? Absolutely don’t let anybody else define the path in front of you if you don’t want them to. You might have a family or parents who want a particular thing for you and think it’s best for you.
You might agree with some of those things, and that’s totally fine. The key is being able to ask yourself, “Why am I doing this? What’s really driving this goal or step for me? Am I going to university because I think I have to, or because it’s actually the most purposeful step for me?”
Ask yourself why and really think about that when you’re making choices. Do your best to make those decisions in alignment with who you are, not the rest of the world around you. Honestly, at the end of the day, who cares what they think? You have to live with it; they don’t.
That would be my advice.
40 - Elaha Gurgani#
James: Think back to when you were finishing uni, perhaps in your last year, about to go out into the world and apply for jobs. Knowing what you know now and everything you’ve done, what advice would you give yourself at that stage?
Elaha: I would say: be bold, take risks and don’t be afraid of unknown paths. Growing up, society tells us to take a safe, linear path. It lays out a path where, if you do X and Y, you’ll get Z, and that’s how you’ll be successful.
For a long time, I chased paths that had been laid out for me, such as management consulting and other roles, because I was afraid of taking risks and following unknown paths. If you take an unknown path, such as a startup or entrepreneurship, you don’t know what lies ahead in five or 10 years. It’s unknown and very risky.
Looking back at my younger self as a graduate or university student, I would say: take risks and don’t be afraid of the unknown. Once you explore unknown paths that aren’t laid out for you, but that you enjoy and are curious about, you’ll meet the most interesting people. You’ll be challenged and grow so much. The things you’ve always wanted—the people, the tribe, the passion, the things you’ve always craved—will come to you through those unknown paths. That’s where the magic lies. That’s where the growth lies. That’s what I would tell my younger self.
41 - Gabriel Guedes#
James: If you could go back to Gigi in his final year at uni, when he was about to go out into the world, what advice would you give him now that you’ve had all these experiences?
Gabriel: It’s hard to say. If that were a serious proposition—if I could go back in time and tell young Gigi something—I would probably pass on the opportunity. You run the risk of saying something that gets misinterpreted over the 10 or 15 years since I was at university.
Perhaps you end up chasing that thing because you think, “My future self came back just to tell me this one thing, so it must be extremely important.” You might really misinterpret whatever the advice is. I could say, “Everything’s going to be all right. Don’t worry,” and perhaps young Gigi would take that too literally, do nothing with his life and change its course. Or I could say, “Work harder,” and send him off on the wrong tangent. I would probably pass on the opportunity.
James: Fair enough. I guess that reflects how well things are going for you now and how much you’re enjoying where your life is. You wouldn’t want to mess that up accidentally. What advice would you give people generally—perhaps Australian university students nearing graduation and trying to work out what they want to do with their lives?
Gabriel: I would say that your life isn’t going to be decided then. At that stage, many people think, “I’m making these big life decisions now.” But in the grand scheme of things, whatever you’re doing is probably a commitment of a couple of years, if that. There’s so much more to your life and career. Don’t overthink these decisions too much, and remember that you can always correct course later if you aren’t enjoying what you’re doing.
43 - Caleb Maru#
James: If you were graduating—or perhaps quitting university early—again now, what advice would you give someone at that stage in their life?
Caleb: The main thing is to take it easy. You have so much time ahead of you. Your twenties are made for screwing up. You’re supposed to screw up as many times as you want in your twenties, and it’s cool.
There’s quite a lot of safety here. If everything goes wrong, you can probably get a job somewhere, or you might have a support network to help you out. Don’t worry too much if things don’t go well in your twenties. It’s meant to be kind of shit, and also really fun.
I’m definitely experiencing that now, where I think, “Why don’t I have my shit together in some aspects of my life?” Then I tell myself, “It’s cool. It’s cool.”
Have as much fun as you can, do things you enjoy and say yes to as many things as you can that are helpful for you.
44 - Lisa Leong#
James: If someone were graduating from university and heading into the world, what advice would you give them, knowing what you know now and what you’ve been through?
Lisa: Never listen to someone who gives you advice without asking questions first. That’s my advice. Isn’t that a head spin?
The other piece is: don’t put too much pressure on yourself. I think you find the right path, whatever road you take at a fork. There is a lot of pressure to make the right decision, but it all comes out in the wash at the end of the day.
If you make a misstep and accept a position you absolutely hate, tick: well done. You’ve learnt what you don’t want next time. Take the pressure off; you’re okay. If every day is lab day, you’ll be fine.
45 - Brendan Humphreys#
James: What advice would you give a recent graduate—especially a young engineer—who wants to become a great engineer?
Brendan: Join a mature engineering organisation where you can learn from exceptional people. Seek teams with strong engineering cultures and formal or informal mentors who can teach you the craft of software engineering.
We deliberately created that culture at Canva, and large companies such as Google, Amazon, Microsoft and Apple also have it. Joining a smaller organisation isn’t necessarily wrong, but graduates can quickly become the most knowledgeable and experienced person in the room, which is risky. It can work; it’s simply a risk. I believe it’s better to begin somewhere with mentors who show you what excellence looks like and help you reach it.
46 - Mykel Dixon#
James: I’ve got one last question for you, Mykel. Graduate Theory is for young people around my age who are early in their careers or perhaps at university. What advice would you give people at this stage who want to grow their careers and, ideally, remain among the two per cent who are still creative geniuses when they’re older?
Mykel: You can’t let the world get to you. I hope it’s changing. I really do. I think it is, but the next 10 years might still be a bit bumpy. We’re trying to figure it out. You’re going to encounter people who are mean. You’ll have people who talk about you behind your back. You’ll have people who actively try to withhold information from you, stunt your career or do all these kinds of things. Don’t let them stop you.
You’ve got to trust yourself and love yourself. You’ve got to accept that you came here for a reason, and it’s not better, smaller, grander or lesser than anyone else’s. If you’re here, you’re meant to be here. You have a voice and something you’re supposed to contribute to this planet. That could be your neighbours or your family. It could be your colleagues or customers. You could be another Steve Jobs, or another Barry who lives in the suburbs and is just a radical dude who says g’day to the postie every day. It doesn’t matter.
You’re here for a reason, and you cannot let the world diminish you and make you feel less than the miracle you are. This might sound a little like Tony Robbins motivational speaking, but we need that right now. We’ve been told we’re not enough. We’ve been told we aren’t going to make it, that we aren’t this or aren’t as good as them. You open Instagram and everyone’s better than you, skinnier than you and has more money than you. It’s horrible.
It’s all because those people are worried, terrified and insecure. My advice would be to find people you can trust and rely on, and hold this little unit of safety and sacredness where you value each other. Support one another and remind each other, “Hey, we’re awesome.”
The next world—the world you’ll all be building—is going to be better than the one I inherited. The world I inherited was better than the one my parents inherited. We’re getting better. We’re on this journey, but it can knock you around, man. It can knock you around, whether people mean to or not.
Everyone listening to this right now, including you, James, is extraordinary. You’ve got so many beautiful, astonishing things to give to this world. We don’t even know what they are yet. That’s the magic of it. Who knows what James is going to do in five, 10 or 20 years? But if you start to believe a little story in your head that maybe James doesn’t have something special to give, then you’re not going to launch that next project, and we don’t get the benefit of it.
The same is true of something I try to tell as many people as possible when I’m doing a keynote, a session or a leadership program. I really encourage you to share generously because I can talk at you for two hours, three weeks or nine months. I hope you get some value from that. Let’s hope there’s a little insight in there, but the real value will come from you all sharing your story, experience and perspective—how you see and perceive the world.
You have no idea whether the question you ask, the story you share or the insight that came to you could be the thing that unlocks something for someone else. The whole reason they came to this event, keynote or program might have been to hear you say that thing, not me. It was you.
If you don’t lean in and share because you think, “My question’s not good enough,” or, “I’m not as talented as the others,” then you’re robbing that person of what they need. You’re stopping them from getting the magic they need to set their life on fire. We’re all connected, and it’s so insidious and terrifying when we start to believe we’re not enough or don’t have something amazing to contribute.
That amazing contribution could literally be putting your hand up and saying, “I’m not sure I understand what’s going on.” Fantastic. There are probably 17 other people thinking that but too afraid to ask. They’ll say, “Oh God, thanks so much for asking that. That was awesome.”
That’s what we want: a world like that, where we’re generous, we’re in it together, and we’re all being ourselves and sharing ourselves as much as possible. That kind of place, man, is the world I want to live in, and it’s coming. Hang in there, team. I’m with you. We’re in this together.
47 - Dave Lourdes#
James: Graduate Theory is aimed at uni students and early-career professionals. Looking back at who you were in the early years of your career, is there any advice you would give the Dave Lourdes who was just starting out, or young people starting a career today?
Dave: Have you got time for another podcast? My whole career and life have been—I was going to say a movie—a series of mistakes. I’ll tell you some of the ones I look back on and wish I’d changed. I’m only grappling because I have so many.
One was thinking I shouldn’t speak up or participate because I was too young, didn’t know enough or it wasn’t my area of expertise. One of the most important things I wish I’d done earlier and more often was scale gratitude and empathy. I don’t think you can ever say thank you enough. Caring about people matters too.
I was overly goal-oriented when I started. I was driven by ego to work on the big projects, feel good about myself and work ridiculous hours. That was working hard, not smart. I wish I’d had more empathy, understood that everyone is different, been more grateful and recognised my unhealthy ego.
Sometimes I wouldn’t ask questions because I thought, “Will that make me look stupid?” If we all did that, no one would ask any questions. I think it’s important to ask questions early on.
A little one is to attend work events. Not attending work events is a CLM—a career-limiting move. You’re part of the team, and it’s no different from social events. Sometimes you can’t be bothered, you’re tired or whatever it may be, but I think it’s important to make the time.
I would have focused earlier and faster on building genuine relationships. Now I’m manic about it. I love building relationships with people; I’m obsessed with it. I did that in my career as well, but I would have started earlier.
I’m a big believer that, if you don’t schedule something, it won’t happen. For example, if you say, “I’m going to read more,” it won’t happen unless you do it at a certain time. Or someone says, “I’m going to exercise.” My exercise time Monday to Friday is 4:30 am, and on Saturdays it’s 6:30 am. I sleep in a little bit, and on Sunday I have a rest. Schedule things.
One of the most powerful things you can say, which I wouldn’t say back then and wish I’d started saying earlier, is, “I don’t know,” instead of pretending or thinking you know and then having to go away and research it. I think that’s important.
Expect to get stuck. Just expect that it’s going to happen. It happens to all of us; it happens to us now. I would have asked for help earlier and faster. That’s something I definitely didn’t do.
Also, don’t take a local issue and globalise it. What I mean is that being stuck is temporary. It’s a stain, not a tattoo. By the way, I wish I knew all this back then.
Another thing I learnt came from having a personal trainer. I don’t know if you’ve ever had one. That’s an industry you want to get into, because when you think you’re dead, a personal trainer says, “Five more.” You hate them and swear under your breath—at least I do—and then you give them money and come back next week.
The trainer mindset is always, “Come on, just one more. Just one more.” When I first got a personal trainer—I remember his name was Michael—that mindset really stuck with me. Whenever I think I’ve reached my limit, I tell myself, “Just one more. Just one more.” That’s helped me a lot.
If I could pick only one thing, James, it would be: self-awareness is king. I’ve already talked about emotional intelligence, and within that they talk about four or five different markers of emotional intelligence. For me, self-awareness is the beast. If you can master that, you’ll master your life: knowing what excites you, what deflates you, what throws you off track, what gets you back on track, and how you respond when you’re confronted and your confidence goes down.
If I could pick only one, self-awareness is what I wish I’d learnt earlier. I wish I’d got a coach earlier too. You’d better stop me, or I’ll bring up more wishes.
Conclusion#
James: Thanks so much for listening to this episode of Graduate Theory. As I said at the start, if you want to get involved further, subscribe to the Graduate Theory newsletter, where you’ll get an email from me every week with a new episode. Thanks again for sticking all the way through, and we’ll see you again next week.