Advice

Why Sharing Career Lessions Needs Translation

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Recently I got laid off.  I could probably add “again,” but I’m living in Silicon Valley, where “laid off” is sort of the minor flu of careers.  We all catch it occasionally and it’s not that remarkable.

So beyond my job search, I’ve also been working on learning lessons to use into my suddenly-delayed book on job search.  I appreciate the irony, and wanted to make sure I not only applied what I learned to my search (which is working) but captured new lessons.

I’m used to doing this; sharing my experiences with others.  In fact, I encourage other people to share their own career experiences.  But I came to realize as I discussed my delayed project and lessons with people, I’ve missed a crucial fact: translation.

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Are You Interviewing For A Position Or As A Person?

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After seventeen years and counting in IT, I’ve done a lot of interviews and held a lot of jobs.  I try to share my experiences, of course, which is why you get a lot of my brain dumps here.

One of those experiences that has turned into the career fertilizer I’m about to import, is that when you interview, you have to determine if you’re interviewing for a Position or as a Person.

This may seem a bit confusing – you’re a Person interviewing for a Position, right?  Well that’s you.  What’s different is what’s going on in the minds of your interviewers, even if they don’t always know it.

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How We Might Turn Unoriginality To Our Advantage

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Nearly two years ago I noted that every other book cover I saw looked like Twilight and wondered about an originality/unoriginality arms race.

Reporting from the front lines in pop culture, I’d like to report that now a lot of book covers look like “50 Shades of Gray,” so I think unoriginality is winning.

When you think about it, there is doubtlessly a lot of 50-Shades derived books out there.  50 Shades is hot and hip right now, so there’s going to be attempts to jump into the market.  Sure all the covers look alike, but some of this is probably selling anyway.  Even though I am thrilled to see fanfic become fic , the story itself disturbs me.

Kind of makes me wonder how many stories wouldn’t be noticed, got made just for this, or were revived to take advantage of the new 50 Shades related craze.

So this got me thinking for all my writing and media friends.

We know that there’s plenty of problems with media originality.  It gets talked about a lot here at Fan To Pro.  Well, ranted about, as we do since many of us are authors.

We know that media goes in cycles, ones that are often big, obvious, and kind of blatant.  Twilight created one, 50 Shades another, but we know this goes back to the days of Star Wars and all it’s obvious ripoffs.

So instead of giving up on your great idea, or avoiding trends, why not embrace it and see what works you have work with current trends?

Any good author or artist has all sorts of ideas, potential projects, half-finished works, and more.  You could try and time their release or development of one of your works to jump on the existing trends.

Yes, there’s the danger of looking derivative, or unoriginal, or getting ignored.  But if you’re going to go with some of the big publishers, you’re facing enough challenges as it is.  Being seen as unoriginal by some, getting a smaller part of a larger market share, etc. aren’t the worst risks you can face.

So, if we’re gonna be in this cycle of unoriginality for awhile, maybe we media procures can take advantage of it.

Worse things could happen.  If nothing else maybe the book covers will all look the same differently . . .

– Steven Savage

Steven Savage is a Geek 2.0 writer, speaker, blogger, and job coach.  He blogs on careers at http://www.fantopro.com/, nerd and geek culture at http://www.nerdcaliber.com/, and does a site of creative tools at http://www.seventhsanctum.com/. He can be reached at https://www.stevensavage.com/.