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Retirement is a Bankrupt Industrial Age Idea

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Day 9 of 21 days with Chuck’s new book, Why Employees Are ALWAYS a Bad Idea

Two-thirds of the people who have ever reached the age of 65 in the history of man are alive today. Living longer is a brand new thing, and we are profoundly unprepared to deal with it. The Industrialists found it extremely inconvenient, so they invented this dumb idea called “retirement.” It is an early stab at dealing with old age and will itself die away.

Retirement is a really bad, bankrupt, industrial age idea that was never a good concept in the first place. It is a core disease of the Industrial Age and will not be welcomed by future generations. Beside the fact that it was invented to get creepy old people off the assembly line during the Industrial Age, it makes a mockery of the 45+ years that come before it. And as proof, it’s already being rejected by a majority who grew up in the shadow of the Industrial Age.

Where Did Retirement Come From?
In 1889, Otto von Bismarck invented – that’s right, invented – retirement, because people in Germany who refused to quit working were causing great unemployment among younger people and gumming up the works in the Factory System.

William Osler, a founder of Johns Hokpins University didn’t help. In a 1905 valedictory address, he said, “It is a matter of fact that the years between 25 and 40 in a worker’s career are the 15 golden years of plenty.” He then quoted Anthony Trollope from 1882 who recommended that “the elderly be chloroformed by the age of 68.” Osler later died of the flu at the age of 70, having sucked up two extra years of oxygen someone under 40 could have used to be more productive.

Get Off The Bus, Gus
After decades of resistance, in the 1950s, at the peak of the Industrial Age, retirement finally began to catch on when people began to discover that they could replace work with play. The debates of the 1950s and ‘60s as to whether leisure could replace work as a source of meaning in people’s lives has been clarified by today’s experts. Surveys show that most people prefer continuing to put their hand to Making Meaning over holing up on a golf course. Leisure is very attractive as a change of pace here and there, but most of us reject it as a source of ongoing meaning. People want to “participate” and “share” even in their elder years.

As a result, the majority of retirees have gone back to work in some form, and less then 18% say it has anything to do with insufficient retirement income. People are deciding to CHOOSE (a very powerful thing) to stay in the work force, and doing it to Make Meaning, not just money.

Death By Golf
Retirees have replaced work with play, thinking that will make us live longer. But a thorough 90-year study of 1,528 Americans called The Longevity Project, shoots big holes in the retirement dream. Turns out goofing off for the last thirty years of our lives is a really bad idea if you want to keep living. The earlier you retire, the quicker you die. This study shows that if you retire at age 55, you are 89% more likely to die before the age of 65 than someone still working at age 65 has of dying at 75!

Also, those who have just retired are most likely to suffer from depression. They are no longer Making Meaning, and they know that golfing, all by itself, will not fill the void. The idea that work is leading you to an early grave is a myth. This massive study proved what we’ve been saying for years now; we should get up every day asking how we can Make Meaning in the world around us.

The New Normal
The new normal is to continue to work after 65, not because we have to, but because we all want to Make Meaning, not just money, and we want to do it every day, not just for the first two-thirds of our lives.

The farther we get from the Industrial Age, the more we realize retirement is just a dumb Industrial Age idea that was foisted on us, once again, to help the Industrialists make money, but certainly not for our own good. The National Opinion Research Center (NORC) posed this question to Americans: “If you were to get enough money to live as comfortably as you like for the rest of your life, would you continue to work or would you stop working?” 85% said they would not retire.

A goal realized is no longer motivating, and retirement is a goal realized. The retirees meaningful years are behind them, and now they’re just coasting. And by the way, the only way to coast is to go downhill.

Make Meaning. Seize the day, every day. Carpe freaking diem already.

This is a summary of a chapter from Chuck’s new book, “Why Employees Are ALWAYS a Bad Idea (And Other Business Diseases of the Industrial Age)”. Click here to pre-order this new ground breaking book at a discount on IndieGoGo.com until July 28.

Separation of Work and Play Dehumanizes Us

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Day 8 of 21 days with Chuck’s new book, Why Employees Are ALWAYS a Bad Idea

The following is a short blog post a few years ago by a young guy in his 20s heading into work. It was riveting and was partially responsible for setting me on the path to writing “Why Employees Are ALWAYS a Bad Idea”. I never saw it again, but it made such an impact I can almost recite it from memory:

“Every day I go to work.
When I get to work, I park, leave myself in the car, and head into work.
At lunch I always try to come back out and reunite with myself for a few minutes before I have to leave myself in the car, and go back into work.
I do this everyday.
And in the evenings I always hope I get off in time to reunite with myself…before I’m gone.”

This wasn’t a kid writing in 1895 about his experience in the steel mill, but someone writing in the 21st century about their experience working in the front office in modern corporate America.

In 2013, Zappos moved to downtown Las Vegas. Tony Hsieh’s reason, “I want to be in an area where everyone feels like they can hang out all the time and where there’s not a huge distinction between working and playing.”

For thousands of years we worked where we lived, and lived where we worked. But in the late 1800s, Frederick Taylor and the Industrialists decided that didn’t make sense. Taylor and the Industrialists worked very hard to separate the two, saying it was “ordinary common sense”. He may have thought so, but it’s not normal, it’s not human, and it doesn’t help productivity in the Participation Age. Separating work and play is another business disease instituted during the Industrial Age as a cure that ended up being the disease itself.

Top Motivators – Making Meaning
Three things motivate people more than money in the Participation Age.

1) Flexible work schedule – let me decide when I work.

2) Praise and Recognition – catching people doing something right.

3) Breaking up the work day – research shows productivity goes up if we take a break in the middle of the day and do something unrelated to work – take a walk, ride a bike, go for a swim, visit an aquarium.

In the Participation Age, Stakeholders expect to integrate work and play, just like we did before the Factory System.

The Old (and Returning) Normal
For thousands of years people lived where they worked (over the storefront or on the farm) and played where they worked. Community was built around work and small markets. The kids ran and played, learned and worked, the grandparents helped out – everyone was involved. When work was slow, people played more and when it picked up at harvest time, or in the mornings when the cow needed milking, they put their hand to it. Barn raisings, quilting bees and even harvest time brought everyone in the community together as families to work, play, and socialize.

There wasn’t much separation of work and play in the process. It was considered natural to blend the two.

Our Past is Our Future
In the Participation Age the work world is once again full of options, making the time/money trade-off a lot less clear, and universally unattractive. Savvy employers are dropping their commitment to a Time-Based Industrial Age culture, and replacing it with a Results-Based culture that values PRODUCTION over PRESENCE.

In the Industrial Age, the employer held all the cards and said, “If you give me your best time, I will give you some money.” Today’s Participation Age companies understand that if they give their Stakeholders time, the Stakeholders will make them some money. Time is the new money.

It’s a New Work World
The Center for Talent Innovation (CTI cites reports that an overwhelming 90% of people want flexible work arrangements. CTI also says, “Companies that treat time as currency — through remote work options, staggered hours, and reduced-hour arrangements — are also more likely to attract and retain high-caliber employees.”

Mayur Singh, a vice-president, one of the largest banks in the world, HSBC, spends six months of the year working at an eco-conservation project, and six months in the HSBC office working. HSBC allows any employee to participate like Mayur Singh. The result? Productivity has shot up in 88% of the participants, and has not declined at all in those who have decided not to participate.

Patagonia, a manufacturer of athletic clothing, encourages its 1,300 Stakeholders to take off during any work day to ride a bike or go surfing. It also gives them two full weeks of paid leave if they will use it to serve a nonprofit of their choosing.

Point B, a Portland based management consulting company with over 400 Stakeholders, offers NO vacation time. They simply pay for time worked. One Stakeholder gushed, “I’ve never worked anywhere that was as committed to helping employees realize what the work-life balance means to them individually.”

Semco, a large Brazilian-based manufacturing company allows you to reduce your work hours for a few months or even longer so you can spend more time with kids or pursue some activity you love.

Citrix reports flexible workplaces save tens of thousands of dollars per employee each year, Stakeholders are 55% more engaged, and productivity increases on average 27%.

It’s Not Optional
People reading this through Industrialist’s eyes are going to say they just won’t play in the new sand box and don’t need to; that there will be plenty of stupid and lazy people left over with which to squeeze the last dime out of the existing matrix. They are wrong.

The work-world is changing and the workforce is shrinking worldwide. In the Age of Participation, Stakeholders will decide for themselves which organizations are desirable and which are not, and will use such measurements as culture, employer reputation, and the company’s willingness to engage in Making Meaning, to make that choice. We are beginning to see a dramatic shift in the employer/employee relationship. In the Industrial Age, the Factory System Industrialist held all the cards. In the Participation Age, the shoe is on the other foot. As a Pricewaterhouse Coopers study says, “the employee will call the shots in tomorrow’s world.”

The Industrial Age practice of trading time for money has been exposed as a disease, not a cure. In the Participation Age, time is the new money. Companies that figure out how to compensate Stakeholders as much with time as with money will do well going forward. The Industrialists will cling to the status quo, and future books will report seeing them last as they were rearranging the deck chairs around their factories on the way down.

Time is the new money.

This is a summary of a chapter from Chuck’s new book, “Why Employees Are ALWAYS a Bad Idea (And Other Business Diseases of the Industrial Age)”. Click here to pre-order this new ground breaking book at a discount on IndieGoGo.com until July 28.

Why Studying Exceptional People Doesn’t Help Us

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Process vs Result

We all have a desire to be significant. Yet few of us feel we are creating the rules that will get us there. So we study “exceptional people” to find rules for success. But we almost always miss the one rule that makes them successful; struggle.

While we idolize our hero, too often we lose sight of what got them there. With very few exceptions, it wasn’t talent, but struggle. Is it possible that deep commitment to the effort it takes to get to your Big Why is what actually creates meaning, joy and success?

Joy in the Journey
Are we too focused on the result achieved by “exceptional people” to understand how they got there? Why do athletes, music heroes, and business people who are already at the top of their field and financially secure keep going? Why don’t they retire as soon as they get there? Is the result their focus?

I believe it is because they have found the secret (such an over used term) of success. They understand that meaning and joy are not found in the destination but in the journey, and that love of the process of persistent struggle is the key to joy.

Love the Persistent Process
How did your star athlete get to the level they are at? By persistent struggle on the weight machines, on the track, and daily work at perfecting their craft. Relentless, consistent, persistent struggle. And a deep love for that process. Yo Yo Ma, world famous cellist, once told my daughter “The key to becoming a world class musician is to learn to love to practice; to practice every day as if you’re sitting on stage at Carnegie Hall for your debut concert.”

Do you love the Persistent Process, or are you focused on the result? Measure the result, but focus on the process and building your mental muscles through it. Learn to love the process and the ongoing development of both your craft and your business.

You will find the most meaning and joy in having made it through the tough times and having created success by loving the Persistent Process of getting there.

Your heroes didn’t get there by talent. They got there by learning to love the process of getting there. Take the things you learn from them with you into the real world, get beat up, fall down, get back up a little stronger, and do it again. Build your mental muscles one at a time, but relentlessly. Unfailing commitment to the process of getting there is the only thing that will get you there.

No Exceptional People, Just Exceptional Commitment
We get what we intend, not what we hope for. Intend to embrace the process in order to get the result. Don’t read books marveling at people who have achieved great things. Don’t study their result. Marvel instead at the fact that these otherwise very common people were dedicated and sold out to the long process of getting there, no matter their circumstances.

Circumstances don’t make me who I am. How I respond to them does. Respond with tenacity and commitment to the long view. That will get you there! Do what it takes to build a business and a life of significance!

Joy is not found in the destination, but in the journey. Love the journey, the Persistent Process, and success will follow.

What to Obsess About in a Maturing Business

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Not survival.

You found a viable product or service. Then you grew the business into a stable, healthy profit-generator. Now what?

A company owner approached me a couple months ago to get help with his business. When we talked it was apparent his business had grown to a nice size, providing a good income for him and his employees.

When I asked what he wanted to accomplish in our one2ones he said, “I need a reason to keep going. I’m making good money and the business is doing a few million a year, but I can’t seem to grow it, and don’t seem to have the clarity I need to move forward.”

Make Meaning, Not Money
The Industrial Age taught us the lie that if you got money, that money would naturally give you a great lifestyle. “If I just had a million bucks life would be great.” No, it wouldn’t. Business owners who work to make money rarely make a lot of it because making money is not an empowering vision. Those who chase something bigger than just making money are much more likely to make a lot of it. We call that a Big Why. A Big Why moves you from Survival right through Success to Significance.

Significance Rocks
Startup and growth are about viability and money, sacrificing time and present significance to get there. This was my sixth business (I’ve started another one since). When I started it, I worked seven days a week the first year, then six the second, then five the third. But once we had a viable product and the money was coming in, I wasn’t done. It was now about ensuring that the business created both time and money for me (and others in the business), because it is the combination of these two resources that set us up to create Significance in the world around us.

The Poverty Mindset
Survival is a very strong instinct for starting a business. I’ve got a mortgage to pay. The fascinating thing is that most business owners live in survival throughout their entire 40 year career – poverty mindset – always living at the end of their two main resources – time and money.

They don’t have a Big Why, a reason to grow their business, so if they happen to make money, they just buy a bigger house or more toys to ensure they are completely out of time and money, and then the need to survive kicks back in to help then grow the business to support the new poverty level they’ve set for themselves.

The Big Why Mindset
Business Owners with a Big Why take paying their mortgage as a given, it’s just background noise for getting something done much bigger than making money. A Big Why is so motivating that it makes you want to get out of bed even when you’re not making money, and it drives everything you do.

Another client of mine said, “I knew when I had my Big Why, because it had me.” He went on to explain that once he had something much bigger than just making money to drive him forward, that he found himself making every decision, from buying a copier to opening a new location, based on whether it would get him to his Big Why or not.

The Big Why – something you can never check off as done
A Big Why is a goal you can never check off as completed – being the best parent, solving poverty, giving every month to a charity, making an ongoing impact in the world of technology (Bill Hewlett’s Big Why for starting HP). Those who have made the biggest impacts always do it with a Big Why, not with a desire to make money.

What is Your Big Why
What is your Big Why, that motivator that you can never check off as completed? Every great business owner has one. If you’re wondering why your business is stagnant or that you’re just going through the motions, don’t look “out there”. Look inside and ask yourself, “What is my Big Why”?

If you do that, you’re much more likely to grow a very successful business that leaves a legacy that will endure. If you don’t get Utter Clarity on your Big Why, you’re likely to stagnate and go through the motions.

Run and grow your business with a Big Why. It’s a lot more fun.