Five Tips to Thrive in an Unpredictable Market

Career & Entrepreneurial Transi0ons:  
Five Tips on How to Thrive in Today’s Economy 
Michelle Awuku‐Tatum| Career Transi6on Expert & Coach 

Michelle Awuku‐Tatum | Career Transi6on Expert & Coach| email: michelle@myfactorcoach.com | oﬃce: 646‐706‐7577 |
www.myfactorcoach.com. Copyright © 2009 myfactor coaching & consul6ng, inc. All rights reserved

What’s Going On? 

Today’s unpredictable market is s6rring up a lot of feelings and reac6ons: 
•  Fear of the unknown 
•  Herd mentality / Lost in the crowd 
•  Devia6on from the core 
•  Lots of heads buried in the sand 
•  Con6nuous self‐promo6on 
•  Decreased value (perceived or real) 
•  Depressed / low energy 
•  Loss / Lack of control 
•  Passivity / Inac6on 

OPPORTUNITY: A lot of successful companies were created during a downturn. Johnson & Johnson, 
IBM, HP, 20th Century Fox, Apple, MicrosoD, FedEx & CNN to name a few. How can we use this Gme 
to seize and idenGfy opportuniGes? Thriving in today’s economy posiGons you to accelerate your 
transiGon during the upswing.  

www.myfactorcoach.com. Copyright © 2009 myfactor coaching & consul6ng, inc. All rights reserved 
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1. Mind Your Ethos 

•  Reframe your thoughts: 
–  Eliminate condi6onal language  
–  Focus on your a`en6on on your desired outcome ‐  What’s your vision?  
–  Recall a 6me when you accomplished something that made you feel proud 
–  Instead of “I can’t....” think “How can I....?”  
•  Be approachable  
•  Do something diﬀerent every week 
•  Laugh 
•  Manage your environment – eliminate / minimize nega6vity 
•  Take care of yourself 
•  Take a class 

THOUGHT: You have a choice, you can choose to par6cipate in the recession or  choose not to. What 
do you choose? 

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2. Refine and Share Your Factor 
•  Refine Your Factor 
What’s Your Factor?  –  What are you known for? 
“Your factor can be a number of  –  What makes you stand out? 
things such as your vision, values,  –  Which 3‐5 adjec6ves do your friends, peers, and/or manager 
story, strengths, approach,  use to describe you? 
effecGveness or purpose. It is what  –  How do you want to be perceived? 
makes you stand out and forms  –  What do you do well?  
the essence of your leadership  –  What do you help others solve or do? 
brand. Living your leadership  –  How do you make people feel? 
brand, means that you  •  Share Your Factor 
strategically manage your career 
–  Form a diverse personal board of advisors or circle of trust to 
on your own terms and make  refine and promote your factor 
successful leadership transiGons.”  –  Mentor a junior colleague or high school student; join a not for 
profit board/organiza6on, volunteer. 
–  A lot of people talk about making difference and not many people try 
to make a difference. 

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3. Connect & Contribute 
•  Be of service to your network:  Be Connected: 
•  56% of female entrepreneurs menGoned 
–  Look for ways to add value, e.g.  share informa6on, ask 
a family member as part of their 
“how can I help you?”, share job opportuni6es  network, compared to only 40% of male 
–  Show apprecia6on, e.g. follow up, thank you notes  entrepreneurs. Women's networks 
consisted of an average of 20% family 
•  Help your network to help you:  members, compared to 14%  for men. 
–  Job Search: Share what you can speciﬁcally do for an 
•  42% of leaders cited their inability to 
organiza6on and the types of organiza6ons that you can  create a new network made their 
contribute to  transiGons challenging. 
–  Career Transi0on: Share your ideas, solicit their input 
•  African‐American women face serious 
and ask for referrals  challenges in their climb up the corporate 
ladder. 31% of surveyed execuGves 
•  Leverage your online network:  a]ribute their challenges to weaker or 
–  When you meet new people, follow up and connect  less strategic networks available to 
with them via LinkedIn, xing or plaxo, etc.  African‐American women. 
•  50‐60% of jobs are found through 
•  Diversify your network: 
networking. This increases to 70% for 
–  Inside and outside of your company and beyond family  seasoned and well connected job seekers 
and friends 
Source: Aldrich and Renzulli, UNC, Development Dimensions 
Interna6onal, Execu6ve Leadership Council & Execunet 

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4. Adopt an Entrepreneurial Spirit 

An entrepreneurial mindset is described as the entrepreneurial spirit, meant to 
cause the innovaGve and energeGc pracGce to idenGfy or create an opportunity 
and take acGon aimed at realizing it. 

How do you take ac6on to realize an opportunity?  “I did something that 
•  Define the opportunity / your next move as best as you can. Think about  challenged the banking 
what problem(s) you can solve. Evaluate your day to day ac6vi6es to  world. ConvenGonal banks 
iden6fy improvement opportuni6es. This typically starts with “I wish I  look for the rich; we look for 
could.. Wouldn’t it be great if.. Life would so simple if..”  the absolutely poor. All 
•  What addi6onal informa6on do you need to define the opportunity?  people are entrepreneurs, 
•  What addi6onal skills do you need? [Ref: h`p://home2.nyc.gov/html/ but many don't have the 
sbs/nycbiz/html/business_courses/fas`rac.shtml#FastTrac_NewVenture]  opportunity to find that 
•  Why are you pursuing this opportunity OR What is mo6va6ng you  to  out.”‐ Muhammad Yunus, 
Founder of Grameen Bank & 
pursue the opportunity? 
2006 Nobel Peace Prize for his 
•  Create your personal support network  efforts to create economic and 
•  Define your learning objec6ves   social development from below 
•  Pilot test your ideas before deciding to transi6on / pursue the opportunity

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5. Plan for Mul6ple What if Scenarios 

•  An eight month financial cushion will enable you to dream and move boldly 
•  Create mul6ple income streams 
–  Check out elance.com, guru.com sologig.com, iFreelance.com, etc. 
•  There are no guarantees that you will keep your job.  To op6mize your chances of 
finding a new job: 
–  Work with an execu6ve/career coach to iden6fy your strengths, what maèrs most to you and 
alterna6ve career paths. According to Lee Hecht Harrison, “People who use a career coach find jobs 15% 
to 46% faster than those who don’t.” 
•  Read professional development books  
–  Recommenda6ons: h`p://astore.amazon.com/myfacoacconsi‐20 
•  Join online communi6es, e.g. Career: Doostang.com, TheLadders.com, careerbuilder.com, 
Execunet.com; Entrepreneurial: herstartup.com, econnect.entrepreneur.com, score.org and 
startupna6on.com 

TAKE CONTROL: We have li`le to no control over the external forces at play and while this can make 
us act irra6onally, what is most important is our response. You do have complete control over how you 
respond in an unpredictable market. 

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Five Tips to Thrive in an Unpredictable Market

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