New job: helping me first, then us

Abe Greenspoon
Nov 8 · 7 min read

About a month ago, I started a new project. I’m now at Statistics Canada and have been given some responsibility to lead the department’s approach to organizational health. After four years working on Canada’s Free Agents, a project I poured my heart and soul into, I’m now starting something new. And lately I’ve been feeling an urge to write about my experience. Writing is useful for me, but I also write because I value working in the open so that others can learn with me.

I’m planning to write four separate pieces in the coming weeks: 1) how I went about finding a new job; 2) what it was like to start a new job; 3) how I’m going about thinking about my new mission; and 4) what I’m planning to do next.

The first two parts are personal reflection. If you’re not interested in my story, I don’t take offence — again I’m also writing for my own benefit. If you’re just here to learn about my work on organizational health, you’re welcome to wait for part three.

But in my view, organizational health is about the conditions in which we as humans will be successful in organizations. This means we need to understand ourselves and be able to bring our whole selves to our work. So for me, knowing myself and exploring my being always comes before any efforts I make to help and support others. Or as the title of this first blog suggests, I need to help me first, then us.

Therefore, I hope my personal story is illustrative of one possible approach to health, change, transformation, modernization, improvement, or whatever your mission is.


This summer I finally came to terms with the fact that I needed to change jobs. I think I knew this was true a lot earlier, but after building something new and feeling proud of what I had helped create, it was hard to walk away. My personal connection with the work, the people, and the mission had become so strong it was difficult to admit that I was no longer meeting my own expectations in my role.

I compare my experience to what I’ve read about the experience of founders of some new businesses. Eventually, as the organization grows and evolves, it seems the founder often needs to evolve into a CEO or make space for someone with a different skill-set. I’m not sure if I’m the CEO type. And even if I am, I wasn’t able to make the transition with Free Agents. I’m not sure if I consider that a failure, but I do know that I learned a lot about myself from it that I’m building on in my new role.

After announcing I was leaving, I felt a weight lift off of my shoulders —definitely a sign that I was making the right decision. But in the same moment, it occurred to me that I hadn’t really thought about finding a new job in over four years. This sent me down a rabbit hole of self-reflection, asking myself questions about my strengths and weaknesses, my passions, my motivations, and my value. After a few months I emerged from the rabbit hole with a decision — and one that I never would have guessed I’d make.

I’ve spoken to quite a few people about the process I used to pick my job and several people have commented that they either have a similar process or they felt they would benefit in some way from similar thinking. So I’m sharing a few key points about how I approached my search. NB: Keep in mind, I wasn’t looking for a promotion, only a lateral job change. YMMV if your main goal is to compete for a higher level job.

  1. Know thyself. Over the past few years, lots of people have asked me for advice about choosing their jobs. And I always start with the same thing — know yourself deeply. Ask yourself questions like “What do I really want to do?”, “What am I truly good at?”, “How do I really want to work?”, “In what conditions have I been successful in the past and in what conditions do I think I’ll be successful in the future?”, and “What matters more to me — the mission I’m on or the people I work with?” There are many more that might matter to you. If you can’t answer these types of questions very clearly, I don’t think you’re ready to meet people to talk about their work. Consider also what trade-offs you’re willing to make and separate into “must have” and “nice to have”.
  2. Use your network. I don’t think “cold calling” really works. Being introduced is way better. Reach out to people you know and talk to them about your answers to the above questions and see if they know of any work that would be a good fit. Even if they’re not hiring, it never hurts to follow leads and you’ll be surprised how willing people are to help if you are courteous and kind.
  3. Be authentic. Speaking of being courteous and kind, if you ask for a meeting with someone, be honest about your goals. If you know that you need certain conditions (telework, autonomy), have certain limitations (language, location), and are only interested in a specific field (HR, policy) then say that to everyone you talk to. Again, this requires you to know yourself (see point 1).
  4. Ask the right questions. Once you’ve drafted and answered the questions from point 1, you need to have a method to determine whether the jobs you’re considering meet your expectations. For each “must have” condition of your next job, consider what question you could ask a hiring manager that might tell you whether the job meets your needs. Don’t be afraid to dig deep and ask pointed questions. If you sense you’re getting vague or evasive answers, that could be a red flag.
  5. Seek references. Hiring managers should stand behind their reputation and the reputation of their workplace. They should take pride in the environment they create and be willing to admit when they have had challenges with people on their team. If this is true for the hiring managers you speak to, they should be willing to openly provide the names of people on their team and even the names of people who have left the team recently. Speaking to these people should help provide additional insights into the workplace and the management. Just as hiring managers ask you for references to validate your suitability for them, so should you ask for references to validate their suitability for you.

And so just to briefly illustrate, these five points added up to this for me:

  1. The mission of the public service resonates with me deeply. I want to make the public service better. I want to help people do better work in the public service. I need autonomy and the ability to have flexible work hours and work locations. I’m much better right now at building things from scratch rather than sustain things once they’re built. I’m good at listening and can translate people’s experiences into action. I have high confidence in the integrity of my actions and decisions and this translated into a kind of fearlessness that can be useful for risky innovations. I have I value honesty, humility, empathy, learning, and psychological safety.
  2. I started by emailing people I trust deeply and told them everything from point 1. Not only did this make it easier for them to think about potential places to work, it also helped me validate whether my message was clear and how it might resonate as a “pitch” of sorts.
  3. I shared everything from point 1 (and more) with prospective hiring managers. I told them that I was taking my time making a decision and a set a firm deadline which I clearly stated. I talked about the process I use when joining a new team (which I’ll talk about in my next blog). I was honest about examples in my past where I’ve failed.
  4. Flexibility and autonomy are make-or-break for me — I need both. So I asked questions about management styles, reporting expectations, policies on telework, how to communicate changing schedules, examples of people who are working in the way I want to, etc.
  5. Once I had a few clear “winners” for places I was pretty sure I would succeed, I again sought out people I trusted who either had worked for the managers I was considering or knew them well enough to vouch for them. When possible, I met with other managers and staff from the team without the hiring manager present. I always related my conversations back to point 1 and asked whether they felt this was the right place for my interests.

Like I said in the beginning, I think this process is critical because I don’t want to work in an organization where I can’t bring my whole self to contribute to the mission. I’ve been there and it’s at best unfulfilling and at worst soul crushing. This sort of process takes time, but I believe if more people were given or simply took the time going through this kind of thinking, we’d see higher productivity and fewer health issues in our workplaces.

Finally, I want to express my infinite gratitude that I work for an employer (the Government of Canada) where I have the privilege of being able to find and do work that is meaningful to me and meets my personal and professional needs. It’s a gift and I hope I don’t ever take that for granted or stop working as hard as I can to contribute to our incredibly important mission.

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