Note: This is the second post in a series called, “Five Lessons” for students in my personal branding class at Lindenwood University in St. Charles, Missouri. Join the conversation with the hashtag, #PBandJterm.
Where did the box go? You know the one. The predicitable box. The box with instructions. The box with a map. The box with safety. The box with a secure future.
The industrial box.
Our parents and grandparents used to live in that box. Most of our schooling trained us for life inside of that box. Follow the rules and you’re guaranteed success and happiness.
Or so we thought.
Yes, in some industries, the box still exists. However, for creative students like yourselves, the sooner you realize the box is gone, the better off you will be.
The “box” represents an old, industrial economic mindset. The one where we trained employees and students to get in line and follow the rules. We could argue a number of influences shredded the box, but, namely, we’re talking about the “flattening of the earth” caused by the digital revolution as Thomas Friedman, author and columnist for The New York Times, described in his 2005 book. He postulates how we should “adapt” in this Op-Ed piece from 2013 entitled, It’s P.Q. and C.Q. as Much as I.Q.
“It will require more individual initiative. We know that it will be vital to have more of the “right” education than less, that you will need to develop skills that are complementary to technology rather than ones that can be easily replaced by it and that we need everyone to be innovating new products and services to employ the people who are being liberated from routine work by automation and software.”
While some may view Friedman’s take as pessimistic, there’s a bright side for students. Essentially, what he’s saying is, this:
In the new, post-industrial economy, passion and curiosity are just as important as a person’s intelligence.
And — lucky for us creatives — Passion and Curiosity don’t exactly play well INSIDE the box.
Waiting to Be Picked
In media courses, we often discuss the idea of the “gatekeepers” — the people in charge of choosing what content gets published, recorded, and produced. Previous generations of college students were provided instructions for how to “make it” in creative fields, as well as how to be “picked” by a gatekeeper.
Entrepreneur, thinker, and author Seth Godin offers this manifesto for Picking Yourself.
While I believe, we, in higher education, still have much to offer you — one of the most advantageous traits we can instill in you comes from my dear friend, television writer, and Lindenwood University Artist in Residence Rift Fournier. He used to say to students,
“You have to learn how to learn.”
Never has this advice been truer than it is at this moment in time. In closing, I challenge you to respond to these questions:
What does it mean to “learn how to learn?”
How can you use passion and curiosity to help chart your career path?
Do you agree with the premise of “picking yourself” as Seth Godin encourages? What steps can you take at this point in your education to start this process?
For links to our other lessons, see below. As part of class assignments, students were asked to reflect on the ideas presented. You can read their posts in the responses section.
Lesson #1: Success and happiness — the ‘why’ and the ‘how’ of your journey
Lesson #2: Where did the box go?
Lesson #3: Hustle. Connect. Share. Repeat. — A Four-Step Formula for Achieving Your Goals
