PhD

About three years ago, during the final presentation feedback session of two HR internship students, I shared that they need to pursue their PhD. The students were shocked as they were still doing their technical degree and pursuing a PhD is still light years away! I explained to the students that PhD in the academic world means getting a “Doctor of Philosophy”. In my world, PhD stands for Passion, humility and Dedication.

Passion as I explained to them is about “loving” what you do. You need to love what you do and if you “fall in love” with what you do, it is no longer about work. Work then is transformed into a craft that you want to continue to get better at it. Every weekend, there is a group of people who will spend almost the entire day hitting a tiny dimple ball over an 18 holes golf course. There was a time in my life where I was also part of this “cult”. However, I did not have passion for golf at all. It was for me just a game to be with my close friends as well as physically detaching myself from work! 

If I had passion in golf, I would be like one of my close friends who goes to the driving range during the week. He will make time week after week to hit at least a few hundred balls in the driving range. I tried a few times but I ended up with more empty beer cans than the balls I hit into the night. As for me, a good game means not losing more than a dozen balls.  For him, it was more playing to his handicap. He had passion, I just wanted to have fun and to enjoy the outdoors. At work, how many people do we have in our organization where we can safely say that they are passionate in what they do?

Passion is about being “professional” in your craft. It is about when the curtain is raised, you do the work in the best possible way, come rain or shine! You do it because you are paid as a professional worker. Despite even on an off day, you don’t pull “long faces” with your colleagues and/or customers. 

“What happens when you really don’t like what you do”, asked the students. I shared with the students that if you are still young, there is still time to go and discover what you really like to do. In fact, there were some students who completed their HR internship with Heraeus and discovered at the end of their assignment that it was not their “cup of tea”.  

One of the students cheekily asked another question, “What happens if the passion is sleeping”?  Well, if sleeping is able to give you the income to survive, then you should pursue it passionately – get a good quality bed! 

The question is what happens after more than twenty years in your profession you discover that it was just a job to you? There is a saying, “better late than never”. It is still okay at whatever stage of your life to change your profession and to pursue what you love doing (if you are able to economically sustain yourself). 

However, I would assume that most of us do not fall into this category. My answer to the student was, “You better find some love in what you do”! Once upon a time, you must have like it or you would not done it for the past twenty years. If you don’t, you will realize that the going will be tougher. You will begin to use phrases such as “too much work”, being “tired” often, feeling under-appreciated, and bouts of frustrations sets in. Surely, it must be insane to go to work every day and to spend almost half your life doing something that you are not passionate, just to receive a salary.

Dedication on the other hand is strongly correlated to passion.  If you do not have passion in what you do, it is highly unlikely you will be dedicated to your craft. Dedication is not about being responsible. It is about wanting to attain personal mastery. It is about the wholeheartedness, single-mindedness, resoluteness, and persistence to go “deeper” into learning more. 

You just have the profound interest to know more. Along the “dedication” journey, you will discover and/or create your own identity.   Through that discovery, creativity and innovation sprung up.  

How many doctors in this world do what they do because it is perhaps one of the most respectable job and pay lots of money? It is one of those profession where you can afford to drive fanciful cars (next to being an elite professional soccer player).  How many of these doctors chose the medical profession for the love of curing and having a genuine empathy for people? How many of these doctors have you encountered when you walked into the room, there were no genuine empathy and instead of even looking at you, talked to you by looking at their computer screen?

If a person is dedicated, they don’t wait to be told what to do next. They take the initiative to find out what they need to do on their own. They explore, discover and they will surprise you. You can easily tell whether someone is truly dedicated in their job. Those that like to “draw boundaries” and those that operate without any boundaries at all. Those that want their job description to capture every single tasks that they are doing versus those that are just comfortable with the phrase, “anything that is being assigned to them from time to time”. Those that are waiting for their next lists of tasks versus those that come up with their own list.

Between the capital letter “P” and “D”, is the humble lowercase “h”. It is about humility.  Over the years I have seen so many senior executives who struggled with humility. Of course, none of them will admit that they have the “h” problem. However, we have seen so many of these executives today in every organization. They often exhibit the following behaviors: 

• Being arrogant with a bonus smirk on their face, especially when they have to hear any suggestions from others
• Acting as God’s ambassador on earth as they are the only ones who is entitled to lead their team on the right path
• Pride themselves for “tearing down other people’s ideas” by coming up with model answer for everyone
• Loves to “talk down” on people, especially if they know they are the most “senior” in the room
• In social settings, they would prefer not to mingle with people that is considered “beneath them”
• Refusal to take any feedback as theirs is considered the absolute wisdom
• When they do listen, it is to search for flaws in your conversation so that they can find fault with you to show that they are the more superior beings

Unfortunately, the world that we live in today sometimes glorify leaders who exhibited great passion and dedication. The “humility” part is often considered “nice to have” and yet having it is the key differentiator of being authentic. Senior executives with humility will attract people who want to follow them not because of their rank but because of what they represent.  

Some leaders will never be able to earn their PhD in their entire career. They are so “full” of knowledge that they have no space in their head to be able to listen to the creative juices of their employees. On a funny note, you find the very same people standing in front of their people asking everyone to be creative (just as long as they follow their trend of thoughts). 

Most of these individuals don’t know that they are the “emperor without clothes” because all their peers (and even their seniors) knows that they have reached their maximum potential. Those people in their organization will eventually either leave or shift to a culture of just giving “cosmetic” suggestions as the “leader knows best”!

When senior executives are able to clear their mind completely, they may discover that they can even hear the sound of the smallest “cricket” in the room. Sometimes, it is the sound of the most junior and quietest person in the room that may hold the answer to what everyone is looking for! 

Those that earned their PhD will have a more fulfilling and sustainable career. They are at peace with their environment.

Key Points:

Passion: Discover the love for what you do. If you are able to do that, you don’t get tired easily.

humility: Know that the higher you climb in your career, the more you don’t know. As you approach the pinnacle, you don’t often get a clear visibility of “ground zero”. You need to listen to the “voices from below”.

Dedication: If you discover the love for what you do, you will naturally have a profound interest to deepen your personal mastery.

Raymund Chua is the Managing Director for Heraeus Materials Singapore Pte Ltd, Head of Regional Center for Heraeus Asia Pacific Holding as well as Head of HR, Asia Pacific for Heraeus Asia Pacific Holding.  His experiences spans across multiple disciplines: business strategy, culture, leadership, organizational design, human resource, and HR. Ray is an advocate of “communities of practices”. Ray is also the inventor of the HRGame as well as a coach. Ray can be contacted via Linkedin or [email protected]

Disclaimer: This is a personal linkedin blog. The opinions expressed here represent my own and not those of my employer.