Guest Post: Hey, Gen Y, Are You Afraid To Network?

I’m a Gen Y job seeker. Unemployment data tells me I’m not the only one. A recent Pew study shows that 37% of 18-29 year olds are out of work! But the career and networking events I go to tell a different story.

Networking, networking, networking. We’ve all heard endless times how it’s the best way to get a job.

So I get out there. I go to mixers, seminars, and job search support groups. And no matter the venue, I notice one thing in common among all these events.  With the exception of events targeted to young professionals, I’m often the youngest person in the room.

I know I can’t be the only twenty-something out of work in my area. So where is everyone?

I admit the first time I went to one of those events, it was intimidating. Like attracts like. I’m immediately drawn to others who are young like me, assuming that our common age will give us other interests in common. How can people from a different generation understand me and my job search?

Being the only Gen Y in a situation makes me stand out and that’s OK.

My confidence and conversation skills have skyrocketed during this job-search process. I don’t have time to worry, “Will they like me? What do I have to say?” Instead, I walk up to strangers 10, 20, or even 30 years older than myself and say, “Hi, I’m Danielle. How are you?”

That’s the thing about a crappy economy. It puts Gen Y, Gen X, Boomers, and everyone in between on equal footing. There’s no hierarchy of age. It’s all about knowledge and contacts.

Just because I’m young doesn’t mean that I haven’t gathered a large database of contacts that I’d be willing to share. And just because someone is older doesn’t mean they don’t have their finger on the pulse of my generation.

Sometimes there’s more value in talking to people who aren’t like you.  Expanding your circle to include people with different careers, of different ages and backgrounds, can yield unexpected results. Some of the older workers I’ve met now serve as mentors for my job-search journey.

Danielle Bullen

If my presence at career events has done anything to reduce the negative stereotype that Gen Y workers expect everything to be handed to them, then I’m grateful.  It takes hard work to find a new job.  I know I’m not the only person my age willing to put in the effort expanding our networks.  So, I ask again: Where is everyone?

Danielle Bullen is a marketing professional and writer from the greater Philadelphia area. You can read her writing, connect with her on LinkedIn and follow her on Twitter @daniellewriter.

Getting There: Tavaghn “Montsterr” Monts Speaks Part II

Getting There is a series featuring interviews from Generation Y young people who are breaking stereotypes and not only working hard to achieve their own definition of success but working to improve the lives of others around them.

Among other professions Tavaghn “Montster” Monts is Vice President of My Life Keys where he works as a Motivator and Life Coach. He has built a strong network leveraging his ability to relate with his target audience through consistent, branded messages on Twitter. If you’re living under a rock, Twitter is a social networking tool that allows people to connect with one another in a vastly more efficient manner than Facebook. Showing his prowess, Tavaghn does more than share what he’s eating for breakfast, offering ways in which his followers can “Motivate Your Motivation” through the “#MYM” hashtag.

In the video below he answers the following questions:

What advice do you have for men who want to achieve success in their lives?

What advice do you have for women who want to do the same?

You’re also known for your relationship advice. Can you discuss the importance of defining your passions and setting career and life goals for yourself as it pertains to building a strong relationship?

You’ve built a large network on Twitter and use that network to share positive messages. How can young people (under 30) use Twitter to achieve their goals? Would you advise them against saying certain things?

Getting There: Tavaghn “Montsterr” Monts Speaks Part I

Getting There is a series featuring interviews from Generation Y young people who are breaking stereotypes and not only working hard to achieve their own definition of success but working to improve the lives of others around them.

Among other professions Tavaghn “Montster” Monts is Vice President of My Life Keys where he works as a Motivator and Life Coach. He has built a strong network leveraging his ability to relate with his target audience through consistent, branded messages on Twitter. If you’re living under a rock, Twitter is a social networking tool that allows people to connect with one another in a vastly more efficient manner than Facebook. Showing his prowess, Tavaghn does more than share what he’s eating for breakfast, offering ways in which his followers can “Motivate Your Motivation” through the “#MYM” hashtag.

In the video below he answers the following questions:

Many famous stars attribute their success to knowing exactly what they wanted to do or be when they were a child. Did you know what you wanted to do or be at a young age?

Sometimes our true gifts are hidden to us and are only revealed after someone who believes in us points them out. Did you see your gift, or did someone help you to identify it?

Authority figures can have a positive and/or negative influence on our lives. Did anyone in a position of authority over you try to steer you away from your dream? If so, how did you recover? If not, how did you fight their negativity?

Can you talk about the important decision you made that impacted your life? Why did you make that decision? How did you feel then compared to how you feel now? Was it worth it?

Continue to Part II

Mr. Director, What’s My Motivation?

After asking myself what was wrong with me, I sought to find the answer. This was not a quick process. I hemmed and hawed, acting with no deliberate speed. Not because I didn’t want the answer and not because I was busy with other things, but because finding an answer would bring a finality to only one situation. If successful at finding the answer, would I even know how to move forward? If I did move forward, would I move in the right path? If I took the right path, would someone be disappointed by my work? This series of thoughts repeated themselves ad infinitum in my mind rendering me paralyzed.

I was paralyzed by fear. In an attempt to get out of it, I researched what it meant to be afraid of success. I wrote a post labeling the symptoms and solutions. It is exactly 6 months after the posting of that article, and I am only a few steps closer to where I want to be. At one point, I immersed myself in work. If it had been the work that made me happy and appears to be my passion, this would have been a good thing. It wasn’t. It was the very work that I had been striving (not so well) to get away from. I wanted to be better. I knew I was smart enough to handle the work. The problem: I didn’t believe in myself.

A disconnect existed between my belief in my capabilities and my belief in myself to follow through. I wondered what made people do the work to advance themselves further in life? If everyone is motivated by something that spurs them into achieving their goals, what was my motivation? Sean “Diddy” Combs owes his motivation to his mother who barely slept working multiple jobs to take care of her children. He developed his work ethic from her, and relentlessly pursued his dreams wanting to be the source of her support. I didn’t grow up seeing someone work nonstop to take care of me. I saw someone working regular 9 to 5’s that they hated. Every job. I was not relied on for financial support. My only role was as student. My follow through came from a fear of admonition. External factors goaded my early success. The motivation never evolved into an internal force.

So, I asked myself, “What the hell is my motivation?” (Coming soon)

Fear of Success

For as long as I’ve been aware of myself, metaphysically speaking, I’ve been conscious of the existence a fear-influenced duality of thought in my mind, which is responsible for my paralysis when attempting to move forward with goals. It causes me to think so much about my next steps that I develop a mild headache and desire nothing more than to lie down, go to sleep, and wake up hoping that the fear has moved on. It is so paralyzing that I devolve from the determined, confident person that I have become back into the apprehensive, insecure person that I was. This is more than fear of failure, though.

I could move forward if I were simply afraid that I might fail. I am no longer worried about fulfilling the dreams of others, or disappointing the people who had so much hope for me. Now, the realization that my life is based on my successes is my motivation to persevere. If I do not pursue my dreams with the ferocity of a predator on its prey, I will not succeed. My happiness is directly linked to my success. It is a causal loop that has been set to iterate ad infinitum. I have to succeed, and, yet, I’m scared. What happens if I do get the job? I’m going to be partly, if even on the smallest of scales, responsible for the success of an entire brand. If I do well, I’ll get even more responsibility. Can I keep producing good work? I don’t want to be a one-hit wonder in my own life.

When there is nothing to inspire you to get motivated, where do you look? Some people say “haters” inspire them to succeed. These are the people whose life goal it is to bring you down to their level or lower because they don’t think you deserve your success. Still others are motivated by the prospect of succeeding. I want to meet these people and ask them, “Why aren’t you afraid that once you do well, you’ll have to keep doing well?” No one can predict the future. They cannot know that they will continue to thrive in their chosen profession. When you do things well, people rarely notice. Break that pattern, though, and it’s all they can talk about. The only way to prevent negative attention is to keep succeeding, but that develops into perfectionism. If perfection and success cannot be guaranteed from every attempt, why try? Avoiding success equals less expectation. Less expectation equals less pressure to do well. The decrease in pressure results in less tension and headache, which leads to happiness, right? Wrong. It leads to mediocrity.

The pursuit of happiness cannot occur on the road of mediocrity. The road may be paved with a zero incline but reaching happiness more quickly will not give you greater satisfaction. Further, the happiness you reach is likely an illusion because mediocrity seeks just enough of everything. If you desire all the happiness you want from life, you must run around potholes, climb steeply-inclining paths, and beat back a few branches.

How are you going to find the happiness you seek if you don’t get on the right road?

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