Jumping into the unknown

Throughout my career I’ve jumped into the unknown, i.e. jobs I hadn’t done before, and even jobs I’d never heard of before. It’s scary and rewarding all at the same time. It’s absolutely a key foundation to how I built my successful career. By jumping into the unknown, you learn new skills quickly, which gives you confidence, helps you stand out, and shows your employers that you’re ready for any challenge.

It was enabled during my childhood, where my parents taught me the key skills needed to try new things, even if they are a little scary and they fostered a real thirst for knowledge. This thirst for knowledge enabled me to be excited about jumping into the unknown. It enabled me to dive into a subject; quickly understand it; then present it back to people unfamiliar with the subject. I learnt so many exciting new things. It was still scary, but that just creates suspense. Because it doesn’t matter which road you go down and who knows what cool shit you’ll see on the way.

My parents fostered a thirst for knowledge early in my life by delving into all sorts of subjects and explaining how things work, and why they work. From how to harvest and process onions, to why there are spirits in the world and everything in between. They also encouraged me to read and I became an avid reader, delving into all sorts of interesting topics at a very young age, which drove my curiosity.

My parents also encouraged me to try new things even if they were dangerous, but they also taught me to not discount the dangers, that I needed to understand how to do things safely. Such as learning to drive my dads Ute when we had just started high school. They taught us how to do this in the onion paddocks, which was a safe place to start. Or when they let me learn how to sail in Bass Strait, one of the roughest waterways in the world, when I couldn’t swim. But they taught me the importance of wearing flotation devices and ensuring a safety boat was in hand if I got into trouble. Or teaching us how to shoot guns when we were high school age, whilst also teaching us why guns were dangerous and how to use them safely. Sure that’s all dangerous, but if you’re cautious, if you learn well and understand what risks you can take, you’ll get through it.

Trusting my gut also helped me to jump into the unknown. My mother taught me to trust my gut. Whenever we would ask for advice, she would say, “what does your gut say?” So I started listening to my gut and it led me to so many amazing places. This helped me, to be not scared of the unknown, because I trusted that when my gut told me that it would be ok, it would work out well in the end.

Another key skill I used, was to understand which core capabilities I possessed, that could be transferred across markets and capabilities. These included, facilitating critical thinking, understanding how to interpret requirements such as quality standards, process mapping, bid development, change management, and process improvement. I would explore how each of these skills could be used in a new job, and that would give me confidence that I could do it. I learnt this lesson early on as well, from my Dads boss, Peter Gilham.

Peter started his business, Vecon, by identifying a gap in the European Onion Market. Because our seasons are different, there was a shortage of fresh onions on the European Market, just when ours were being harvested and fresh. He was one of the first people to identify this and it enabled him to become the largest onion exporter in the Southern Hemisphere. He then diversified into walnuts using exactly the same market entry strategy. At the time only 3% of walnut production was in the Southern Hemisphere. This enabled him to became the largest walnut exporter in the Southern Hemisphere. But he was also cautious that growing and processing onions, is very different to growing and harvesting walnuts, but the fundamentals are the same. Having that basic understanding gave them the confidence to jump into a different vegetable, they then travelled overseas to see best practice, so they could implement it back in Tasmania.

My best example of jumping into the unknown was when I was working for Boeing. A customer on a $500 million dollar program was concerned that we weren’t implementing Reliability, Availability and Maintainability (RAM) Engineering into the program correctly. We didn’t have a RAM specialist at the time, or previously. I’d never even heard about RAM Engineering before. So I asked a few people about it, and did some research. What I found, was that RAM is unbelievably complex and requires incredibly detailed mathematics. But I had loved maths back in my school and university days, so my thirst for knowledge took off and I honestly couldn’t stop myself from diving in further. I was also utilising the skills I had learnt in Quality Management, as the task I was assigned, was basically auditing the program for RAM implementation. So that gave me confidence. But I also acknowledged that it was scary, as it was such a big program for Boeing Australia, with our major customer, and we couldn’t afford to lose confidence with them. This had top managements attention, and it’s focus would be on my ability to prove that we were implementing RAM effectively.

So yeah, it was scary, but I also respected the importance of us demonstrating our confidence to our major customer, so I jumped in and learnt all about it, and I’m so glad I did, because it taught me so much about an extremely complex capability. I wouldn’t have learnt about it any other way. Even better; I jumped into the program; gathered evidence that RAM was being implemented; presented that back to the customer; and the customer was happy. Now that’s cool shit.

Because I’d done so well jumping into RAM and proving that my thirst for knowledge could be applied to many different things, I then got rewarded with the opportunity of a lifetime. Boeing created an Advanced Systems team that was asked to look widely across the global Boeing company to identify products, capabilities and services we delivered elsewhere, that could be applied to the Australian market. It was here that my thirst for knowledge took off and I delved into so many different areas. It was so much fun. I was on the cusp of launching Boeing’s global ground based solar power business in Australia. Unfortunately Boeing’s top management back in Chicago weren’t a fan of ground based solar power and with a stroke of the pen it was gone. Oh well, I’d had my fun!

Another great opportunity was with KPMG, who are one of the Big Four in Management Consulting. Whilst I’d heard about Management Consulting, I’d never considered a career as a management consultant before I’d applied for a position as one, but management consulting had a good reputation, as the place smart people went. So I thought I’d give it a go. I’d learnt all about process improvement at Boeing and that’s a key capability used in Management Consulting, so that gave me confidence that I could do the job. I’d also developed a good knowledge of the Department of Defence through Boeing; and KPMGs major customer were the Department of Defence. So that gave me more confidence.

Management Consulting is such a great place to extend your capabilities and I would recommend it to anyone as a way to get out into the world and develop new capabilities, networks and friends. They always have several jobs running needing different skill sets, so you learn new skills quickly and you get to work with some of the best in the business. But I also got rewarded when I walked into the office and met my wife!

Another great example is my job straight after Management Consulting, it was as a Competitor Intelligence and Position to Win Analyst with Lockheed Martin. Once again I didn’t even know that job category existed, but it looked like an interesting role and I figured that the market analysis I had learnt in the Advanced Systems team at Boeing would be directly applicable, so I thought I’d have a crack at it. It really was a fascinating role and I learned so much about how markets work in a competitive environment. The stakeholder engagement skills needed for the role were also much harder than any other job I’d done, so I extended my experience even deeper. My old boss from Boeing had also joined Lockheed Martin. I then got rewarded when he tapped me on the shoulder and asked me to join him in the Space Industry! I wouldn’t have got that job if I hadn’t jumped in and been working at Lockheed Martin.

But it’s not just about jumping into new capabilities and markets. I’ve also not been afraid to move into new towns, cities, and states. I learnt this lesson early on when I was launching my career. Straight after high school, my goal was to study Mechanical Engineering. But to do that, I had to move to Hobart which is a three hour drive, which scared me. So I chose to study Civili Engineering at a TAFE college nearby. But as I worked my way through the first year I realised Civil Engineering wasn’t my thing. So I sucked it up and moved to Hobart. Whilst moving to Hobart did scare me, I settled in quickly and easily and I really loved it. It went so well that it gave me the confidence to move up the other end of the country to Brisbane, which led me to work with Boeing and it was Boeing who really launched my career. To be fair, my Uncle Vince lived in Hobart and my mate Pat did move up to Brisbane at the same time as me, so that made it much easier to move to a different city. But I’ve also moved to places where I didn’t know a single soul. Gympie in regional Queensland and also to Canberra. But it didn’t take me long to make friends in any place I’ve lived. You become friends with the people you work with, the people you play sport with and the people you live next door to. You also experience and see new things, like Rainbow Beach near Gympie. It has rainbow coloured sands, but there was also a huge Cargo ship that had been sitting on the beach rusting away for 30 years. I never would have seen these things if I hadn’t lived in Gympie. It doesn’t matter which road you go down and who knows what cool shit you’ll see along the way.

Easily the scariest time I’ve jumped into the unknown, was when I returned to work after my cancer journey, as a Strategy and Business Development Manager in the Space Industry for Lockheed Martin. I was a changed man in all sorts of different ways. My nerve prone feet meant that I was unable to attend trade shows which was a big part of my job. Travel was too difficult due to the fatigue issues I was suffering. My cognitive impairment meant that it was unknown if I could even do the same job again, and as it turns out I couldn’t. This was the first time that I had failed when I jumped into the unknown. This then threw me into an even deeper unknown. I didn’t even know what type of job I could do!

But I didn’t panic, I delved back into my past and explored jobs that I’d previously done, but walked away from. Jobs that I knew really well such as Quality Management and Training. I also found that one of the things that really helped me out here, was just how many times I’d jumped into the unknown previously, because it helped me create a diverse career and it was that diverse career that attracted the employers who I was interviewing with. I also wasn’t scared to jump into the unknown again, even though I’d just failed at jumping into the unknown. I then went to work for an ICT company. I’d never worked in ICT before, I didn’t want to work in ICT before, because every ICT company I’d ever worked alongside, used to work away writing computer programs, then hand it over and say “here it is” then walk away. They never put any effort into creating a software product that people could easily use, and they never followed through, to help people use them. But I threw myself into the unknown once more. Because it doesn’t matter which road you go down and who knows what cool shit you’ll see along the way. What I found was an ICT company that worked so closely with users throughout the design and development process, that we produce intuitive software, that solves more problems than users originally anticipated, because we uncover latent needs along the way. I honestly couldn’t be happier working in ICT. I didn’t expect that!

So whilst it is scary jumping into the unknown, don’t let that stop you from doing it; be aware of the risks; explore which of your skills are applicable; take it slowly and cautiously; enjoy it, because you’ll learn so much, gain confidence and status.