Taking your blinders off
What does career progress look like when your industry is constantly changing?
I reached out to this month’s Navigator, Ken Collins, to find out.
He recently started a new role as VP of Product for talent marketplace Torc. Below I’ve paraphrased our recent conversation on how he’s kept curiosity and experimentation at the core of his work while riding the waves of major tech shifts such as AI.
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What have you found particularly helpful for adapting to a field that’s changing rapidly?
I typically like to go through an axe-sharpening phase, I try not to speak unless I know what I’m talking about. Even as you get higher up the ladder to the C suite, people are always experimenting, and playing and tinkering with things that help inform their decisions.
In software delivery, you have whole systems built up around how to ship code faster. You want to find out how well it works as fast as you possibly can. My way of working is to take a real problem and see if that can be solved. In software, you learn it’s really more about the people than the code. You need to understand who’s using it. Whether your work is good or bad, “it’s not going to live to the heat death of the universe, so don't get emotionally attached to it.”
In my career, I like to experiment, I think a lot, I like to share what I’m working on over time, and it culminates into being able to move a little bit faster.
What advice would you give someone grappling with how to plan for the next step of their career?
I noticed a pattern in my career where I would stay somewhere for a short time and grow my skills fast and then stay at the next place for a while.
If you’re at a company for a long time, you’ve probably seen it grow, or shrink, or go through some major transformational change. Maybe you’ve seen the industry go through something similar. For people who have been at their company for a while, don’t stay too long. It may be time for a move when the person you’re meant to get help from at your job really can’t help you move forward.
“Try not to put the blinders on your value. … You have a perspective that's probably very valuable that other folks need in a different context, whether that's a different industry or the same type of company that's at a different stage of that growth.
“Believe in yourself — the things that you're doing now are actually probably pretty amazing.
“The things that you’ve known and seen are highly valuable to other companies, either big or small.”
I went from a relatively large company to an absolutely huge company, but the things that I learned at my last job are still valuable to the huge company.
“At my old company, I don't think that that would have been recognized as much, because it's hard for them to see the change of your career when they're right next to you, day by day by day. So they may not see that transformation.”
If you could go back and give your earlier self advice about finding fulfillment in your work, what would you tell him?
I was in a twin study as a young adult, and these psychologists would ask me a lot of questions about stress and coping. For me, I feel like a lot of things roll off my back. I try not to take things too personally.
“Know that things are not always perfect all the time, but make things work for you. … You’re in control of where you get to go. You get to choose who you work for. It may be hard at times (matching your skills to what the industry is looking for), but always try to make sure that it is fulfilling.”
Thank you, Ken, for sharing your advice! And thanks to all of you for supporting Career River. I’m thrilled with our lineup of Navigators to kick off 2025, be sure to check out what’s coming up next and save your spot for our upcoming webinars:
Bridget Thoreson
Happy navigating,
Bridget