Happy New Year and Best Wishes for a Prosperous 2015
I read an very interesting article over the weekend in Fortune Magazine (January 2015) titled “Start-up: You.” The premise of the article is that employment as we have known it had fundamentally changed. Additionally, the way on progresses in your career is also different. Gone are the days of corporations guiding you along your career path. You are responsible for your career. Thus, the free agent nation. There is also a book “Free Agent Nation, The Future of Working for Yourself” by Daniel Pink.
I am one of the approximately 30 million self-employed workers in the United States. Did I see it coming? No way. I was progressing along in my career starting as a research scientist at IBM (mostly R and a little D), then on to mostly D and a little R as a R&D manager at AlliedSignal Electronic Materials. When I joined AlliedSignal, I shifted from individual contributor to R&D manager, and then R&D Director. After AlliedSignal, I joined Ablestik Labs as R&D Director and eventually Vice President of R&D and Engineering. After the Henkel acquisition of Ablestik (and E&C) in 2008, I was given “an opportunity to prosper elsewhere.” In other words, I was a synergy savings, since the new combined business didn’t need two VP’s of R&D.
I quickly decided that back to corporate America was not for me. So I struck out on my own, became a free agent. The rest they say is history. I started InnoCentrix in September 2008 and have not looked back. The great recession made it a pretty difficult start-up, but you have to be persistent and patient.
I wonder what this effect has had on the polymer/plastics industry? When I started InnoCentrix, my sole focus way to become a boutique consulting firm focused solely on the polymer/plastics industry. I don’t do any other materials or industries. So far that has worked for me.
The Fortune article talks about the startup of you. It outlines 5 key attributes that a successful “startup of you” will require. One of them that resonated with me is “bet on who you work with, not on where.” The premise is that successful startups are a collection of great people. Owning my own business allowed me to work with some really great clients. It also afforded me the ability to choose not to work with some clients. I also have a great team of associates that have worked on projects from Russia, Germany, Korea, China as well as many clients in the United States. Jim Collins in his book Good to Great also talks about “Who first, then What.” In other words, get the right team of great people in place first, and figuring out what to do will come easily. Sounds simple, but I have found both in corporate America and in my own business, surrounding yourself with great people is the key to being successful.
Are you a member of the free agent nation? If so, I’d like to hear your experience in the comment section.
Next week I will be back with a new series on cure monitoring using dielectric spectroscopy. Have a great week!
Leave a Reply