We know the adage “life imitates art.” This is life imitates job search.
Great jobs in organizations have six ingredients; a boss who motivates, a values aligned culture, work team compatibility, a fit for your life, appropriately challenging work, and – to crib a Steve Jobs’ phrase – one more thing.
That one more thing?
The same thing I saw in Erin and Ben’s wedding this summer. Read on to learn more.
Wedding events were held in the town of Hessel in Les Chenaux islands. If you’ve missed Hessel, you’re not alone. It’s in the Upper Peninsula (the UP) of Michigan, a large piece of the USA where only 3% of Michigan’s 10M people live. Bounded by three of the Great Lakes – Gitche Gummee (aka Superior) to the north and Michigan and Huron to the south and east – it is geography shaped by the last Ice Age.
The Mackinac Bridge, built in 1954, joins the UP with the much more populous lower part of Michigan. Until the bridge was built, the road to lower Michigan went through Wisconsin or Canada. If you’re from the UP you’re known as a “Yooper.” The UP word for people who live “below the bridge?” Trolls; Yooper humor at its best.
The UP is rural and remote. Apart from the tourists visiting Mackinac Island, what do you do in the UP? Outdoors stuff; hunting, camping and fishing. Snow mobiles are big. Ice fishing is too. Winter starts early and lasts long; it takes adaptability to live there. June is the first month when average high temperatures climb above 70 degrees.
The UP is also stunningly beautiful, blessed by a combination of lakes, land and forests. People are gracious, kind and friendly, even to die-hard partisan Westerners like me. Similar to very few other parts of rural America, this place will take off if / when broadband hits and people can easily work well-paying jobs anywhere they want. It will be like Bend, Oregon with an upper Midwest twist.
Dating life for well-educated, career-minded thirty-somethings like Erin who are looking to marry other career minded thirty-somethings is tough. Apart from the fact that there are few people (St. Ignace, home to Erin and Ben, has 2,500 people. Marquette, the biggest town in the UP has 24,000), the ambitious and educated mostly move away, something in common with the rest of the rural US.
And the job work connection?
What changes a job from good to great is that “one more thing” mentioned above. It’s a match when what you bring – whether it’s experience, personality, or skills – is highly appreciated, recognized and valued by the organization you join. In the recruiting world it’s called a “purple squirrel” – finding someone to fill an impossible to fill role that fits all the specifications.
With Erin and Ben it was the same. For Erin, an attorney returning to the UP after a fizzled marriage in Miami, it was finding something scarce – a guy who was funny, good looking, well educated with an interesting job who was willing adopt the “Yooper” lifestyle – and Erin’s family – and have kids. When Erin and I talked about the chances of finding a mate last year I figured her best bet was one of those tourists visiting Mackinac Island who fell for the area as much as I have. Not many prospects otherwise locally.
For Ben, who lived downstate (yes, he’s a troll), it was finding someone who liked dogs, was serious, unlike a previous long term relationship, about settling down and having a family, and wanted to do many of the same things he enjoyed. Really good looking and smart helped; “out of my league” was the way I recall Ben characterizing dating Erin.
In the end the wedding was one purple squirrel marrying another purple squirrel.
The best job? The same. The organization you join really values you for something special you bring and lets you know it, and you really appreciate what the organization offers, and don’t forget it.
Good luck. It happens. Just ask Erin and Ben.
Life Back West is an occasional set of writings focused on ways people, teams and organizations can be both more effective (doing the right thing) and more efficient (doing the right thing well). More about my 30+ years of work coaching execs, start up and leadership teams can be found at the “About J. Mike Smith and Back West, Inc.” sidebar at the Back West blog. Now welcoming new and known clients.