Six Career Lessons From Johnny Bunko
The Adventures of Johnny Bunko: the Last Career Guide You’ll Ever Need by Daniel H. Pink is jam-packed with relevant life lessons fit for today’s increasingly complex and chaotic workplace. Here are six lessons from the book that may better you and help you achieve all that you want in your career and beyond.
1. There is no plan.
Life changes in an instant.
Plans are static, life is dynamic. Plans do not reflect the realities of living. This doesn’t mean that planning is a waste of time. Knowing where you want to go is an important compass but it’s not the map. The map is not the territory. Things change.
Where you want to go is a good place to aim.
How you get there? That’s life.
“Plans are useless, but planning is indispensable.”
— Dwight D. Eisenhower
We are responsible for adapting to the strangeness of living. We can project into the future but those projections are educated guesses, not facts. Everything changes. Your entire industry could be wiped out by AI tomorrow. Planning for stability and security can be a dangerous game.
Instead, consider the possibility that life can be turned upside-down any moment. Roll with the punches, not against them.
“Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth.” — Mike Tyson
2. Think strengths, not weaknesses.
You’ll never find joy if you focus on your weaknesses.
We all have bad days. Sometimes life sucks no matter what you do for a living. We might as well do things we enjoy because disappointment, failure and grueling hard work is inevitable no matter what we choose to do.
Find flow in work and life. Flow — the mental state where a person is fully immersed in an activity. It’s that feeling when you work on your favourite thing and the world slips away. When you’re so absorbed in the activity that there is no second-guessing, no judgment and no ego.
“Contrary to what we believe… the best moments in our lives, are not the passive, receptive, relaxing times — although such experiences can also be enjoyable, if we have worked hard to attain them. The best moments usually occur when a person’s body or mind is stretched to its limits in a voluntary effort to accomplish something difficult and worthwhile.”
— Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi
You only succeed by going where nobody else is willing to go. You need to love what you do enough that you’re willing to go as far as it takes. Love is hard, sometimes boring — it takes work.
Blood, sweat and tears are all part of the package. Batteries not included.
Strengths, not weaknesses.
3. It’s not about you.
You are at work to serve, not to self-actualize.
Humility is key in life and in the work place. Work isn’t about your selfish desires for glory and achievement. It’s about the needs of the business. It’s about the greater good for your clients, team mates and colleagues.
Keep the long-term and big picture in mind. As they say in football, play for the name on the front and they’ll remember the name at the back.
You are not alone.
People depend on you. Help them so that they thrive. Maybe they won’t return the favor. Why does it matter? Are you here at work to feel self-important or are you here to do great things?
The more you give and help others look good — the more life gives back to you.
Go further, together. The most successful people improve the lives of others without expectation of anything in return. Counter-intuitively, it is this selflessness that allows success to show up on their doorstep.
Focus on helping outward, not inward.
It’s not about you.
4. Persistence trumps talent.
Compound interest is the most powerful force in the universe. Consistency and small steps will always beat last-minute procrastination and burnout. Our #HUSTLE culture places too much emphasis on eye-catching power moves and not enough focus on the boring foundations of success.
How do you climb a mountain? One step at a time.
How do you build a relationship? One day at a time.
It’s the same with life.
Tiny, consistent improvements go a long way. 1% improvement every day for a year results in a 37.78% improvement. It’s a big ask to start the year saying “I’ll be 37.78% better in a year!”
Instead, aim to be better by 1% each day. Not 20%. Not 10% — 1% is all you need.
Look at what you can achieve when you consistently put in those baby steps.
The steely magic of persistence reveals why intrinsic motivation is so important to career success. Intrinsic motivation is generated from within. This includes things like tapping into your why, exploring your ikigai and falling in love with the (often boring and tedious) process.
Most people are doing things ass-backwards. They’re focused on extrinsic motivation and external markers of success. It’s about the salary, flashy cars, investment properties, career awards and recognition… This is a fool’s game. It’ll never be enough.
If your life is driven by external motivation, you’ll be perpetually stuck on the hedonistic treadmill. Ever got what you wanted? It was never quite as good as you imagined it. The joy soon fades and you’re on to the next thing. The grass is greener on the other side? No. The grass is greener where you water it.
Find your intrinsic drive and you will increase your probability of sticking with the process. In life, shit always hits the fan sooner or later. How will you bounce back?
Talent may smash a home-run once in a while, but persistence grinds out the scrappy wins.
Persistence plus talent?
That’s a winning combination.
5. Make excellent mistakes.
Making excellent mistakes is about playing to win, not playing to not-lose. By playing to win, you put yourself in positions where you could fail spectacularly. You could look like a fool with your pants on the ground. Only by daring to go far enough will you realize how to adjust and improve. Our mistakes reflect reality instead of theory.
Often what we fear exists only in our minds — these fears are not substantiated by data. They are illusory. Our fears are not real.
You grow by moving forward. You grow by stumbling along the path and picking yourself back up. A mentor of mine always says that the worst-case scenario of failure is that you learn something new. He’s right.
The Adventures of Johnny Bunko emphasizes making excellent mistakes. It’s hard to figure out which mistakes are excellent without the benefit of hindsight. I think making excellent mistakes is all about being vulnerable and following your fears. Put yourself and your ego on the line. You might be scared, but why not let it fly?
We know from physics that inertia hinders us from moving forward in life — Newton’s First Law of Motion. We fall into the inertia trap when we aren’t willing to do the thing because we fear failing.
Inertia becomes less and less of a problem as you develop the skill to move forward no matter what setbacks or challenges appear on your path.
“The master has failed more times than the beginner has even tried.”
— Stephen McCranie
A friend shared with me a practical three-step process you can use to continually make excellent mistakes:
- Experiment
- Reflect
- Evolve
Experimenting allows you to go out there, make mistakes and gather data.
Reflecting transforms these mistakes into lessons and insight.
Evolving transmutes the mistakes into excellent mistakes. Adjust future actions based on the data and analysis of your scientific process.
Rinse and repeat.
6. Leave an imprint.
No matter how much you achieve in life, one day you are going to die. Find what you love and let it kill you. Death is a natural part of life. It’s what makes being alive so worthwhile.
“Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life.
Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure — these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important.
Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose.
You are already naked.
There is no reason not to follow your heart.”
— Steve Jobs
It’s funny that so many successful people implore us to leave the world better than we found it. The world is larger than we are and perhaps we are here to serve a greater purpose.
Serving others is what it means to live.
Thanks for reading!
