Dismissed as Career Day Speaker, He Reworks His Advice

I recently spoke on “Career Day” at a Tustin middle school. I’ve always considered myself a boring person, and nothing reinforces that quite like listening to yourself as you sit on a stool in a classroom and chronicle your career to a group of sixth-, seventh- and eighth-graders. They have an unmistakable way of signifying, without really saying, “Uh, sir, how much longer will this go on?”

Don’t get me wrong. The students were perfectly respectful. They didn’t interrupt, although I begged them to. In fact, they were amazingly well-mannered, considering the droning coming their way. If nothing else, though, an hour of me just after lunch probably left them longing for a dissertation on the importance of the Louisiana Purchase. For, try as they might to conceal them, I recognized those pained and distracted looks, if only because I invented many of them more than 30 years ago as a middle-schooler myself.

I spent most of my allotted two class periods discussing the news business and how I got started and what it’s like to work for a newspaper and how much money they could make and various stories I’ve covered and blah, blah, blah. I’ve been second-guessing myself ever since, replaying my spiel and wondering what I could have told them instead.

In short, what career advice might have been more helpful and interesting?

I might have begun by announcing I wasn’t going to discuss the newspaper business at all. I could have told them they were way too young to focus on a specific career and that, for all any of us knew, the news business might be totally different by the time they were 21.

“Let’s forget the newspaper business,” I could have said. “Let’s not zero in on any one career. Instead, let’s talk about what kind of person you plan to be when you do begin your career. How do you plan to treat people as you go through life?”

They might have looked at me and said, “Huh? What’s that got to do with a career?”

I could have told them that the answer to those questions might be more important than whatever career path they choose. “Don’t worry if you don’t know what you want to be,” I’d tell them. “You’ll figure that out eventually. What you can start working on now, though, is what kind of person you’ll be. Are you going to try and learn about different things? Are you willing to at least listen to people when their points of view are different from yours?”

For fun, I should have asked the students to go home and interview their parents about their jobs. “Ask them to describe what makes them happiest at work and what angers them the most. I think you’ll be surprised to find that your parents’ experiences aren’t much different at work than yours are at school. You might see your parents aren’t as goofy as you think.”

I then could have asked how important they expect their careers to be. Do you think it’s possible to balance work and home life, I’d ask. For pointers, I’d suggest they consider their own families as a measuring stick.

Getting down to basics, I could have told them how exhilarating the good days on the job could be--whether they’re office workers, laborers or stay-at-home mothers. But I’d also let them know about the hair-pulling frustrations. Why sugarcoat reality? I’d tell them that they might all work at some point for bosses they didn’t like and see other people get promotions they didn’t think they deserved.

“That will drive you crazy, if you let it,” I could have said. “The secret is to enjoy what you do and accept that the workplace is not always fair. It’s a lot like school--sometimes you get a B when you think you deserved an A.”

I wish I would have asked their idea of professional success. “Would you do anything to get ahead?” I’d ask them. My guess is that their moral codes are pretty much in place at this point. I’d urge them to trust their instincts about the difference between right and wrong, and warn them that as they get older, they’ll see people bend the rules to get ahead.

If tempted to get ahead by cheating, I’d remind them to dust off a simple phrase: “Nah, that’s not the right way to do things.”

In closing, I’d tell them not to be afraid of the world. “It’s doable,” I could have told them. I could have asked the class to take a sacred vow not to fall for other people’s versions of success. I’d try to drill into their heads that any work done honestly, no matter what it is or how much it pays, fits the definition of a “successful career.”

That would have made for a wacky Career Day. The students might have left scratching their heads, wondering who the crackpot was. But I think it’s the kind of session I could have used all those years ago when a career seemed like such a strange and distant thing.

Dana Parsons’ columns appears Wednesday, Friday and Sunday. Readers may reach Parsons by writing to him at the Times Orange County Edition, 1375 Sunflower Ave., Costa Mesa, CA 92626, or calling (714) 966-7821.