Find your dream job without ever looking at your resume | Laura Berman Fortgang | TEDxBocaRaton

Your job satisfaction doesn't really come from what you do, says author and career coach Laura Berman Fortgang. With vivid stories of people she has helped, Fortgang tells the secret of how to figure out what to look for in your career without ever looking at your resume.

This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at http://ted.com/tedx

Everybody knows somebody
who hates their job.

Maybe that somebody is even you.

In fact, half of the people
in the United States who work

would do something else
for a living if given the chance.

That's an epidemic.

Look, I know,
it's hard to change,

it's easier to stick
with the devil you know.

Walking away
from a paycheck and benefits -

that doesn't fit conventional wisdom ,
and doing something more meaningful -

I mean, who wants to make less money?

But when I think about this subject,
I think of my grandfather,

my immigrant grandfather who left Poland,
alone, on a boat, at 17 years old,

to go to New York City.

I wonder what he would think about us
talking about being happy at work.

"Happy?" he would say.

"Happy at work?

Put food on the table, that's 'happy.'

What are you talking about, happy?"

My dad, first generation American,

he was the first to go to college,

the first to have a "good corporate job,"

his was the 1960s' version
of being happy at work.

But he really wasn't.

Today, the research shows

that to be happy at work,
people want to be engaged.

They want to have mastery
over their subject matter.

They do want to know

that what they do matters more
than the paycheck they get.

So, if we know that, why is it

that 50 per cent of us can't figure out
what we want to do with our life?

I think it's because when we are in doubt,
we look to our resume.

We look to our credentials,
what we're qualified to do.

What we're qualified to do
is not necessarily what we're meant to do.

It isn't necessarily
what's going to bring us satisfaction.

Think of an egg, if you will.

From a little hummingbird egg
to an ostrich egg,

all of them are roundish shell.

For people, that shell
are our credentials, our track record,

our accomplishments, and our resume.

A lot of us get attached to that shell,
it becomes our identity,

and that's what makes it hard to change.

But to get to the good stuff,
you have to crack the egg open.

Because inside is the yolk,
the golden center.

That's where the DNA is.

That's what determines
how each egg is unique.

For people, I call that yolk
their "life blueprint."

Everything that can be
taken away is the shell.

The status, your identity,
what people think of you,

the perks, the salary.

But what can't be taken away is the yolk.

That's where the discovery
of career satisfaction can happen.

Maybe it's more important to understand

that career satisfaction
doesn't come from what you do.

It comes from who you get to be
while you're doing that job.

Who your job allows you to be,

that's where the happiness comes from.

So, the shell is what you do.

But the yolk is who;

who you get to be.

When I was in my 20s,

I wanted nothing more
than to be a Broadway star.

Well, I did reasonably well;
I got my union card,

I worked in reputable theaters,
and I gave myself five years to make it,

and at year eight,
I was still waiting on tables.

So, I grew despondent, I really did.

I was almost suicidal over the fact

that I thought that I failed
at the only thing I ever wanted.

Why haven't this dream come true for me?

I'd worked so hard, I invested so much.

10 years after I left show business,
I had an epiphany about this.

I remembered a scholarship
that I was up for,

for an acting program where they asked me:

"What would be possible
if you were successful as a performer?"

The answer came to me in a flash.

I knew it was like the right answer,
the Miss America pageant answer,

the eldest child answer,

the "I'm going to get
the scholarship" answer.

So I went up to the mike and I said,

"Well, if I were successful
as a performer,

people would see me on stage and be moved
to change something in their life."

That answer got me the scholarship.

But it wasn't until ten years later
when I realized what I really had said;

the performer was the shell
causing change from the stage.

That was the yolk.

That was me.

So I hadn't failed at my dream after all;

I just suffered
from a misinterpretation of my dream.

I needed to allow
the dream to change form.

I think that's what's wrong
for a lot of us

when we can't figure it out.

No one's taught us to pull the dream apart

and understand
the true significance of it.

We're told we could be anything
we want to be when we grow up.

But when we go to pick
that college major,

the question changes from, "What
do you want to be when you grow up?"

to, "How are you going to make
a living with that?"

We haven't been taught

what are dreams and imaginations
really mean to our career trajectory.

John was someone who heard me
speak about this concept

and he was very skeptical.

He said, "Laura, I've accomplished
everything I set out to do.

I've had every dream
for my career come true.

So this cannot possibly hold any weight."

But at the time we met,
he wasn't sure what he wanted to do next.

He was struggling with that.

I want to tell you a little secret:

I don't believe anyone who tells me
they don't know what they want to do.

I believe they do know;
they're just too afraid to speak it

because then they have to do
something about it.

Anyway, back to John.

Since he challenged me, I said,

"Okay, what are all your career dreams
that you had come true?"

He said, "When I was a kid,
I wanted to be a magician.

As a young adult,
I wanted to be an architect,

then I wanted to change
and be in advertising and marketing

and be responsible for huge
billboards in New York City."

He goes, "And now I want to do something
with my love for the outdoors,

maybe an adventure
travel guide or something."

But he couldn't reconcile
how that fit with the rest of his life.

But I could see it.

So, this is where I need your help.

If you go -

if you go out and you see
a wonderful magic trick,

one that blows your mind,
what's your reaction?

Show me on your face
what your reaction is.

Audience: Wow!

Laura Berman Fortgang: Wow!

So, if you go to a city
that you've never been to

and you're looking up at the architecture,

what does your face look like?

Alright, now if you've been to New York
and ever seen a billboard so large

that a woman's navel
is the size of a cruise ship,

what does your face look like?

Wow.

So, you see.

Everything that John did
evoked a universal human response.

Across culture, language, or age,
"Ooh, aah, wow."

All those jobs were what he did,

but who he was
was someone who inspired awe.

If you go out in nature,
you will be in awe.

So, it was completely in his blueprint
for him to go and become someone

who worked in nature and took others
into nature to inspire awe.

Today, he owns a company

where he designs and manufactures
gear for outdoor enthusiasts.

He found his way.

So, the formula seems to be:

something from the past
whether it has come true or not,

re-examine for its true significance,

married with your skill set of today,

equals a satisfying new chapter.

Now, there are people
who have said to me over the years

that they've never had a dream,

that they never had anything
that ever called to them,

they don't have any memory of anything

they'd ever wanted to be
when they grew up.

Over the years, what I've seen
as a common thread among these people

is that they all had
a rougher childhood than most.

They either grew up
in a dysfunctional home,

maybe there was raging,
maybe there was alcoholism,

perhaps they were worried

that a relative who was sick
or sibling who was sick,

they didn't know
if they were coming or going,

any child who has to keep their
guard up all the time,

and doesn't feel safe can't dream.

If that's any of you, don't worry,
there is a solution for another time.

I've also met people who have had
a round of success with their career,

but it was based on something
that was a reaction from their past.

So, they succeeded,

but now they don't know what to do
because they have no criteria.

So, that thing from the past,
if any of you have ever made a vow,

anyone who'd ever said,
"I won't be like my mother,"

or "I won't be like my father,"

or "I'll never be poor,"
or "I'll show them," that's a vow.

If you did that,

it was a reaction
to circumstances of your life,

and it probably served you well.

Look, a lot of people
have a lot of ambition

based on things
they don't want in their life.

But there may come a point

where that motivation
is no longer useful to you

because you've outgrown it.

And then, what do you do?

Karen was someone
that I met in this situation.

She was a top salesperson,
she won all the cars, all the trips,

but she started talking
about how she was feeling really anxious

because she felt like
she was losing her mojo.

She didn't know
if she could keep up this pace

and she didn't know
how to discipline herself

to be as ambitious as she was before.

I suspected that there would be something

in her story that would tell us
what was going on.

So, there it was; at 17,
she was ready to accept a scholarship

to play basketball for college,

and she found out she was pregnant.

She gave up the scholarship,
she had the baby, and she made a vow.

"I will not be a teenage statistic."

She had that baby, she had
another baby with the same guy,

then she married him, went to school,
got this great job, succeeded wildly,

and now she couldn't figure out
why she could make it work.

Well, she wasn't a teenager anymore,

and she had well proven
that she wasn't a teenage statistic.

So, once she had the awareness

that she needed to just
change why she worked,

the motivation for why she worked,
she was on to new paths.

So you see, your resume
is only part of the equation.

All the things that happened
which made that resume,

that made your life story,
that's what reveals your blueprint.

That's what reveals
the themes and the imprint

that is your yolk.

I want to live in a world where people
stop competing at work,

because they realize
that they are so unique

that there's nobody to compete with.

Everyone's unique, we don't cross over,
we don't have to compete.

I want a world where we don't torture
our teenagers to figure out

what they want to do with the rest
of their life at 17 years old,

because we've taught them

that their dreams have many ways
that they can come to be.

I'd like to see a world
where nobody suffers to make a living

because they understand
that they are not wedded to the shell,

but they can evolve from the yolk.

So, before, I told you
that half of the people in the U.S.

would do something different
if given the chance.

Half!

That is an epidemic.

But it's an epidemic that has a cure.

The cure is understanding

that career satisfaction
doesn't come from what you do.

It comes from who you get to be
while you're doing it.

The beauty is, who you
get to be is the real you.

Thank you.

(Cheers) (Applause)