Use it or Lose it fears? Six ways to stay sharp when you’re out of work.

The premise of Malcolm Gladwell’s Outliers is that “talent” is really just the culmination of extraordinary amounts of practice.  Everyone is talking about it. “Put in 10,000 hours doing what you love.”  But what happens if you’re interrupted in the middle of becoming great?  Maybe you just graduated and you’re trying to break into advertising/marketing, maybe you got laid off.  For all my fellow unemployed marketers out there, if you’re like me at all, you’re worried about losing “it”, that creative spark that let’s you know you were made to be a marketer.  How can you prevent this from happening while you’re out of work?

So the big question is how do you hang on to everything when you’re out of work?

1. Exercise

All you have to do is a Google search on “Exercise and Cognition” and you’ll get more than a million results.  I don’t need to prove that from a science standpoint.  But from another perspective, one of the keys to success is confidence, and regular exercise makes you feel great about yourself.

2. Recreational Think Tank (or Get Together and Collaborate with Friends)

Not long ago, I was working a job that provided me virtually know mental challenge.  I was “losing it” even though I was employed!  I got two of my friends together and we met on a regular basis, just to pitch ideas to each other.  We called ourselves a think tank just for giggles.  Most of our conversations were about new business ideas.  We’d go talk to experts on how to best accomplish certain ideas, even wrote marketing plans, and did market research.  None of the ideas ever became businesses, but it kept my mind working.  The more excited I got about our ideas, the more my mind poured over them.  It didn’t matter that I wasn’t employed; I was challenged nonetheless.  All of you know more people like you.  Screw up your courage and ask someone to get together just to pitch ideas around.  Nothing has to come out of it, all that matters is that you keep the wheels turning.

3. Volunteer

Volunteer opportunities abound, and I encourage you to go build a house with Habitat, or hand out blankets to the homeless for the upcoming winter.  But I also encourage you to additionally seek out a very specific kind of volunteering.  Reach out to non-profits and see if they need any help from the marketing side.  Marketing is one of the areas that usually gets neglected in a non-profit’s budget, so chances are they will jump at the chance to bring you in.  Once in, take it seriously and do good work.  You’ll be able to add this to your resume, but more importantly you’ll be gaining real world experience and making contributions that hopefully will continue past your time volunteering.  Talk about building confidence!

4. Read (Duh!)

This one is the most obvious, but also the one I have failed at the most here.  I have Seth Godin’s Permission Marketing and Purple Cow, Zig Zigler’s See You At The Top and Secrets of Closing the Sale, Rich Dad Poor Dad by Robert Kiyosaki, QBQ! The Question Behind The Question by John G. Miller, and James Collins’ Built to Last.  All gathering dust.  Don’t be like me; do as I say, not as I do.  These are great titles that have been recommended by many people I respect.  You (and I) would benefit from reading them.

5. Mentorship

For some people, this comes easily, but for others it is bloody hard.  I’m in the latter, and still working on it.  However, the glimpses of successful mentorship I’ve experienced have unlocked my creativity and reignited my drive.  In fact, Unemployed Marketers Group is an idea I began developing out of one such relationship.

6. Remember What You Learn

This idea isn’t mine, but comes from a designer named Alan Knox over at a great agency called redpepper.  He has a great process for hanging on to what he learns.  He sums it up with Capture, Process, Categorize.  But that summary doesn’t  do it justice.  Watch his presentation here and get the slideshow here.  Seriously, do it.  I’ve got to start putting this into action.

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The ante has been upped.  Nowadays, it isn’t enough to have good interview skills and even just networking may be insufficient to get by.  You have to keep growing, keep getting better, even when you’re out of a job.  The Unemployed Marketers Group came out of that very need.  Check out the below post, and if you want to be a part, drop me a line!  Plus, your complimentary or constructively critical comments are always welcome.

From the Top: What is the Unemployed Marketers Group (Collective/Community)?

We are not defined by our résumés.

Our job history is not the whole story.

Believe it or not, sometimes the best person for the job is the one who hasn’t done it before.

The paradigm is wrong.  Unemployed does not equal untalented.  There are hoardes of us, boiling with potential, chomping at the bit, ready to be let loose.  But potential cannot exist without action.  If you’ve stopped by this blog, I hope you’re like me.  I’m ready to start doing instead of dreaming of doing.  This is the heart of the Unemployed Marketers Group.

Purpose

The Unemployed Marketers Group arises from the need to provide a place to keep that edge finely honed.  This sharpening process will occur through fellowship and real-world work.  The job search sucks and you need to keep in tune with others that share your boat, both from a support and a networking standpoint.  But the real world projects will keep those creative juices at a rolling boil through the synergistic effect of collaboration, while providing incredible volunteer opportunity.  Never been a project leader?  You might have the chance.  Always knew you’d be a kick-ass copywriter, but lacked the experience for the opportunity?  Suit up, you’re on deck.  The Unemployed Marketers Group is where you prove your potential isn’t all in your head.

Who are we?

We are birthed from an economy that has been forced to either shed incredible, proven talent, or unable to support developing new talent.  We may be people with 30 years of experience, or we may be those passionate types who are ready to change the world but haven’t found the right opportunity yet.

How will it work?

I present first and foremost a base rule.  You must be unemployed at the time you join.  No, I’m not going to check up on anyone, but there’s a reason for this.  It is REALLY hard out there right now.  If you’re currently employed, you might be a mindblowing talent that we would love to have on board, but from a community perspective, you just can’t understand.  But when (yes, WHEN) you do become employed, you are welcome to stay on.

We’ll meet at an interval TBD at the first meeting.  The first part of each session will be fellowship and exchange of knowledge through discussion.  But the bulk of each meeting will be tackling marketing challenges for our non-profit clients.  From the very first meeting, we’ll have a real-world client.  The work you do will be beyond the hypothetical; it will impact lives.  In many cases, the challenge will be one you likely haven’t encountered before: our clients may have to accomplish their objectives with little-to-no expenditure, so be prepared to break the paradigm that it takes money to make money/accomplish your mission.

The Call to Suit Up

There’s no doubt in my mind that you’re out there.  You’re sick of sorting through job listing after job listing, applying along with the sea, while your absurd talent goes to waste.  I hope you found your way here and you’re ready to get started.  I’m looking for a commitment of 4-10 people to have a first meeting before I get a client on board.  Comment and let me know you’re ready to get in the game.  Just because we’re unemployed doesn’t mean we don’t know how to do incredible work.