Changes, questions and answers

Snatch

The news are bad. The context does not help. Opinion columns in magazines and newspapers all too often refer to the generation that lives between crises, those of us who have no job opportunities.

Alfredo, a young engineer, recently hatched less than five years ago, does not identify with this mantra. Since he jumped from the classroom to the office, he has had no shortage of work. He was not a brilliant student, but he has been able to seek out good opportunities. So much so that, in his constant search for the golden chalice, he had not lasted more than a year in any one company. Those who know him know that he is now in the ideal place to grow. He arrived a year ago at his current company, where he holds a position of responsibility, despite his insulting youth.

Today is an important day, salary review day. The perfume of great occasions, the tie of luck, and off to the bull!

Just as he gets into the car on his way home, without the tie already knotted around his neck, he dials the phone of an old friend to tell him about the catastrophe: the only increase has been in promises and responsibilities. The salary would have to wait.

He was not a brilliant student, but he has been able to seek out good opportunities.

After the conversation, Alfredo is not satisfied with his friend’s final conclusions and, so capricious is fate that, as soon as he gets home, he comes across a LinkedIn message in the form of a seductive Recruiter.

Why not, he thought.

After several days of conversations with this new “friend”, Alfredo agreed to meet his suitor and, above all, to find out the terms on which they could reach an agreement. In other words: the starting price.

Wow. What a figure. More than double.

Houston, we have a problem.

Loyalty

Days, evenings, nights, weeks, months and years. Joys and sorrows. Hours of work and fun. There was no more for Sara to give. Ten years of fruitful relationship. A child came into the world and, today, there is a mother of a family.

For several months now she has been visited by a soft voice, more and more often, with a higher and higher tone of voice, insisting on the same thing: What’s out there? Shall we go for a walk? Are you going to retire in this chair?

Occasionally, our friend Sara would get carried away. A furtive application on a LinkedIn offer, a replied message or a CV sent to her cousin’s friend’s brother-in-law. And, unexpectedly, within a week, it all happened. Three interviews, a challenging project and a salary increase. And now what?

Anyone would have thought it was the logical thing to do. After a decade of faithful service to his company, he deserved a change. Shaking the foundations of this tower and dusting off some completely forgotten feelings: uncertainty, illusion, nervousness…

She does not want to live in that hidden stagnation to which personal and family circumstances lead so many women.

It is not so easy.

Sara is submerged in an ocean of doubts, in a vertigo of change that she never thought she would have. No one could guarantee that this new opportunity would go well. Besides, with a family behind her, she has to think about her moves very carefully.

On the other hand, he had to change, he could not risk becoming a professional relic with no future usefulness in the market. She does not want to live in that hidden stagnation to which personal and family circumstances lead so many women. No, not her.

Signing, she just needs to muster enough strength to sign.

A professional career through the generations

Alfredo and Sara are two sides of the same coin in the face of a possible career change.

A consistent career path in which he has time to make an impact on the organisations in which he works.

For those of us who work with people and, more specifically, with the labour market, we observe a generalised tendency that points to an incomprehensible rush of the youngest profiles to climb a mountain against the clock, which contrasts with the chronic uncertainty of other people with more experience when it comes to relaunching their careers.

Alfredo should prioritise “more important” aspects than money: a consistent career path in which he has time to make an impact on the organisations in which he works. Besides, where is the word if we only focus on the financial amount? Growth requires patience.

For her part, Sara is facing a great opportunity not to lose herself in indifference and to feel the adrenaline of learning again. Perhaps this new company will not be her last, but after so many years in the same space, where you have already reached your ceiling (unlike Alfredo), change is the only way to enjoy the day to day.

Faced with the same change, there will always be the same doubts, but different answers.