Reflections on building a 'plural career'

A happening year – in many respects, and a personal year of change! I was down with a bad flu for a couple of weeks in Dec, and it gave me an opportunity to reflect on the year gone by. As I retired from a full-time corporate career earlier this year, I thought I would focus on a ‘plural’ career- here are a few random thoughts from someone who is in the midst of a ‘career transition’.

My idea of a plural career was that I spend some time working/consulting with businesses, some time teaching and working on a non-profit, in addition to finding enough time to pursue leisure and hobbies. Should be quite easy for a retired bloke, shouldn’t it? Well, I took some baby steps in this direction. First, I got to work with a fabulous business and learnt a lot about that business- a completely different industry to what I have experienced before, and hence phenomenal learning for me. And, at another level, also learning to make an impact through coaching and nudging! I am always amazed at the importance of understanding the nuances of the specific business or industry to be effective in HR- one size doesn’t fit all!

I also taught 2 small courses- one for the more experienced ‘future CHROs’ on ‘Strategic HR’, and one for budding entrepreneurs, the PGD-Entrepreneurship Course in XLRI NCR, on ‘Managing Talent’. The second course helped me brush up on my own fundas as I tried to put together relevant content for a young group of entrepreneurs. I realised that the only way to ensure learning and engage a young class is to get active involvement through cases, exercises and role plays- more experiential learning. However, what I really loved is mentoring some of these future CHROs and entrepreneurs- this is something I guess I will do more of.

A couple of us got together and we started a non-profit organisation focused on soft skills learning for the underprivileged, at scale. The past few months opened up my mind to the huge challenges that lie ahead of us. In the first phase of our project, we have put together content for some basic soft skills which we have shared with a partner NGO for training in some government colleges in Tamil Nadu. Our next phase is to make this content easily consumable in a digital way and work on a ‘digital skilling at scale’ model. Do check out our resources tab for more information: Resources | Atyourbest In

So then, what are the challenges as we shift careers? First, one realises how easily we become creatures of habit. As you make some significant career shifts, we have to consciously develop new habits. For instance, when you are in a corporate role, there is a cadence of activities, meetings, initiatives in which you are inexorably drawn into. But now, we have to consciously decide what to do, and how to spend our time- and I sometimes struggle to do that well. The second learning is time management. We somehow think we have enough time on our hands and schedule engagements in the future. When that future arrives, we find that we are caught in a bind and feel under pressure to meet those agreed obligations. So while it is easy to say yes to events in the future, I realise it is essential to be very clear on what is important. And I think we underestimate the power of teams and togetherness to get everyone working at a right speed. When you are alone, I would tend to slack off, succumbing to watching a match or just doing nothing! The ‘team tether’ really helps here.

The last challenge is our identity. When you work, you are linked to a role in an organisation- and everyone finds it easy to relate to that identity. People tend to link identities with where you work. But you don’t work full time for anyone, what’s your identity? So one has to build something that is not linked to a role in an organisation- and work through transition period, before you strengthen the new identity.

So, what’s going to be cooking in the future? My focus in the new year is on two broad areas. One that does not change- which is HR’s opportunity to create value in any organisation. And we can do it by a simple focus on a few things- identifying your critical jobs and ensuring you have the right talent to meet your level of ambition, building right skills, by promoting the behaviours needed to be successful, by building the right group of leaders and planning for their succession, and ensuring great execution through performance management practices. The other area which is new is the application of AI across the organisation, and also in HR. This is an area where I am trying to learn more as job design, and organisations, could change with the right use of AI. I will continue to focus and work on these areas.

Some of you may have read ‘Catalyse’ (if not, it’s worth reading now ??). It’s done reasonably well, with great reviews. CATALYSE: POWER UP YOUR PEOPLE ECOSYSTEM by Krish Shankar ( amazon.in ) Based on feedback and inputs from many folks, I now plan to work on a new ‘field book’ for Catalyse- a kind of an ‘open source’ workbook that will help people drive HR actions in a simple way (any ideas or suggestions welcome!). And also explore the germ of an idea for another book! And double up on our soft skills learning modules for Home | Atyourbest In Of course, I will also find time for my running and sports, and reading (started re-reading Will Durant on philosophy), and maybe a new hobby! And I have become a fan of podcasts (my current favourite is the Standford Psychology podcast)

Somewhere I read that intention sets the 'compass for the heart'- and my intent now is to see how I can help others be better. I guess this helps me think better about what I want to do!

Thanks to those who have been helping me during the year- I really appreciate your support. And wishing you all a wonderful New Year- stay well, stay happy and keep learning.