“Will my career end in failure?” Sounds like it

The Financial Times agony aunt (yes it does have one) Lucy Kellaway recently tackled an issue that tweaked my interest, regarding feelings of failure at the end of a career. This is an extraordinarily neglected subject. What do we say to someone who, near retirement, becomes convinced they have failed: finally, fatally, forever.

Posted first on FT.com to elicit public responses prior to Lucy’s, this was the problem (nutshelled): “I’m a successful businessman approaching career’s end but haunted by a sense of failure. I missed out on the CEO post but stayed on. Now I feel sidelined. Nobody pays much attention and nobody will remember me. They say ‘all political careers end in failure’. Is this also true of business careers?” – Director, male, 57.

Lucy’s replies are usually spot-on but I felt this one lacked some empathy. Yes, she said, nearly all business careers end in failure. They can end in big, spectacular failure – like, say, the career of Tony Hayward – or they can end in little anonymous failure – like our 57-year old director.

She suggested that things may have ended no better had he won the CEO post and that, he should realize, the feelings of failure are “all inside your own head – no one else will care one way or another”. She offered “various mental tricks” to help him feel better, such as “comparing himself to unsuccessful people”. “I suggest you force yourself to stop thinking about success altogether,” she concluded, as “such thinking always ends in tears. The only way to deal with these horrid truths is denial – to distract yourself with other thoughts”.

I doubt this made our man feel any better about his predicament. Lucy is a highly-successful writer (the inventor of the hilarious Martin Lukes), so she may have had difficulty empathizing with the energy-sapping dull pain of realization and disappointment that had depleted this man’s self-esteem so late in his career. Unlike Lucy, he hadn’t achieved his goals, and now felt he wouldn’t. There are few mental tricks – and especially not denial – that can suppress such a thought.

So what could I say to make this man’s outlook more positive? Looking for ideas, I read the reader’s responses, which were predictably less measured.

• FT reader: "Wow – you maintained a decent position into your late 50s. That’s success. I hope I’m as lucky as you."

This chimes with Lucy’s mental tricks in my opinion. Reframing your thoughts to focus on the positive will offer only the briefest of respites. By his own standards this man has failed. And it’s his perceptions that matter: no one else’s.

• FT reader: "You seem to be suffering from the kind of existentialist angst that most folk address in their teens."

I absolutely agree with this, although I’d replace “most” with “many” as “most” people never face existentialist angst at all. Facing it at 57 is no crime, and will have its advantages: he should be mature enough to cope with the realization that “yes” he will die and “no” he will not achieve everything he wants to achieve. Writing to Lucy is just the start of his coming to terms with this “awful truth”.

• FT reader: "Incredibly narcissistic. Why should anyone remember you? What have you done to make the world a better place? Have you eradicated world famine?"

He knows this – hence the crisis. Yet there are many ways to change the world, not just through charity. Our 57-year old worked for a mid-sized multinational – probably the strongest sector historically for producing life-saving drugs or equipment or even ideas. Also, charity workers have their own benchmarks of achievement, not all of the “save the planet” variety.

• FT reader: "You may wish to consider not defining success by what others may or may not think of you."

He hasn’t. He’s measured himself against his own standards – the billions that failed to achieve his status are, quite rightly, irrelevant.

But among the trite replies were two I thought worthy of further thought. “If you really want to be a CEO,” said the first, “then you are still close to the average age and over 20% of CEOs are in their 60s.”

Certainly, the other guy may falter or become disliked by the board, or there may be a crisis that requires a different sort of head (bringing Mr. Haywood to mind again). Yet why wait? They’ve made their choice and, to be frank, they probably expected (wanted even) you to take the hint and go. One assumes some form of early retirement is possible (making a nuisance of yourself may be a good way of getting this on the table) perhaps with some lucrative consultancy projects as a further sweetener. Meanwhile, sourcing non-exec positions with smaller companies looking for your kind of experience can help rebuild your self-esteem. There are even agencies that can help in this quest.

This brings in the second interesting comment, which declared: “at the end of the game nobody will spend time wondering how the knight on the side of the board got there. They are all pondering THEIR next move, and so should you”.

Certainly, it’s the next move that counts, not the last one (which was a setback you seem to relive daily). The key is to get a plan, develop a strategy and become an effective executioner. With this in mind, I think Stephen Covey’s the man for you. His Seven Habits of Highly Effective People will shake you from your self-fulfilling stupor of negativity, even at your age.

With breath-taking abridgement, here they are:
1) “Be proactive” (don’t mope around the office writing to Lucy – take action),
2) “Begin with the end in mind” (work out what you really want in the long term and move towards that goal with every step you take),
3) “Put first things first” (plan your route),
4) “Think win/win” (this is a must in terms of changing your current win/lose thinking, which is probably making you a bit of a pain in the office),
5) “Seek first to understand, then to be understood” (with every conversation, listen to others rather than inwardly shouting “listen to me”),
6) “Synergize” (develop your network, and use it).
7) “Sharpen the saw” (develop the skills you need to succeed – don’t struggle on with rusty instruments).

At your age it’s also worth considering Covey’s 8th Habit, written as a follow-up to the multi-million selling Seven Habits… . This habit requires you to “find your voice and help others find theirs’,” he states – making the point that self-obsession is desperately unhealthy (as you now realize), while “choosing to serve is the most effective habit of all”. He implores us to find our “unique personal significance”: the key element of ourselves that we can offer to others, perhaps via teaching, mentoring (maybe through non-exec roles) or even consultancy – anything that can pass on that hard-acquired wisdom. Certainly, such a quest would make the perfect final innings for a man of your calibre.

And if you think 57 too old to start, then you are probably right. On the other hand, if you think – with your age and experience – you are now in the perfect place to get going on forging your own path (rather than one dictated by a soulless and myopic board), then – again – you are probably right. So what if you drop dead en route? What a great way to go – far better than staring at the rain everyday and wondering what might have been.