Careers: "They're Here" - Are We Ready?

Greetings Educators, Career Professionals, Employers and Students,

My blog's mission is to help prepare career seekers for passionate, profitable and fun careers in what can only be called The Global Workplace - or perhaps, the "Multicultural Office."

It seems to me that we're sort of living in a precarious Best of Times / Worst of Times scenario for America's industrial, educational and civic leadership. The so-called "Death of Distance" brought on by converging technologies, lowering trade barriers and easier (and in some cases cheaper!) travel is creating a world full of opportunities and challenges. Since our future corporate, civic, clerical and community leaders are going to be dealing with this in ways we can barely imagine, it only makes sense to help prepare them for those opportunities and challenges.

The good news: There's never been a better time for career seekers to empower, enrich, and enjoy themselves "on the job." For example, while forecasts vary wildly, there's strong arguments that nanotechnology and the Green "movement" will be trillion$ industries in coming years; with product/service ramifications for millions of new jobs. (That will be the theme of one of my next blogs). And it's not just new technologies, but brand new roles created by changing political, economic and social factors. Can you say "retail climatologist?" - "neural marketer" - "cyber criminilogist" - "virtual concierge" ?? It's a long list... :>)

The bad news: Not only is the precipitous decline in our youths' test scores well documented (29th and 34th place out of 35, respectively in science and math, according to the international Organization for Economic and Cooperative Development), but turns out we're equally naive in our "geographic" awareness, as exemplified by National Geographic's 2006 survey of American 18-24 year olds... you know, the same ones getting ready to enter the workforce, having children and going off to fight wars in places that they literally can't find on a map.

So what's the big deal? Well, "They" - our global neighbors - are already "Here", now. They're moving aggressively into new industries and alliances, graduating well-educated, motivated students. They represent potential customers, vendors, partners, investors - and competitors. And guess what? Like the story of the Blind Men and the Elephant - they all "see" through different perspectives. Unfortunately, we know a lot less about them than they do about us - which is a trend we must reverse...

So back to the mission. I guess I come from the school that says if you want people to change, one must appeal to their higher interests and emotional hot-buttons. Which is why my public persona is as an "Edutainer", using stories, lessons learned and intriguing trivia to light a fire. Maybe it's from six continents of rambling around, or maybe from my obsession with goings-on in the world, but I'm convinced that we can definitely turn this challenge around by helping kids - and adults - to become more aware, informed and connected to ways that will excite, and embolden and enrich, them. The trick is to get the iPod out of their ear and CSI turned off, and the only way to do that is to replace those opiates with even stronger "attractors."

For example, in coming posts, I'll talk about Hot New Careers that even most guidance counselors and job fairs aren't talking about yet. These already exist, in both traditional and new fields - and many pay very, very well.

We'll also talk about how to prosper in the "Multicultural Office" - how to create productive relationships and avoid cross-cultural collisions with all those folks who see, think and act differently than us.

And we'll talk about emerging new practices (business and social), such as Conscientious Capitalism , Microcredit Lending, and Voluntourism that are truly "Lifting the World' and providing Win-Win-Win scenarios for all involved.