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Self Eliminating Jobs - A Survival Guide
There is always at least one person (and often entire groups) who, when chaos strikes the workplace, can be heard proclaiming in a half joking manner, "Hey, its job security!" People laugh and agree. I have even used the phrase myself when I’ve been told I have a Sexual Harassment investigation or an Employee Relations issue to deal with.
I’ve often wondered how many jobs could be eliminated if this were a perfect world. Of course, it could never be a perfect world with every HR person out of work. Wait..... let me think on that.... no, you’re right; it would be a perfect world. The fact is we are surrounded by people in jobs who, in doing their job, are trying to eliminate it. Which creates the great conundrum: how hard should we work to complete our job if, in achieving it, we no longer have any work to do.
Just think of the jobs we would not need if things went the way we actually wanted them. Dentists teach us that if we brush well and floss, we would have no cavities. Yet we continue to have dentists and dental technicians cleaning teeth every day. Quality technicians ensure that employees do what they are supposed to do in their job. If employees did quality work, then there would be no need for quality departments. There are many who think we have all the laws we could ever possibly need in a free society. No more new laws....no more politicians. The world is filled with people whose job depends on something going wrong or at least the perception that something may go wrong. (Lawyers immediately come to mind.)
Accident investigators, tax lawyers, product inspectors, sexual harassment trainers… the list goes on. Imagine the number of photographers and reporters out of work if Lindsey Lohan was not such a train wreck. Imagine life without reality shows and Snooki if parents had done their job.
I personally know several exceptionally talented Vice Presidents whose management skills were so powerful and their team so well managed that, when it came time to identify who should be laid off, they were top of the list. Why? Because it looked like the team could take care of themselves. The manager had managed his way out of a job.
Now think about this. Does your job rely on things to be broken so you can fix them? If the work you do actually accomplishes its goal (i.e. accountability training for the finance department), would you have nothing to do? Does everything you touch require a new "Version #"?
Then you, my friend, are in a Self Eliminating Job!
Now the good news is that, for many of you, humanity will continue to bless you with screw-up after screw-up so your job is not only assured, it's almost guaranteed. (Microsoft technical support has NOTHING to fear.) But for others, you might want to have a moment of reflection. Consultants deal with this everyday. They come into a job because something needs a fix (supposedly). They look at the situation and formulate a plan based on their expert knowledge (supposedly). They fix the problem (supposedly). Then they leave. (If you’re hearing laughter in your head, then you obviously have worked with too many contractors.)
Now let us not confuse contractors with consultants. To compare contractors with consultants is like comparing surgeons to psychiatrists. The surgeon wants to be done the first time; the psychiatrists are Satan's version of the Energizer Bunny. From both of these, you will hear that there are days of plenty and lots of free time. Of course they are lying by pretending to enjoy their time off as they scramble to find some new problem that needs fixing.
For you who have a job which when all is well you are out of work, you should be actively formulating how you can "improve" the company with "new" processes for the next five years. Plan long and show your value or find yourself as the second runner up on "The Apprentice." There is always the possibility that being good at what you do could be a poor career choice if your job is fixing other people's mistakes.
For people like me, I formally thank every horrible manager, dumb employee, flirtatious CEO, and promiscuous receptionist for a long and productive career.....keep it up!!!
Copyright © 2010 Mike Baumgartner | HR | Consulting | Coach | Human Resources | Search - CEO, Worklife Survival Center LLC
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