AIBU to find career advice from privileged speakers tone deaf?

When I was still in med school, one of the speakers at some careers event was a female consultant neurosurgeon (very rare) who also had 3 kids (incredibly rare). When asked how she managed, the answer was basically "have a husband who works in finance, so you can afford a live in nanny and private school."

I do think most of these people have a couple of good tips but probably in the Q&A not the talk.

The good ones do acknowledge the structural advantages they have. But probably not to the extent that ‘if people without these advantages do what I did, they are actively punished for it.’

The guy with burnout, if he properly had burnout I don’t think is the same- if you fell down the stairs tomorrow (touch wood!), you wouldn’t be able to work, same with burnout. She took time off, he couldn’t work. Saying that you could say that people who got fired/ made redundant etc and retrained because they couldn’t find jobs, they couldn’t afford that but it had to be done so technically if people have to manage they do

I’m sure she worked hard in those roles, I’ll give her that.
But she had an awful lot of luck fall in her lap, as well.

Where I work you might get one or two of these opportunities crop up, throughout your time there. It’s not what you know, etc…
But not year, after year like she did.

‘Creating a need for a job’ is such bullshit.
Unless you have the ear of a director, or the head of a department, you simply don’t have that hotline.

This is really dismissive and totally underplays the importance of networking and connections.

This woman made herself visible and convinced senior leaders that they needed someone to do X/Y/X job. This is actually valuable advice: not all opportunities exist when you start looking for them but you do have the option to create the need and push for them (which she apparently did) rather than just wait from them to be posted.

Martin Lewis did a good speech at a graduation basically saying a huge part of success is luck which is totally true.

My career looking back is actually mental. I ended up in a place many would kill to work by weird series of events. Rags to riches within 4 years. Dh did it the correct way but we both ended up in the same place!

I read a similar article by Richard Branson's mother. Apparently when she was living in poverty (her husband was training as a barrister) she just simply got a contract to supply Harrods with ornaments she sourced from overseas.

Sometimes you have no choice. Leaving your job to recover isn’t something done easily. My husband is currently on month 5 of unpaid sick leave and it’s been the hardest, most terrifying year of our marriage but he had no choice.

I think dismissing their brave decision to make it work for their own health is quite close-minded. You have no idea if those 7 months were incredibly challenging and scary for her.

We were saving up to try for/have our first baby. Now that money is gone.

I was at one from a guy who genuinely had risen from nothing. He had been raised in poverty, left school at 10 or 11, zero formal education and started at a stall selling cheap items. Gradually worked his way up to being a shop owner, a factory owner and a brand millionaire. It was an interesting story until he started ridiculing people who take sick leave. He never had a sick day in his life, he never had a cold or an injury or medical condition, he boasted about this. He also said he worked long hours and slept about 4 or 5 hours and that's how he got ahead. He ridiculed anyone who needed more. I thought he was an absolute idiot but sadly some of the managers thought he was inspiring. The managers were all healthy people, all either men with SAH partner or child free women. All thinking this man was their hero. It still gives me the rage, that was years ago.

To be fair to Philip Hammond that is good advice and I have done it!

I actually think this is useful. As getting jobs to created for her is how she got her career success!

Dd looking at university choices and we were fretting about employability etc. Mil piped up
with advice she had heard from an elderly random. Buy a large rental property in the Cotswolds - real money earner apparently 🙄. You don’t say.

A little off topic but I remember when Philip Hammond , the Tory ex chancellor was talking about retail shops closing down.
He said that women can basically set up a business and work from home..

Most women juggling childcare and work can’t just set up a business from thin air and make a good living out of it! Otherwise everyone would be doing it surely ?

That is basically how I dealt with my difficult child, right down to coming back to work on my own terms. It is a ridiculous place of privilege both in the ability to step out of the workforce and to have the power to negotiate a return.

we have had similar speakers at work. We had one who came to speak out burnout. She gave advice about how to structure the day to be kind to our staff. When we explained our billing system and how her suggestions would hurt the staff, she thought the billing system was barbaric. It is. We all know it is. That is why we have burnout. But they had not even briefed this life coach they brought in on the most fundamental aspect of how our system runs. The whole thing was a waste of time.

Also, I find it borderline fraudulent when business owners and new companies talk a big game, only to discover they’re still not even turning a profit because they've had a really long funding runway even after a couple of years. It's just bullshit and hot air.

I'm only really inspired by people who started with nothing and took big risks and are turning real profits quickly

Reminds me of a panel of women during the International Women's Day stuff my work put on, where several twenty-something women talked about how they got into their position.

Every. Single. One. Of. Them, had come through the Graduate programme, where if you successfully pass, you automatically get promoted into that grade.

The inability to see how it really doesn't help to be told "be young, live in London, get a relevant degree (preferably from LSE), and then join the programme. Twenty years ago"

It is really, really hard to progress into that grade (a grade above mine, so I know). Most are actively recruited from outside the business, or are already at that grade when they move into a new role.

So anyway, that was irritating.

At work, i was on a call with about 30 people, and we had gathered to hear a woman tell her story about her success.
She’s worked her way up to the highest band and naturally we were keen to hear her story.

Well, it turns out that she’s done lots of schmoozing and that new roles (with high falutin job titles) had been created for her.
None of these wonderful opportunities were posted on Oracle, so they basically didn’t exist.

But, oh yeah, please tell us about the secret of your success. 🙄

Our MD loves doing mentor stuff, getting groups of business studies kids in to subject them to death by power point.

The secret of his success? Inherited a booming business from Daddy

He really believes his input is useful too bless him.

I actually find the whole 'inspirational speakers' and talks by mentors culture of today's workplace completely pointless and self-indulgent. Either do proper training or stop wasting time and shareholder money getting your staff to spend hours listening to Petronella talking about how she became a girlboss.

😂😂😂

The only career advice worth anything is from a hard working successful person in the field that you want to go into. Everything else is just a chat imo 😂

Senior male manager taking part in a talk about progression to young people. When asked about juggling family life, man replies “my wife left her job to look after the kids” 🤣🤣🤣🤣

I was thinking about this today, the only reason anyone is in their well paid job is pure luck, the job opening was available at the right time and the hiring manager chose them over someone else, they could easily still be at the bottom if they hadn’t charmed the right person or joined the right company at the right time.

Yes, Elon Musk springs to mind. “First, get your millionaire dad to give you one of his emerald mines”.

@PleatherandlaceThese people definitely aren’t all male. What they are is privileged and lucky. They either don’t really need to work to pay the bills or they get lucky with who they know. Most people working for most companies cannot just walk out if they need the money. You can set up a business of course but you need skills people want and will pay for. We simply aren’t all like this.