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Solve anything with Dr. Mark: Career advice for the working class; Outsider at work

By Dr. Mark Goulston, Source: Tribune Media Services

Q: I am in sales and I've been at my company for six months and my co-workers are still treating me like an outsider. It's starting to affect my work because I feel intimidated. Can I get over this?

A: Yes you can, but it's time to dive (vs. divide) and conquer. First decide whether your company promotes people rooting against each other, in which case you're not an outsider, everyone is an outsider, in which case you need to stop taking it so personally. If people try to help each other, but you're just out of the loop, go to your supervisor. Tell him/her that you're not satisfied with your performance. Say that you want to do better and are planning to take each of your co-workers out to breakfast or lunch to pick their brains on how you might improve your sales. Hopefully he'll go along if what you're requesting is something that will help you to increase your sales.

Go to each co-worker and tell them you ran the idea of going out with them by your supervisor who told you to go for it. When you meet with your co-workers ask each of them:

1. What is something they wish someone had told them when they started selling at your company?

2. What is the number one thing they think you should avoid doing to succeed in sales and why?

3. What was the best sale that they ever made and what did they think enabled them to close it?

Whatever they say, act and be genuinely grateful and compliment them on some part of the sale that you think they feel proud about. Ask them to elaborate on how and where they learned to do that, because people love to share stories of how they mastered something. Finish by thanking them, saying that you'd like to try what they did and would like to talk to them at a later time about how it worked for you and asking them to come up with something that you can do for them to return the favor. Then go out and try putting their suggestion into practice. Flattering them in this way may be just enough to get them to start rooting for you, or at the very least to stop giving you a hard time.

Searching for mojo

Q: I am in my early thirties and specialize in marketing for start-up or early-stage Internet companies that want to go viral. I have been laid off twice in the last year in companies that burned through too much capital too quickly before they developed traction.

My particular marketing skills are marketable and I will be able to find another job at another company. But I am really ticked off and have a bad attitude, which I am having trouble shaking. It's starting to come out in conversations with friends and is difficult to hide in interviews for jobs, since I am not good at hiding my feelings. I would like to feel and act more positive, but just like you can't be a little bit pregnant, I can't go back to being so naive and cheery when I know how unpredictable things can be at young companies that hire me for my services. How do I get my mojo back?

A: I have run into similar unpredictability especially when it comes to working with the entertainment industry, where I don't want to set myself up to be too disappointed, but I don't want to come off as too negative either. What has worked to center me is to adapt a mindset where I have high hopes, realistic expectations but don't count on anything.

But something that lifted me from centered to positive came after I recently worked with two men who were also in their thirties and who like you were between jobs for the second time in the same year. The first guy was cynical, bitter and spent nearly a whole session coming off as an angry victim at the companies he worked for. Fortunately by not getting into a debate with him and instead letting him punch himself out, we were able to get to the underlying issue, i.e. that he was afraid that this pattern would just keep happening, endlessly.

The second man however was in the exactly same position, but he was incredibly positive and almost giddy when I saw him. Struck by the incredible contrast between the two, I asked him how he could be so positive. He responded: "I was just thinking how good being between jobs, but still marketable is going to look when I'm in my fifties and possibly un-hirable."

I realized from him that if you can look at your present through the eyes of your future, you can easily see your glass as more than half full, and feel grateful to be able to have the time to take charge of your life and make it turn out better.



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Mark Goulston, M.D. is a Santa Monica-based business psychiatrist, executive coach and author of "Get Out of Your Own Way at Work." Question him at mgoulston@markgoulston.com. Visit him at: www.markgoulston.com