March 2007

Eduardo Fracassi

Career SimulatorWorkshop

50th Anniversary Celebration--Boston Conference News and UpdatesInternational Conference of the System Dynamics Society

Excercise 1 – In Groups of threeImagine yourself and your career in 4 years

1) ¿How will you measure your progress?

2) On a piece of paper, draw curves showing the evolution in time of the key measures of you future progress.

3) Describe the key reinforcing loops of your future career success

4) Describe the key balancing loops that may limit your progress in the future.

5) ¿Which are the key leverage points for your career?

Marketing & Sales

Production & Logistics

Consultant & Quality

Finance

Jr Ssr. Sr. Mgmmt

CEO

Which are the Typical careers for Industrial Engineers in?

¿Which are the advantages of following these typical career paths?

In the first stages of your career they allow you to :

•Learn the nature of a work relationship from your first experiences working for your boss.

•Learn how to manage your relationship with peers and collaborators.

• Learn the diferent advantages and disavantages of working ofr small, medium, large and multinational enterprises

• Have a relatively secure and stable income.

• Uses many of the techniques learnt at college / university.

• Take advantage of the career plans already.designed by the enterprise.

¿But which are the disadvantages of following such a career path?

• Your income is fixed and / or restricted by the market.

• Promotion and growth are related to your capacity to lead and manage people.

• Some engineers and professionals with technical backgrounds are not interested in leading and / or managing people.

• The number of middle andf high management positions is reduced and it declines the higher you climb the corporate pyramid.

• Your career might be conditioned or influenced by your boss’ virtues and / or weak points.

•Many professionals focus too much on their job and forget to develop relationships that might advance their careers outside the company.

¿Which career path followed the most successful?

Jack WelchGeneral Electric

Bill GatesMicrosoftAndy Grove

Intel

Ted Turner TNT, CNN

Thomas Watson IBM

Walt DisneyWalt Disney Co.McDonnald’s

Mary Kay AshMary Kay Cosmetics

¿What have others done in Argentina?

Gabriel Dreyfus

Dreyfus Comunicaciones

Carlos Avila

Torneos y Competencias

Eduardo Bakchellian

Gatic

Fulvio Pagani

ARCOR

Hörst Paulmann

CENCOSUDThey created value offers for othersin their community according to

their own tastes, peferences and personalskills and made them real through

their personal contacts

¿What are “Soft” & “Hard” career decisions?

“Soft” decisions:

“Hard” decisions:

Those related to our own personal values, capacities, competencies, visions, and career goals.

Those directly related to our own paycheck numbers and/or invoices for services or products. You can see and touch them.

Excercise 2 : Learning from the best

1. ¿What have these carers in common?

2. ¿Which were the “hard” career decisions that these professionls took in order to achieve career success?

3. Think in how to improve the model you made in Excercise 1 with these new insights

Self knowledge

Contacts

Vision &

Purpose

Information

Message - Value proposal

Trust relationships & Negotiation

¿Which are the elements of the O.R.O. Model?

O.R.O. Model

Career Planning

Networking

Excecutive search and

selection – 1995

Career Planning bibliography

HHRR, Competencies

(HayGroup)

NLP: Communication, personal change and modelling of excelence

Personal MasterySenge / (MIT – OLC)

System Dynamics Model of ITBA’s graduate population 2000

Modelling thecareers of successful

entrepreneurs in USA and Argentina

O.R.O. Model

¿Which are the sources of the O.R.O model?

Options Resources

Goals

Adds published in newspapers and

internet

People who know our work by references made by others

People with direct experience of our work

Active Clients

Projects / work

in process

Job search strategy

Type of work relationship

Type of billing:

Hours, services, products

Materials

Human resources

Costs

Income

Workload

Virtous circle of achievements and contacts

Materials balancing

loop

Human resources balancing

loop Finished work

and finished projects

Finished products

+

+

+

++

+

+

+

-- +

+ +

-

+

+

++

+

Causal Loop Diagram

Which are the most important “hard” decisions?1) First decision – specializing

in a certain field

2) Second decision – Job search strategy

3) Third decision – Choosing the type of work relationship3.1 Fixed income 3.2 Variable income3.3 Number of Clients:3.4 Types of work

relationship4) Fourth decision – Type of value proposal

Choosing the industry and the rol one wants to play. This is know as career = field + occupation

  Focusing our creative energy in a certain field moves us to excell in careers.   All the people mentioned before as models chose a field of work that awakened their passion.

• Our careers may change in time, like different phases with different career goals.

1) First decision – Specializing in certain field:

Our second key hard decision that our models took conciously or unconciously was the method they used to get new clients or new job opportunities. This desions equals choosing how to navigate the social network. Nelson Bolles, author of the famous “What color is your parachute?” book, publishes the following probabilities of finding a job according to the job seach strategy used:

2) Second decision – Our job search strategy

Mailings of resumés

Adds in newspapers

HHRR search firms.

Internet

7 %

5 al 25 %

4 %

7 al 10 %

Which are the success rates of the “numbers game” job search strategy?

Spontaneous presentation in the offices of the firm where we want to work, independently of them having or not publised vacant positions.

Using a database, alone

Job Club – a group of job searching people using a database

Ask family, friends and /or the career services offices at our school / college / university

47 %

84 %

33 %

67 %

Creative method to find jobs or to change your career

86 %

Becoming famous – becoming so well know that people come to offer us jobs

More than 86%

Which are the best job search strategies? ¿Cuántos profesionales recientemente egresados del ITBA

han pensado antes de egresar en trabajar durante su carrera para ser conocidos y famosos?

3) Third decision – choosing the type our work relationship

It is decisive for long term growth. In our modelling process we presupose we do an excellent job. The equation is very simple

The trust of our clients in our work brings prosperity

Fear and uncertainty produce poverty

They cut the relationship between our achievements and our actual income.

Salaries are fixed mainly by the market.

3.1 Fixed income relationships

3.2 Variable income relationships:

They have the greatest growth potential, as they stimulate us in direct proportion to our achievements.

The disadvantage of variable income relationships, is that income can diminish with the economic cycle’s downturns.

 Depending on only one boss or client when we begin our careers might be something normal and useful, as it may facilitate learning concentrating your energy in excelling at work.

But after a career of 10 or more years it’s necessary to have multiple streams of income, real and /or potential. This is generally achieved through networking and it is a skill that should be develped as early as possible.

3.3 Quantity of clients:

 We have clasified work relationships in 6 classes, according to a) feedback in terms of money perceived and b) the number of effective clients.

AloneFixed incomeMultiple streams of incomeSmall or medium business ownerBig bussines owner / associateMultiancional business owner / associate

3.4 Type of work relationships

4) The fourth decision – nature of our value proposal

Bils hours worked

Bills products sold

Bills for a service

Excercise 3: – Updating your Model

1) ¿Which are the main metrics you’ll use to measure you career advance?

2) Update the graphics showing your predicted evolution of the main metrics in time.

3) Update your maps on the principal virtous circles that will stimulate your future career growth

4) Update the principal stabilizing loops that might limit your growth

5) Update your list of key leverage points for career growth.

  The model proposed in this workshop:

a)    Offers more resources and options for excelling in your career

b)    Offers the possibility to achieve a better income level

c)     Offers tools to achieve more security and stability to your career

d)    Complements the “soft” career decisions with the sound and logical criteria for taking the “hard” career decisions.  

Main conclusions:

Excercise:4: An interview when w’re 70

We’re going to imagine that we are 70 years old and a reporter asks us: What did you do to become number one in your field?

You’ve got a minute to write down what you think will help you to be successful in your career.

With this feeling, each reads and captures this feeling in your body.

I hope this sensation lasts