In this article we explore the professional identity through a temporal lens to identify the optimal balance between acknowledging the past, being present in the moment, and imagining an idealised future.
It draws on narrative concepts that are covered in the upcoming Strategic Narratives Masterclass, and is a sidebar to the essay What we might become: a topology of sharing. New installments to this essay will announced via the Radar mailing list.
Contents
- I. Career time horizons
- II. Extending time horizons
- III. Finding the optimal balance between past, present and future
- References
I. Career time horizons
A career time horizon represents the attention a person pays to their past, present and future at various times in their life, insofar it relates to their career (Figure 1). This temporal framing can help identify the optimal balance between acknowledging the past, being present in the moment, imagining and planning for an idealised future.
Figure 1. Attention paid to the past, present and future
A temporal framing enables us reflect on:
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What to pay attention to, and when
- Why some experiences became foundational to one’s core identity and self-narrative, and whether these are in their present and future best interests
- The emotions associated different time horizons, including how these can bias decision making
- Whether some experiences are overly fixated upon
- Opportunities that are more likely to be realised with advanced planning
Returning to our archetype, Anna, the following four examples (Figure 2) introduce the visual language of the career time horizon, where the length of the cone shows the temporal horizon, the breadth indicates a narrower or broader focus, and colour intensity signifies the depth of attention paid.
Figure 2. Career time horizon examples
We can combine these examples into a single framework (Figure 3), where ‘the present’ represents roughly one month—sufficient time to encompass a range of contexts that trigger Anna’s thought processes. Of everything Anna thinks about during this time period, these appear to be the most pertinent to her career.
Figure 3. Combining career time horizons
How attention is directed
Of everything Anna thinks about, what directs her attention to the past, present and future?
We can frame this question by whether the stimuli that direct Anna’s attention are driven by intrinsic or extrinsic stimuli, as shown in Figure 4. For example, organisations put employees through a range of processes such as annual performance reviews and goal setting that orientate employee attention to time horizons aligned to their planning cycles.
Figure 4. Intrinsic and extrinsic stimuli that direct Anna's attention
The examples in Figure 4 start out obvious, but become more interesting when we consider how a single act can lead to shifts in Anna’s mindset, behaviours, and a cascade of other acts.
To illustrate this, in Figure 5 Anna’s boss recognises her myopia in her approach to a particularly thorny problem and deliverable (A1), and asks her to attend a series of talks by her industry peers about changes in their industry with the stated aim of helping the organisation prepare for the future (A2).
Figure 5. Extrapolations from attendance an industry event
With her deadline looming Anna is reluctant to attend the event, but agrees:
On the surface it appears that her attendance was a bust—she only picks up a single insight that she considers relevant to her boss’s ask: how her organisation will need to prepare for changes in the industry. She then considers that this might be an opportunity to position herself as a change agent for this transformation.
However much of the value for Anna’s attendance lies elsewhere:
For starters: being away from her desk shifts her mindset from focusing solely on her deadline to placing her deliverable into a broader perspective, enabling her to consider alternative approaches to the challenges she is facing.
Surrounded by her industry peers, she reflects upon why some speakers are more memorable than others, the content of the talks, the speakers’ presence, behaviours, and the event’s dress code norms.
She also experiences momentary anger and anxiety from recalling an offhand comment made by a colleague about her appearance prior to a client presentation, which had undermined her confidence, and which still triggers resentment. Although it was crassly communicated by her colleague, she recognises that the underlying intent might be valid.
During the less engaging talks, Anna reflects on whether lessons learned from her past projects could add value to this community, and the network and reputation that would enable her to be invited on stage, engage the audience, and in-turn provide momentum to her career.
In this example, attending the event has reminded Anna of the value of shifting her mindset, to adapt her behaviours when interacting with colleagues in order to influence their decision making, and has led to a series of new acts. Not all of her thoughts are positive, but even so, she is able to put the recollection of a negative event into perspective and plot a way forward (including a mental note to refresh her work wardrobe).
Attendance has triggered a range of thoughts that draw on her past experiences, reconsider her present situation, and enable opportunities for the future. This invites the (currently rhetorical) question: Of everything we could spend time on, which experiences are most likely to lead to preferable career outcomes?
The pace of change in professional networks
Another way we can utilise time horizons is as a lens to view professional networks, with a nod to the relative advantage of weak social ties (Granovetter, 1973), the role of information brokers bridging structural holes (Burt, 1992), and different forms of social capital (Coleman, 1992).
Framing the evolution of a network temporally, prompts questions such as:
- How long does it take to establish an effective professional network?
- What level of investment is required to maintain a positive reputation i.e. to build or expend social capital, proactively reach out to peers, or associations with successful project outcomes?
- What touchpoints reinforce or undermine a preferred professional identity?
- In times of disruption, for example during organisational restructuring or downsizing, or landing a new job, what aspects of a person’s reputation transfers from one role or organisation to another?
- Over what time frame does a positive reputation depreciate if not maintained? Not in the sense of a reputation being tarnished, but rather that the spatial awareness of a person depreciates.
- What accelerates or decelerates this depreciation?
The following example highlights the evolution of my identity that occurred when moving from frog, to starting my own consultancy:
When I left frog and founded Studio D, an ex-colleague provided some sage advice that I return to every year: that the network, momentum and reputation from my role at frog would last around three years.
Another way to interpret this is that I would need to shed my past professional identities (built around various roles at Nokia and as Executive Creative Director of Global Insights at frog), morph into something recognisably new (founder of a fledgling consultancy), and figure out how to demonstrate the value of that new identity through business development to clients who are unfamiliar with or disinterested in my past.
In the event my evolution didn’t pan out in a three-year timeframe—it took closer to a decade—but her advice is still sound. In essence my ex-colleague was asking “How long does your past reputation sustain future opportunities?”. Since I’m in a consultancy that was reliant on client projects the question is a matter of Studio D’s survival, especially as I have an aversion to traditional forms of business development such as responding to RFPs, networking within established professional communities, publishing case studies, listing clients on our website, and the like.
Reflecting on why my public identity evolved at this glacial pace:
I attribute a number of reasons my evolution was closer to a decade than the three years she suggested: producing an artefact (The Field Study Handbook) that became a totem for a community of practitioners and generated many ongoing conversations, a training offering that maintained our presence in a wide range of organisations, demonstrating broadly consistent values across my career, a luggage brand that encapsulated many of these values, and focussing Studio D’s offering on a well defined niche.
Only some of these touchpoints were part of a larger strategy: the Handbook was six years in the making, SDR Traveller took three years from the initial prototype to the first retail unit, with my values being the consistent thread that bound these and other activities together. However, most of the things that enabled Studio D’s commercial viability were more reactive, enabled by responding quickly to opportunities as they arose, with the input of a strong team and network.
This personal example is of course highly subjective. It takes time for changes to the public facing identity to filter through to different audiences (something we’ll cover when we unpack the impact of sharing). I still have people reach out after discovering decades-old articles, expecting to converse with that version of myself.
If consistent values support the transfer of reputation across roles, should these be stated implicitly or explicitly?
The explicit expression of values through the publication of a manifesto, opinion piece, organisational ‘what we stand for’ statements have merit in some situations, but are often too cloying, and polarising. The implicit approach that we adopted for Studio D is for values to be embedded in all public touchpoints (such as the tonality of articles, client project deliverables, other artefacts), plus every interaction, conversation, and decision. This approach provides the audience with more leeway to reinterpret values based on their own context.
The evolution of a professional identity over time
“What do you do for a living?”
Although the professional identity is constantly evolving people are often pushed to articulate a more static version of their current self through this seemingly innocuous question.
How do you answer this question?
How has your response changed over time?
From speaking with our Reflecting Forward fellows, the most interesting responses to these questions are articulated in times of considerable transition. This often results in one of three main outcomes, to:
- reiterate an outdated version of oneself,
- acknowledge being in a state of significant transition, or,
- gravitate to something new and (probably) untested.
Returning to our archetype Anna who previously worked in finance in London, now three-months into living in Kigali, Rwanda in support of her partner’s career, and early in the process of turning her hobby, carpentry, into a fledgling business (Figure 6). On arrival in Rwanda, and depending on her relationship with the asker she alternates her answers between “I (still) work in finance”, “I worked in finance” or “I’m still figuring it out”, to “I’m a carpenter”, and occasionally “I’m a carpenter and entrepreneur”.
Figure 6. Forces that anchor us in the past, or propel us to the future
To unpack some of these terms:
- Investments, e.g. the commitment of time, effort, social capital and other resources to build and maintain an identity,
- Environment, i.e. community, city, country, where associations with the past identity are omnipresent and assumed to remain static unless proactively updated,
- Public touchpoints, e.g. a business card, website, or a mention in the media,
- Meaningful moments, absorbed into the core identity and structured in a self-narrative,
- Risk of failure, and ‘permission’ to fail from family, close friends, peers or society.
For people whose sense of self worth is wrapped up in their professional identity the “I’m still figuring it out” response is often considered an admission of failure, rather than a positive recognition of potential evolution. The past provides comfort, the future offers hope and new opportunities, whereas acknowledging a transition reveals that change was required or that we were at the mercy of forces outside our control.
Figure 7. A foundation for embracing a significant transition
There is significant value in embracing the discomfort of a significantly transitional period, ideally with supportive relationships and community, emotional and financial security (Figure 7).
A transitional period provides the mental space to evaluate what aspects of prior identities we wish to retain, what and whom to jettison or let drift away, and to ensure the next iteration of our evolution is built on firm foundations. (I’m writing this as someone going through another significant identity transition, perhaps the fourth such iteration in my lifetime).
Although the above inventories are focussed on the self, we can broaden our thinking to compass two other notable factors that direct attention to particular time horizons—dependents and finances
The impact of dependents
Responsibility for others (rather than focussing on oneself) orientates attention towards the future. Decisions require longer lead-in times to accommodate socialisation, alignment, and (in healthy relationships) compromise. For example, plans for a child’s education, to provide a stable home life, ensure access to adequate healthcare, or support for an elderly relative (Figure 8), or supporting colleagues in the workplace.
Figure 8. The impact of dependents
Noted cultural differences underpinning a person’s default stance on dependencies, are whether one’s belief system is formed within an ‘I’ or ‘We’ culture, plus norms around multigenerational households and familial relationships.
The impact of personal finances
Personal finances have a direct impact on where attention is directed. We set budgets for a given time period, save for larger purchases, pay rents and make mortgage repayments. All of these emphasise the importance of maintaining a steady income and building a financial safety net to cope with unforeseen events.
Figure 9. Time horizons of financial commitments
Unsustainable debt (Figure 10) profoundly limits longer term thinking, directs attention to mitigating negativities in the present, (ensuring survival, maintain income sources), whilst being dragged down by past decisions (borrowing money, events that led to this current predicament).
Figure 10. Time horizons for unsustainable debt
At the other end of the financial health spectrum, healthy savings and living off investment returns, provide the mental space to be present in the moment, and to decide when to direct attention to the future.
II. Extending time horizons
Thus far we’ve assumed orienting attention within a single lifetime, such as:
- Moments, e.g. reading a book and making previously-unrealised connections between past experiences and one’s current situation,
- Events, e.g. corporate restructuring, or a change in relationship status,
- Phases, e.g. recognising a suboptimal rate of evolution whether from boredom or a sense of stagnation, or that with frequent bouts of anxiety realising that one’s current situation is unsustainable.
However, we can extend time horizons to past and future generations, as shown in Figure 11. For example:
- Prior generations: acknowledging the sacrifices made by parents and grandparents to enable a university education; the adoption of narratives from a historically marginalised community; or opportunities enabled by an inheritance,
- Future generations: temper the impact of current lifestyle choices on the environment, inheritance planning, or setting children up for success.
Figure 11. Multi-generational time horizons
For practitioners interested in narrative theories, these multigenerational considerations often reference the higher strategic narrative layers.
III. Finding the optimal balance between past, present and future
To return to the starting point in this article: there is an optimal balance between acknowledging the past, being present in the moment, and realising an idealised future. The balance that is optimal for you will change at different life stages, contexts, and compared to others.
It is highly likely that the peers you admire for seeming to know what they want have either gone through multiple painful transitions to reach this point, or will later find themselves significantly challenged by maintaining a too blinkered perspective. The shock of recognising the limitations of one‘s prior thinking is often articulated as a ‘mid-life crisis’, but in reality can occur during any life stage.
The past provides a foundation for a core identity, often recalled through a self-narrative structure. Deciding what to include and emphasise in one’s self narrative is a choice, along with what to jettison, or depreciate.
‘Letting go’ of past experiences is an integral part of everyone’s personal evolution, which requires acknowledging and (sometimes) challenging familial, societal, gender, peer group and other pressures for the past roles we’ve adopted or found ourselves forced into. Identity transition can be eased by curating relationships, nurturing environments and new communities that are conducive to your (and their) personal evolution.
Recognise that for some, being present in the moment is a luxury—whereby financial debts, familial dependences and expectations force a sometimes brutal level of prioritisation.
In today’s information landscape, the biggest challenge to being present in the moment is filtering out other people’s present, i.e. the constant bombardment of social media content that has been weaponised to monetise your attention.
We all have it within us to realise an idealised future albeit with two significant caveats.
Firstly, if we doggedly decide to pursue a path that could lead us to our preferred outcome, it is ‘merely’ a matter of the sacrifices we need to make to arrive there—whether friendships, relationships, health, or ethics. How will your future self reflect on these sacrifices? And how does each sacrifice change what you have become?
Secondly, regardless of what idealised future we’ve committed to, and the pressures we’re under to achieve them, deciding what makes us successful, content or whatever goals we prioritise—is a choice. The easiest, and arguably most fulfilling way to achieve ‘career success’ is to redefine what we mean by ‘career’ and what we mean by ‘success’, and to make peace with the answers.
References
Adding an insightful comment from reader Lena Belin. “We don't just make meaning of our experiences, but we act in order to align with the identities that are created in the process of adapting or doubling down, which in turn creates new experiences and so on. I think this is another function of narratives, we don't just make them to make sense, but we act upon them to stay congruent, and by doing so, inevitably change”
If your interest extends to cultural perceptions of time there is a deep body of literature, with Robert Levine’s A Geography Of Time (1998) an accessible entry point.
- Granovetter, Mark S. The Strength of Weak Ties. American Journal of Sociology 78, no. 6 (1973): 1360–80.
- Burt, Ronald S. Structural Holes: The Social Structure of Competition. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1992.
- Bourdieu, Pierre. The Forms of Capital. In Handbook of Theory and Research for the Sociology of Education, edited by John G. Richardson, 241–58. New York: Greenwood Press, 1986.
Photos: Sichuan Province + Shanghai suburbs. I'm also reminded of duck necks and fireflies to catch a breath during a particularly busy period of my career.