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Unpacking Career Skills: Personal, Industry, and Hard Skills for Professional Growth with Charlie Rogers and Albert Marealle

Join Charlie Rogers and Albert Marealle in this interview as they explore the evolving world of careers and the essential skills needed for professional growth. Discover the significance of personal, industry-specific, and hard skills, and how they intersect to create a competitive advantage. Gain insights into lifelong learning, adaptability, and pursuing your unique purpose in today's dynamic job market. Charlie and Albert discuss emerging industry trends and the importance of well-being in the workplace, offering valuable advice to inspire young individuals from diverse backgrounds to thrive in the changing landscape of work.

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[00:00:00] Hey guys, you're locked into CareerCon Monthly. I'm myself, Albert, Graphic Designer at hundo, and I'm with the lovely Charlie Rodgers, who is a special guest today. Would you like to introduce yourself?

Basically, when people ask me what do I do, I normally say I do a few things. What this means is I do four days a week operations, where we help people build portfolios, where they earn via many sources of income. I also have a portfolio career, so I also Then on the side, write a newsletter on the future of work called Mastering in the 20s and how it's changing, as Jen said, and I also have a community called the Undefined Community, or I think it's now 28 of us who are in their 20s and 30s who like doing many things called multi potentialites.

Uh, and so those three things together for me, all about the future of work and the future of careers and how they're changing, how they're [00:01:00] developing. So I think this is a super relevant conversation and I'm looking forward to having it with you. Yeah, that sounds interesting. You know, you're really trying to like help people from all different communities, different backgrounds and different ages as well.

So that's like really inspiring to hear. So let's start off with the first question, which is, how do you define the term career and what elements do you believe in and make up a fulfilling and meaningful career in an ever changing environment? Yeah, it's a good question. I'd say, put simply, a career is what you do for a living over time, how that changes, but more broadly, it's a combination of the specific knowledge, skills and expertise that you have.

And in the past, we've often seen careers be quite linear and they've been quite obvious in that you might go be a doctor and you go and do your six years at university, you become a junior doctor for two years, and then you can go and actually specialize afterwards. It becomes quite a career, obvious career path, but nowadays we're seeing a lot more nonlinear careers, i.

e. squiggly careers, ones that change a lot in terms of how the environment around is moving. And so I think in an age [00:02:00] where technology is only getting more exponential and things are changing only ever faster. We're often seeing careers be more of a term that's applied to not just one obvious linear, linear career, but having many careers over someone's lifetime as well.

So I'd say what makes it meaningful and what makes it purposeful though. Is the alignment of purpose so really at the heart of this in an ever changing environment is you are really delving into who you are and what values you have and what purpose you want to create in the world and then you're also applying the skills that you have like what unique thing can you do really well I know Albert's great at graphic design so like how can he apply his graphic design skills and then it's how do you get enough financial benefit how can I actually pay to live in this world this gets ever more expensive also important and then how can you have the freedom to engage in work in a way that's So how can you design your day in a way that's meaningful and allows you to be most productive and also most effective?

effective in life too. Yeah, I can definitely relate to what you're [00:03:00] saying as well, especially with like the non linear pathway as well, because I remember like years back, the first thing I wanted to be was a train driver when I was younger. Yeah, like looking outside at Upton Park Station, all the trains going past, I was like, nah, let me be a train driver.

And then I wanted to be an actor for Disney Channel. Then I wanted to be a basketball player because I was younger. Then Like, when I started doing art in secondary school, that's what really made me, um, have my part. That's when, like, my creativity passion started as well. So even that, and then even alongside that, I also done photography as well.

So I was like, oh, let me see if I could, like, dabble into photography as my career. Also done video editing. I'm also, like, starting to, like, look into animation as well during, like, my uni times as well. So, like, I definitely hear what you're saying, like, the non linear, like, career path as well. Yeah, that's pretty interesting.

Do you ever still apply some of those skills now in terms of wanting to be a train driver? Do you ever still research about trains or being an [00:04:00] actor? Do you ever still act? I mean, like, I've done, like, voice acting in terms of, like, my animations, like, which is, uh, I've done, like, a recent animation for my birthday.

I was like, oh, let me do some voice acting, like, done like a little voice recording, then put it all together on Procreate and then put it together on CapCut. So like doing a little voice acting skills, then a little bit of video editing, and also trying to jumble my art into it. Train driving, I still look up like, um, uh, um, what's it called?

the YouTube videos, but also like implement, like I done, um, like a animation which incorporated like Carrington station, which is where I used to, like where I grew up. So still implementing like the public transport, like element of things into my work as well. Yeah. See, that is really cool. That's kind of like exactly what I mean here is even though you might change your skills and what you're focused on, you can still build on top of them.

They are not wasted. They are used in a unique way. Yeah. [00:05:00] Yeah. And I even got an extra question for you. Like, what would you say is like meaningful work to you? Cause you said like you're like purpose driven. Yeah. So for me, like I spend a lot of time working about this and I think the key thing here is you don't know it from day one.

It's only in retrospect when you have time to reflect that you can really define it. Uh, but for me, it's all about creating. empowering people to create organizations that actually create meaningful experiences of work. So for other people, how they can go to work and not turn up each day and be like, I hate what I'm doing, but instead be engaged and be like, Oh, I actually feel aligned to it.

So it's kind of meta. My purpose is about helping other businesses unlock other individuals, employees, freelancers, contractors, however they engage their purpose at work too. So for me, Like, there's nothing worse in the world than turning up soullessly to a job you hate. Like, I wouldn't, I hate the idea of someone doing that.

So how you can get people engaged in work is for me really, really important. Uh, sounds so lovely to hear. It's like you, it's like you've got like a big heart for like the people around you and trying to like help make the world a better place to live in. [00:06:00] Yeah. Yeah. Can you share like insights into the key trends and shifts you foresee in the future of work, and especially in light of like technological advances and global changes?

Yeah, for sure. Like, there's quite a lot here. And I think this, the key thing here is that it's always changing and that the future of work definition is so broad because you could kind of pick up on anything because everything impacts work because work is such a big part of our lives. Something we do.

I mean, most people do 40 hours a week, 50 hours a week, if not more or less. And so I think, With whatever I'm about to say here, like, take a pinch of salt. These things change very quickly as well. Um, but I'd say the key six trends that we often see, and these are the ones that I kind of consult on as well, are about flexible hybrid working environments.

So we've seen post pandemic, how we shifted from the normal thing being nine to five in an office. Monday through Friday, and now it's become, okay, maybe come in like three days a week or two days a week, uh, and then you can do the rest at home. And then if in the more innovative companies, they've gone, okay, rather than working nine to [00:07:00] five, let's do core hours, 11 to three, and then you choose the rest, but there's really interesting models of work and how people engage with it, with their time, which is changing pretty, pretty quickly as well, and there's no like set best way of doing it right now.

It's more about thinking how is an organization best set up to. Empower and engage their members of the team as well. So that first one, flexible hybrid working environments. Second one, lifelong self directed learning. Because career paths are changing so quickly and because the skills here are becoming very ever changing in the working world.

It means it's on you, the individual to learn and upskill yourself as much as other company, because we're often seeing people jump companies every two, three years at a minimum, at a maximum really. And so with Gen Z in particular, it's thinking how can they empower themselves with the learning they're taking on.

And then authentic experience of work. Number three, how can people bring their full selves to work? How can they, rather than wear their corporate mask and smile, like actually bring their full selves and talk about the things they do outside of work. [00:08:00] Like for me, it's, I'd spend 15, 20 hours doing triathlon training.

Like that's an important part of my life. , if I can't talk about it at work, like that restricts me a little bit. So in a similar vein, how can people be authentic? So that's number three. Number four, socially responsible organizations. So you're seeing this a lot with B Corps. Uh, E S G, uh, becoming more important.

And for a lot of companies it's thinking how do we actually. Care for the world around us in some way, or how do we at least account for it in the minimum way, like with carbon credits and the equivalent, it's thinking, let's be somewhat social responsible. And you're seeing the big, bigger companies think more about becoming a vehicle for doing things that are more longevity as well.

So before number five, this is the one that we often hear about nowadays next technology. So, I mean. These trends got like this, uh, but Metaverse, those trends maybe down here now, uh, but then AI is up here now, um, and then you've got Web3, which again is down here now, uh, and then Crypto, so all these trends about next generation technology, how they're embedded in the future of work is very interesting as well, and then finally the humanized hiring experience as well, so with the AI coming into it, [00:09:00] it's how do you make The application process, when there's thousands of people who apply for one role, how do you actually humanize that process?

And it's really interesting what people are doing in this space and how they're making it. So you're removing biases in like, so rather than saying we're looking for a, I don't know. I saw actually an ad before on the way to the gym this morning. It was like, we're looking for a waitress. And I was like, waitress, like why not waiter?

And I was, that's kind of interesting about how we use language to, uh, advertise jobs and roles. is becoming a lot more D& I friendly and becoming a lot more open to everyone rather than implicitly implying that Only some people can apply for a role. It's pretty interesting. Yeah, that's so interesting to hear as well.

Cause like, even like speaking about like the whole, like how we're going to like from like an office to like a hybrid, like hybrid models, like that's so interesting to hear because I remember cause I was still in uni during them times where everyone was still in the office and then lockdown, like lockdown happened and it's like, Oh, okay.

This is. This is [00:10:00] mad. Like everyone's like working from homes. I never thought I'd see the day that people will be draining like meetings from like team calls or like zoom or like google meet and then like even like the um even um google meet and like even like hybrid working models like what I've noticed is that it creates like a better work life balance because like people like we all have like our own things to do like we're always trying to like make our own um trying to make our own like lives and trying like how to like fit that around work.

like really trying to get the work done. And also like, even like speak about like being your authentic self at work. And that's what I realized is the most important thing as well. Cause you don't want to like put on a mask and like try to like pretend to be who you are. Cause like, like, what's it called?

You want to like be able to be like a good fit for the people around you as well. And even with like the. CV bias as well, like noticing the language as well, like you've got to try and make sure that you've got to be like fair towards everyone, like no matter what race, like gender, where you come from, like trying to make sure that everyone deserves an [00:11:00] equal opportunity in life as well.

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. And even like from your experience, like how can individuals proactively prepare for a successful career and what skills do they need in an increasingly digital and dynamic job market? So I think here the skills and that we talked about before alignment to purpose, we need to really start from the point of what do you want to do in the world and what's your unique talent that you can add to it.

That's the really important starting point. But with that in mind, you need a backbone of soft skills because Everything in business, it's about interacting with other people, like sales skills, you're selling to someone, marketing skills, you're convincing someone to buy, uh, leadership skills. You're convincing someone to follow you, but they are all about psychology based and they are all about how you interact with humans.

So you need a strong backbone of those soft skills. Cause you can be the best coder in the world. Yeah. But if you can't interact with people and play in a team, then no one's going to work with you. Like they might hire you to do a certain project and you could probably get paid relatively well for that.

But if you can't sell yourself and can't do the soft [00:12:00] skills of. selling or marketing, how are you going to be able to do that? So it's a combination of a deep backbone of soft skills combined by very specific hard skills. So the example that I was coding for you, Albert, graphic design as well, is thinking how can you develop those specific hard skills that not everyone can do and everyone appreciates the value that you can bring through your unique application is often the hard skills, the ones where.

Someone comes in and you're like, it looks like magic. Like how, how, I have no idea. Um, and those hard skills combined by the soft skills also combined by industry skills are really important to you. So the industry skills could be in this case, that future of work, like understanding the future of careers is the one I'm sort of developing myself.

And that then combined with the hard skill. Of say, like project management and combined with the soft skill of like communication, leadership, charisma sets me up to be in a pretty good place for it too, as well. So I'd say you need all three. Um, but you also need to start thinking in how you can build 10 year games, like play 10 year games rather than one [00:13:00] year games.

Because a lot of, especially Gen Z, a lot of young people are obsessed with like seeing results very quickly. And I know I've been there. It's quite addictive to try and how can we do things faster? They're like these old people who tell me that I can't do it or they need to wait a year. Like, nah, nah, nah, I can do it now.

I totally get it, but also play 10, 15, 20 year games with your purpose, change the activities you do, but with your purpose, play long games, it'll mean that you are forever building that industry expertise, regardless of the job or the business you've built beneath it as well. Yeah. Like even when you said about like Gen Z's wanting to see that immediate gratifications, that is me.

It's so me because I'm a Gen Z myself and I'm like, I don't see things now. Sometimes like, it's like having that. endurance to like persevere for all these different like trials and tribulations to get like the results that you want as well. So it's that I definitely relate to what you're hearing is that even like learn about like soft skills and hard skills, that you want to be able to have like the combination of both as [00:14:00] well.

Because it's true what you said, like you You can be amazing at the hard skills like coding, graphic design, and like really skilled in like what you do in those sort of sectors, but if you can't really like socialize and interact with people, like how are you gonna like help other people around you as well?

Yeah, yeah, exactly. I think the other part of this is seeing what you do and what projects you work on as case studies. So this is how I think about work. It's like, I'm currently in my role. This is actually my first almost full time role working four days a week here. Um, and I've only ever been self employed before.

Started my own businesses, uh, contracted, freelance, everything but employment. Um, come around. I was like, I need a great case study. I'll be working in operations in a future of work at tech business. And I can get there by going and. Joining as a almost full time employee. So I think the way to think about career and experience and skills is how do you build a case study that you can then tell someone about that you've worked on later on as well.

It's kind of like creating your portfolio, [00:15:00] right? Yeah. Case study portfolio is all adding up together now, but the portfolio isn't just a graphic design. It's also Yeah, most definitely like portfolio can go into many different things called a property portfolio, graphic design portfolio, animation, video editing, photography, like there's lots of like different case studies you can put in there to like really like sell yourself to other people.

And if you're able to like build up on like selling yourself, then you'd be able to like attract the people that you want in your life and to help each other grow. Yeah, for sure. Yeah. And could you explain the distinction between personal skills, industry specific skills, and hard skills, and why each category is essential for professional growth?

So with the personal skills, like I mentioned before, it's all about the people. It's how you motivate them, communicate with them, and generally work with others. And then the industry specific skills, knowledge about a particular industry. So it's normally highly specific. It could be... I don't know banking, but then you [00:16:00] could go more deeper than that and talk about I don't even know enough about it So, uh have the credit system in europe like you could be a specialist that will attack system in Switzerland.

Uh, like that could be your industry six skill. Um, it normally involves learning a lot of terminology and jargon and technology that other people don't know. So that when you talk to someone who also has the same industry specific skill, it's like you're talking another language. Yeah, like no one else gets it.

Um, and then your kind of role is to be able to take the complexity of https: otter. ai Consult, help others on how to understand it too. So I'd say personal industry skills and then hard skills, the technical abilities demonstrated. In a measurable way. So this could be like, like I said, coding, rewriting, graphic design, project management, I like to think of these as like degree skills, things you normally get a degree for, uh, they're the hard skills.

I mean, it's not entirely true, but it's mostly accurate. Uh, the ones where like a certificate is quite useful. So getting a certificate for project management, Or a certificate that says, I know how to code in JavaScript, pretty [00:17:00] useful. And those are the things that you can put on a CV and say, Hey, look, I know that.

The personal skills, the more things that you can show in an interview and say, Hey, look, like I do this stuff. I can show it to you because I can smile on interview and say, I'm really good at it. Uh, and then the industry skills are more of the things that only you could say because you have the knowledge of the industry.

Thank you for breaking it down, Charlie, because I know like many people, even like myself, like hearing like soft skills, hard skills, like personal skills, industry specific skills that can be very overwhelming. So it's nice to be able to break it down and explain to other people that, oh, how can they be able to apply for professional growth as well?

And even like personal skills is like learning all these different jargons and breaking it down into layman terms so they can really understand it and help it with their professional growth too. Yeah, for sure. I mean, to become an expert, you normally have to realize how little, you know, uh, about an industry.

And then you have to, then even with knowing how little, you know, go and explore it and learn as much as you can anyway. And then when someone asks you about it, [00:18:00] if you can then explain it simply, that's when you're pretty much an expert. Yeah. And like, what would you say that the roles, like what roles do personal skills such as communication and adaptability play in a person's career success?

And how can they be developed? So I'd say the personal skills are crucial. Often overlooked, people focus a lot on hard skills. I think the personal skills are everything. Yeah, you could be, you could have zero really hard skills and just be amazing at talking to people. And if you double down on them, you maybe apply like a bit of.

Uh, bit of a hard skill, like public speaking might be defined a little bit like a hard skill, but if you're great with personal skills, it's like inspiring the people communication and being adaptable, then you can sell yourself massively. Yeah, like I've seen some of the best people in business succeed because they are great with people because it's all about leading, interacting people because you might be thinking about this.

In a technical role where you're focused on a hard skill, like maybe you're a graphic designer or maybe you're a UX designer or a coder, like great, that's awesome [00:19:00] roles, you can get paid quite a lot for them, but often the next roll up is a manager role, is one where you manage teams, and that's all about people, so if you are like not setting yourself up for personal skills, you're almost limiting your potential growth within the company and within roles as well.

And for you to make anything impactful in the world, you often need to bring together people. You to work with others to go further. And so that involves interacting with people. And so that's pretty much why they are pretty crucial as well. And think about them. This is how I think about them. It's like amplifiers.

The personal skills amplify the hard skills and the industry skills you have. They allow you to fully leverage the knowledge that you have in those two areas. Yeah, like you said, there's no I in team, right? Yeah. Yeah, like. Like being able to like, um, like come together like a community to like really like people from like all different skills and mindsets and like being able to like come together on like one, maybe like safe space or like any, anywhere where you guys have things in common [00:20:00] that really like build something that will help the other people around you, right?

Yeah, yeah, exactly. And it's like a. If you want to go fast, go alone, but if you want to go far, go together. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And like, even like, going on with it, like in today's like competitive job market, what are some industry specific skills that are highly sought after and why are they crucial for job seekers and professionals?

So ironically, the answer here is it depends on the industry. Yeah. Um, but it also depends on what you want to do as well. And no one expects, in a lot of roles, For you to have deep knowledge straight out of university, they expect the university graduate to be basically a fresh play. Yeah, you're going to have high potential, but you're not going to have industry specific skills at that stage unless you've maybe done a master's in something else.

So you might do a master's in one of the classic ones is like environmental policy. You might go do a master's in that and then join a climate consulting team that you would otherwise not be able to get the role without having done that. [00:21:00] So I'd say see the undergraduate. In a lot of cases as the kind of baseline and then if you want to do more industry specific learning in academia, the masters is probably the place to apply some of the industry specific knowledge, but often you can develop it on the job, like some of the classic career parts of.

Uh, consulting, uh, banking, uh, they require you to go and learn by doing it rather than by saying, you know, a lot about it, um, as well. So I'd say it depends massively, but some of the trends we're seeing defense is pretty big right now. Obviously we've got a war going on in Ukraine. So anyone that knows everything about defense, uh, do pretty well, pretty hard to develop at a young age.

So that's kind of more for the seniors who have been working in. Uh, more military roles for a while, but other big ones, climate, say global warming, increasingly becoming aware of that happening and Anyone who's working the climate spaces tends to be well sought after. And then the third one is like well being as well.

Like I'm talking [00:22:00] about here about the future of work, how it's changing, and that sort of engagement of employees at work. I think it's some crazy stat about like 21 percent of people are actually engaged at work. Like the rest of the 79 percent aren't like, that's a crazy mad stuff. I think anyone that can bring an understanding of wellbeing to help people, or even as a more selfish business goal, engage their employees.

They become more productive. Like that's super valuable, but even as a more like, you know, human goal of actually having people enjoy life. Uh, also grateful to, so I'd say it depends on where you want to play. I'd say pick a industry or space that you want to play for the next 10 years. And be able to stick to it.

I don't follow the kind of wins of that. Oh, here comes AI. Here comes crypto. Here comes web three. Like that can be quite fun and great. And it's cool to explore. But actually those things, they often fads a little bit and they go up massively and then come down. I, I would say my AI isn't, isn't a fad. It's going to keep increasing, but, um, at a rate that's slower than everyone [00:23:00] projects.

So I'd say, do not necessarily do it because it's sought after. Do it because it's interesting to you and you can do it. So that for your heart, right? Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. I even like, I can even relate to some of the points that you said. Cause I remember that I also got like a master's degree straight off the university as well.

Cause I remember like a couple of years back when I finished that uni, I was like, raw, like I'm not actually prepared for the work industry. Look at the job requirements. It'd be really like, it could be like an entry level world. It'd be like, Oh, you need to two years experience in that studio, they feel like they need a cover letter, or you need to be using that Python, C HTML, CSS, I was like, nah, man, I wasn't ready.

So I was like, let me like a master's degree. And it really helps me like shape my skills. So cause I learned. like what I really want in terms of like being able to be like an artist, being able to develop in different skills, such as video editing, being able to animate, learning different softwares, including blender, which is something I've never used [00:24:00] before.

And looking that is like, I know it's my idea because you feel like it's intimidating to use. And it's like, um, once you get into it, it's like, you realize that how easy it is. it is to use as well. And even outside of that, like YouTube's your best friend as well. Cause you'd be able to like, find like lots of different like tutorials as well.

And even like right now, like you can even like find like tips on Tik Tok as well. Cause I'd be scrolling from my 4U page and I'd be looking at appropriate tips, how to do this, how to do that. And it's like, wow, like they're really trying to like help like upskill like young people to really get into like whatever field they want to go into.

Yeah, for sure. There are ways of learning online. Uh, I personally wouldn't recommend it to myself. That's your way. That's cool. Normally discovery platform of like you become, Oh, that's interesting. That's like a one minute solution to a problem I have. And then you get more into it. So I'd say if you're unsure about what to explore, maybe this platform is a good for you.

Just like try loads of things. But then when you want to like about deep knowledge, Personally, I'd [00:25:00] say avoid the old social media and get stuck into doing a thing, learning about doing it. Yeah, and even like what you shared about like mental well being, that, that stats honestly surprised me. Oh yeah, it's crazy.

Yeah, 79 percent to 21, so like even like, even those sort of fields like, like if there are people that are passionate about it, like they could like go into those sort of fields too to like help young people, like help everyone be like productive at work too. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. And, uh, what would you say is that in terms of like hard skills that, that technical, technical proficiency are often emphasised, can you share examples of hard skills that are particularly valuable in various industries?

So some classic hard skills like graphic design, copywriting, project management, programming, data science, they're pretty valuable regardless of where you go, yeah? Like you could work in a startup, you could work in an agency, you could work in a corporate. They're all going to be valuable pretty much regardless because everyone needs a great graphic designer.

Everyone needs [00:26:00] someone who can turn words into sales scripts, um, operating. Everyone needs people who can actually manage projects. Everyone needs someone who can write, well not everyone, but most companies now need someone who can write code, or at least build a website, programming. And everyone's got this big data problem with loads of data, but nothing, no idea how to do anything with it.

So data science is also pretty big too. Um, so I'd say, yeah, it depends on the role, um, but I'd say most industries value those skills in some way. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And like, even like into, into the next point, like how do personal skills, industry skills, and hard skills complement each other in a person's career journey?

And how can they be harnessed? for maximum impact because you know, like how there's like the hard skills, which are, which are things that companies are sorting after. But there's also things that industry schools and personal schools, and they need to be like in unison as one. So they can really create like a big impact.

So the way I like to see it is like, think about E, I'll put it upside down for you. So the backbone is the soft skills. These are the things that [00:27:00] you almost need to do really well with the hard skills. Without them, the other bits kind of fall apart. You can't interact with a team. You can't really play in a role.

So the backbone is the soft skills. And then the hard skills become the different, um, elements of the, the user parts, the top and the bottom. And then the industry skill is the middle bit. So the industry skill is something that you want to develop deep knowledge of. The hard skills, you want to often combine multiple hard skills together.

So if you're a great, uh, project manager and you're a great graphic designer, there's probably some unique application to that. Like maybe you want to work in, uh, agency, the agency world of creating great assets for companies and manual projects. It's probably something that applies when you do two hard skills together.

So great backbone of soft skills, two hard skills on one entry skill, those elements together, help you create your competition of one. And the way I think about this is how do you as an individual become only competitive with yourself? How does no one else have the same experience, knowledge, [00:28:00] understanding that you do, and how can you be the one that's like the obvious best fit for a role or the obvious best fit to sell something to someone else?

And so with the compliments of the like two different hard skills and the industry skill, you should be able to do that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So like being able to like have like the, being able to like break it down and like make it, and like try not focus on different things at different times to like really help, like really help like grow each part at the same time.

Right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, for sure. And I mean, take an example here. Let me try and find a more relevant one of that a graphic designer, hard skill, a data science, hard skill seem kind of irrelevant, maybe they didn't really go together, but then you may put in an industry of education and you go, okay, this person then understands how best to ask for data through surveys by creating great experiences of survey data collection.

And then they can better analyze that data to more the education space. Like that's pretty unique already, um, you can obviously add in more Over your career develop quite [00:29:00] a few industry experiences. So you might have more like Ends or prongs to your E as well. So it might become like, I don't know what else to call it, a ladder rather than an E shaped model where you have multiple different steps on it too.

Yeah, that's so interesting to hear, you know, thank you for sharing that one, Charlie. And can you also share like anecdotes or examples of professionals who have effectively combined a diverse set of skills to achieve success in their careers? Just like what you said, like the graphic designer going into education, like do you have any examples of like professionals who have done the same thing?

So I'd start with people that you already know. So someone like Joe Rogan, hopefully you've already heard about. Uh, this guy, obviously, you know him for his podcast. Before that he's been like a comedian and UFC presenter. Uh, he's also got involved with boxing, UFC fighting himself. And for him, he's like deep.

Curiosity and understanding of the world helps him create a better podcast because he has a broad level of knowledge of like [00:30:00] hard skills in different areas that he can then ask his guests about in a way that's a lot more interesting and open than perhaps people that would just specialize in one area would be like Joe Robbins, a great example of a.

Like a polymath, more potential client than a modern person. We also have someone say in our TBC, the portfolio collective community, there's loads of people here who are great examples, but I'll pick out one that's really good. Um, called Nicola and she is both like a founder right now, a coach and an event specialist.

But beneath all that, she has her like values focused on like play and freedom. And so whenever she applies for roles that are maybe part time that fit in that event specialist role or in her own work, helping others through workshops, it's all on the play and freedom aspect of what she really values in the world and how she applies.

Uh, skills of facilitating to that as well. So pretty interesting. And then one from the past is someone like Da Vinci, who is one of the best examples, a true polymath. This guy can paint. This guy can engineer. This guy can go and do sculptures. He's a mathematician. And [00:31:00] like all of that together, he combines to create very unique art that we now know and love as well.

So I'd say there are examples in the past to look to who are polymaths. There are examples today who are living it too, which are super, super cool. It's basically that kind of people that do like lots of different things, but tap into like different fields. Like it can be like an actor one day, the next thing you'll have like a podcast.

It's kind of like, well, well, I don't know if Will Smith, Will Smith counts here. Cause like, he was thought of like the Fresh Prince and then he done that rap hit, like rapping. And then he went into acting with the Fresh Prince of Bel Air and now he's got his own family and they're doing like books as well.

So would you say that's kind of like an example? Yeah, for sure. For sure. Like it's building on those different skills. And I think it's. overlapping what they do as well and it's being able to embrace the fact that you can actually learn more than a few things and the fact that you combine them together makes you unique.

So for for what's meant it's probably partly like being a comedian um and also being like a great actor and then [00:32:00] probably also the family values of you know being able to bring up other young people how it looks like what it looks like to have kids and then being able to combine them together in a unique way is always really good.

Yeah that's so now now it makes a lot more sense Thank you for explaining it Charlie And even like in the, uh, coming up to the last question now. So in a rapidly changing work environment, what schools do you think will be most in demand in the next two to five years? So this, that's pretty interesting.

It always depends on how things change. Some of the most, like favorite job roles that I've seen are things like an AI prompt writer. Mm-hmm. . So we're seeing right now obviously the rise of ai. Uh, a big part of that is how do you best write prompts to get out, say of Mid journey, a great image or of, uh, open AI chat, GPT a great response.

So being able to create great prompts is a super valuable skill. Mm-hmm. . And a lot of that comes back to how we best interact with technology. Think about the skills going forward as like technology [00:33:00] management. So rather than you doing the work yourself, you becoming a manager of other technologies and AI is that becomes a really important skill. So beneath that, there are other interesting examples here, which, uh, metaverse event directors, things like how do you organize great events virtually? Pretty interesting question, especially if we're doing more of that online. Um, I mean, things like roadblocks fortnight and massive right now, and they'll continue to grow beneath that.

There is the problem of like, how do you create great clothing on the platform and avatar clothing designers, again, an interesting skill. So there's always jobs being created and it depends on where the technology goes, but as a trend, I'd say managing the capabilities of AI technology is crucial and.

Things like no code and AI together are really important. And no code is where you can build platforms or websites or applications without ever writing a bit of code. It's amazing. I've developed a bit of a [00:34:00] skill in this and it's super cool, but combining that with AI is wow. Okay. Next level. That means you can ask a chapter to build your website for you.

Like those skills are incredible. Thinking about how they're changing. It's always going to matter depending on which industry you're in, but. There's always going to be a way of managing AI. And I think one of the most important, perhaps reverse questions to this is what skills won't change in the next two to five years and things like sales, marketing, management, anything grounded in human psychology is always going to be relevant regardless.

Yeah, that's so interesting to hear. So when you say like technology cool, like management, would you be like managing like softwares at mid journey and like chatGPT then and make sure they all run smoothly for the content? Yeah. Imagine this is a classic example of like before we might have contact centers where people would answer phone calls from people who need support with.

One of the devices. Great. Now that might be a AI chapter chat [00:35:00] bot that might be managing the chatbot responses and improving the data collection and being able to improve the answers and analyzing if they're getting it accurately or not. Yeah. And that makes a lot more sense now. And like, thank you for taking your time out to speak with us, Charlie.

That was really having you on board here. And I just want to ask, like, where can we find you on our social media platforms? So the big ones for LinkedIn. So Charlie Rogers on LinkedIn is where you'll probably find me. That's just hit 10K followers.

The one old plug is a mass breeding of twenties. I typed that in on. Um, Google Magic 20 sub stack. Hope you'll come up and that's very right about the future of world has changed, Jen said. So that's the place for it. Uh, cool. Thank you, Charlie. And if you want to follow us on hundo, hundo.xyz on all of our social media platforms.

And if you want to follow me, Albert, I go by @AlbzMadeIt on Instagram, TikTok as well. So yeah, thank you guys for [00:36:00] watching our CareerCon Monthly today.

VIDEO TRANSCRIPT

[00:00:00] Hey guys, you're locked into CareerCon Monthly. I'm myself, Albert, Graphic Designer at hundo, and I'm with the lovely Charlie Rodgers, who is a special guest today. Would you like to introduce yourself?

Basically, when people ask me what do I do, I normally say I do a few things. What this means is I do four days a week operations, where we help people build portfolios, where they earn via many sources of income. I also have a portfolio career, so I also Then on the side, write a newsletter on the future of work called Mastering in the 20s and how it's changing, as Jen said, and I also have a community called the Undefined Community, or I think it's now 28 of us who are in their 20s and 30s who like doing many things called multi potentialites.

Uh, and so those three things together for me, all about the future of work and the future of careers and how they're changing, how they're [00:01:00] developing. So I think this is a super relevant conversation and I'm looking forward to having it with you. Yeah, that sounds interesting. You know, you're really trying to like help people from all different communities, different backgrounds and different ages as well.

So that's like really inspiring to hear. So let's start off with the first question, which is, how do you define the term career and what elements do you believe in and make up a fulfilling and meaningful career in an ever changing environment? Yeah, it's a good question. I'd say, put simply, a career is what you do for a living over time, how that changes, but more broadly, it's a combination of the specific knowledge, skills and expertise that you have.

And in the past, we've often seen careers be quite linear and they've been quite obvious in that you might go be a doctor and you go and do your six years at university, you become a junior doctor for two years, and then you can go and actually specialize afterwards. It becomes quite a career, obvious career path, but nowadays we're seeing a lot more nonlinear careers, i.

e. squiggly careers, ones that change a lot in terms of how the environment around is moving. And so I think in an age [00:02:00] where technology is only getting more exponential and things are changing only ever faster. We're often seeing careers be more of a term that's applied to not just one obvious linear, linear career, but having many careers over someone's lifetime as well.

So I'd say what makes it meaningful and what makes it purposeful though. Is the alignment of purpose so really at the heart of this in an ever changing environment is you are really delving into who you are and what values you have and what purpose you want to create in the world and then you're also applying the skills that you have like what unique thing can you do really well I know Albert's great at graphic design so like how can he apply his graphic design skills and then it's how do you get enough financial benefit how can I actually pay to live in this world this gets ever more expensive also important and then how can you have the freedom to engage in work in a way that's So how can you design your day in a way that's meaningful and allows you to be most productive and also most effective?

effective in life too. Yeah, I can definitely relate to what you're [00:03:00] saying as well, especially with like the non linear pathway as well, because I remember like years back, the first thing I wanted to be was a train driver when I was younger. Yeah, like looking outside at Upton Park Station, all the trains going past, I was like, nah, let me be a train driver.

And then I wanted to be an actor for Disney Channel. Then I wanted to be a basketball player because I was younger. Then Like, when I started doing art in secondary school, that's what really made me, um, have my part. That's when, like, my creativity passion started as well. So even that, and then even alongside that, I also done photography as well.

So I was like, oh, let me see if I could, like, dabble into photography as my career. Also done video editing. I'm also, like, starting to, like, look into animation as well during, like, my uni times as well. So, like, I definitely hear what you're saying, like, the non linear, like, career path as well. Yeah, that's pretty interesting.

Do you ever still apply some of those skills now in terms of wanting to be a train driver? Do you ever still research about trains or being an [00:04:00] actor? Do you ever still act? I mean, like, I've done, like, voice acting in terms of, like, my animations, like, which is, uh, I've done, like, a recent animation for my birthday.

I was like, oh, let me do some voice acting, like, done like a little voice recording, then put it all together on Procreate and then put it together on CapCut. So like doing a little voice acting skills, then a little bit of video editing, and also trying to jumble my art into it. Train driving, I still look up like, um, uh, um, what's it called?

the YouTube videos, but also like implement, like I done, um, like a animation which incorporated like Carrington station, which is where I used to, like where I grew up. So still implementing like the public transport, like element of things into my work as well. Yeah. See, that is really cool. That's kind of like exactly what I mean here is even though you might change your skills and what you're focused on, you can still build on top of them.

They are not wasted. They are used in a unique way. Yeah. [00:05:00] Yeah. And I even got an extra question for you. Like, what would you say is like meaningful work to you? Cause you said like you're like purpose driven. Yeah. So for me, like I spend a lot of time working about this and I think the key thing here is you don't know it from day one.

It's only in retrospect when you have time to reflect that you can really define it. Uh, but for me, it's all about creating. empowering people to create organizations that actually create meaningful experiences of work. So for other people, how they can go to work and not turn up each day and be like, I hate what I'm doing, but instead be engaged and be like, Oh, I actually feel aligned to it.

So it's kind of meta. My purpose is about helping other businesses unlock other individuals, employees, freelancers, contractors, however they engage their purpose at work too. So for me, Like, there's nothing worse in the world than turning up soullessly to a job you hate. Like, I wouldn't, I hate the idea of someone doing that.

So how you can get people engaged in work is for me really, really important. Uh, sounds so lovely to hear. It's like you, it's like you've got like a big heart for like the people around you and trying to like help make the world a better place to live in. [00:06:00] Yeah. Yeah. Can you share like insights into the key trends and shifts you foresee in the future of work, and especially in light of like technological advances and global changes?

Yeah, for sure. Like, there's quite a lot here. And I think this, the key thing here is that it's always changing and that the future of work definition is so broad because you could kind of pick up on anything because everything impacts work because work is such a big part of our lives. Something we do.

I mean, most people do 40 hours a week, 50 hours a week, if not more or less. And so I think, With whatever I'm about to say here, like, take a pinch of salt. These things change very quickly as well. Um, but I'd say the key six trends that we often see, and these are the ones that I kind of consult on as well, are about flexible hybrid working environments.

So we've seen post pandemic, how we shifted from the normal thing being nine to five in an office. Monday through Friday, and now it's become, okay, maybe come in like three days a week or two days a week, uh, and then you can do the rest at home. And then if in the more innovative companies, they've gone, okay, rather than working nine to [00:07:00] five, let's do core hours, 11 to three, and then you choose the rest, but there's really interesting models of work and how people engage with it, with their time, which is changing pretty, pretty quickly as well, and there's no like set best way of doing it right now.

It's more about thinking how is an organization best set up to. Empower and engage their members of the team as well. So that first one, flexible hybrid working environments. Second one, lifelong self directed learning. Because career paths are changing so quickly and because the skills here are becoming very ever changing in the working world.

It means it's on you, the individual to learn and upskill yourself as much as other company, because we're often seeing people jump companies every two, three years at a minimum, at a maximum really. And so with Gen Z in particular, it's thinking how can they empower themselves with the learning they're taking on.

And then authentic experience of work. Number three, how can people bring their full selves to work? How can they, rather than wear their corporate mask and smile, like actually bring their full selves and talk about the things they do outside of work. [00:08:00] Like for me, it's, I'd spend 15, 20 hours doing triathlon training.

Like that's an important part of my life. , if I can't talk about it at work, like that restricts me a little bit. So in a similar vein, how can people be authentic? So that's number three. Number four, socially responsible organizations. So you're seeing this a lot with B Corps. Uh, E S G, uh, becoming more important.

And for a lot of companies it's thinking how do we actually. Care for the world around us in some way, or how do we at least account for it in the minimum way, like with carbon credits and the equivalent, it's thinking, let's be somewhat social responsible. And you're seeing the big, bigger companies think more about becoming a vehicle for doing things that are more longevity as well.

So before number five, this is the one that we often hear about nowadays next technology. So, I mean. These trends got like this, uh, but Metaverse, those trends maybe down here now, uh, but then AI is up here now, um, and then you've got Web3, which again is down here now, uh, and then Crypto, so all these trends about next generation technology, how they're embedded in the future of work is very interesting as well, and then finally the humanized hiring experience as well, so with the AI coming into it, [00:09:00] it's how do you make The application process, when there's thousands of people who apply for one role, how do you actually humanize that process?

And it's really interesting what people are doing in this space and how they're making it. So you're removing biases in like, so rather than saying we're looking for a, I don't know. I saw actually an ad before on the way to the gym this morning. It was like, we're looking for a waitress. And I was like, waitress, like why not waiter?

And I was, that's kind of interesting about how we use language to, uh, advertise jobs and roles. is becoming a lot more D& I friendly and becoming a lot more open to everyone rather than implicitly implying that Only some people can apply for a role. It's pretty interesting. Yeah, that's so interesting to hear as well.

Cause like, even like speaking about like the whole, like how we're going to like from like an office to like a hybrid, like hybrid models, like that's so interesting to hear because I remember cause I was still in uni during them times where everyone was still in the office and then lockdown, like lockdown happened and it's like, Oh, okay.

This is. This is [00:10:00] mad. Like everyone's like working from homes. I never thought I'd see the day that people will be draining like meetings from like team calls or like zoom or like google meet and then like even like the um even um google meet and like even like hybrid working models like what I've noticed is that it creates like a better work life balance because like people like we all have like our own things to do like we're always trying to like make our own um trying to make our own like lives and trying like how to like fit that around work.

like really trying to get the work done. And also like, even like speak about like being your authentic self at work. And that's what I realized is the most important thing as well. Cause you don't want to like put on a mask and like try to like pretend to be who you are. Cause like, like, what's it called?

You want to like be able to be like a good fit for the people around you as well. And even with like the. CV bias as well, like noticing the language as well, like you've got to try and make sure that you've got to be like fair towards everyone, like no matter what race, like gender, where you come from, like trying to make sure that everyone deserves an [00:11:00] equal opportunity in life as well.

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. And even like from your experience, like how can individuals proactively prepare for a successful career and what skills do they need in an increasingly digital and dynamic job market? So I think here the skills and that we talked about before alignment to purpose, we need to really start from the point of what do you want to do in the world and what's your unique talent that you can add to it.

That's the really important starting point. But with that in mind, you need a backbone of soft skills because Everything in business, it's about interacting with other people, like sales skills, you're selling to someone, marketing skills, you're convincing someone to buy, uh, leadership skills. You're convincing someone to follow you, but they are all about psychology based and they are all about how you interact with humans.

So you need a strong backbone of those soft skills. Cause you can be the best coder in the world. Yeah. But if you can't interact with people and play in a team, then no one's going to work with you. Like they might hire you to do a certain project and you could probably get paid relatively well for that.

But if you can't sell yourself and can't do the soft [00:12:00] skills of. selling or marketing, how are you going to be able to do that? So it's a combination of a deep backbone of soft skills combined by very specific hard skills. So the example that I was coding for you, Albert, graphic design as well, is thinking how can you develop those specific hard skills that not everyone can do and everyone appreciates the value that you can bring through your unique application is often the hard skills, the ones where.

Someone comes in and you're like, it looks like magic. Like how, how, I have no idea. Um, and those hard skills combined by the soft skills also combined by industry skills are really important to you. So the industry skills could be in this case, that future of work, like understanding the future of careers is the one I'm sort of developing myself.

And that then combined with the hard skill. Of say, like project management and combined with the soft skill of like communication, leadership, charisma sets me up to be in a pretty good place for it too, as well. So I'd say you need all three. Um, but you also need to start thinking in how you can build 10 year games, like play 10 year games rather than one [00:13:00] year games.

Because a lot of, especially Gen Z, a lot of young people are obsessed with like seeing results very quickly. And I know I've been there. It's quite addictive to try and how can we do things faster? They're like these old people who tell me that I can't do it or they need to wait a year. Like, nah, nah, nah, I can do it now.

I totally get it, but also play 10, 15, 20 year games with your purpose, change the activities you do, but with your purpose, play long games, it'll mean that you are forever building that industry expertise, regardless of the job or the business you've built beneath it as well. Yeah. Like even when you said about like Gen Z's wanting to see that immediate gratifications, that is me.

It's so me because I'm a Gen Z myself and I'm like, I don't see things now. Sometimes like, it's like having that. endurance to like persevere for all these different like trials and tribulations to get like the results that you want as well. So it's that I definitely relate to what you're hearing is that even like learn about like soft skills and hard skills, that you want to be able to have like the combination of both as [00:14:00] well.

Because it's true what you said, like you You can be amazing at the hard skills like coding, graphic design, and like really skilled in like what you do in those sort of sectors, but if you can't really like socialize and interact with people, like how are you gonna like help other people around you as well?

Yeah, yeah, exactly. I think the other part of this is seeing what you do and what projects you work on as case studies. So this is how I think about work. It's like, I'm currently in my role. This is actually my first almost full time role working four days a week here. Um, and I've only ever been self employed before.

Started my own businesses, uh, contracted, freelance, everything but employment. Um, come around. I was like, I need a great case study. I'll be working in operations in a future of work at tech business. And I can get there by going and. Joining as a almost full time employee. So I think the way to think about career and experience and skills is how do you build a case study that you can then tell someone about that you've worked on later on as well.

It's kind of like creating your portfolio, [00:15:00] right? Yeah. Case study portfolio is all adding up together now, but the portfolio isn't just a graphic design. It's also Yeah, most definitely like portfolio can go into many different things called a property portfolio, graphic design portfolio, animation, video editing, photography, like there's lots of like different case studies you can put in there to like really like sell yourself to other people.

And if you're able to like build up on like selling yourself, then you'd be able to like attract the people that you want in your life and to help each other grow. Yeah, for sure. Yeah. And could you explain the distinction between personal skills, industry specific skills, and hard skills, and why each category is essential for professional growth?

So with the personal skills, like I mentioned before, it's all about the people. It's how you motivate them, communicate with them, and generally work with others. And then the industry specific skills, knowledge about a particular industry. So it's normally highly specific. It could be... I don't know banking, but then you [00:16:00] could go more deeper than that and talk about I don't even know enough about it So, uh have the credit system in europe like you could be a specialist that will attack system in Switzerland.

Uh, like that could be your industry six skill. Um, it normally involves learning a lot of terminology and jargon and technology that other people don't know. So that when you talk to someone who also has the same industry specific skill, it's like you're talking another language. Yeah, like no one else gets it.

Um, and then your kind of role is to be able to take the complexity of https: otter. ai Consult, help others on how to understand it too. So I'd say personal industry skills and then hard skills, the technical abilities demonstrated. In a measurable way. So this could be like, like I said, coding, rewriting, graphic design, project management, I like to think of these as like degree skills, things you normally get a degree for, uh, they're the hard skills.

I mean, it's not entirely true, but it's mostly accurate. Uh, the ones where like a certificate is quite useful. So getting a certificate for project management, Or a certificate that says, I know how to code in JavaScript, pretty [00:17:00] useful. And those are the things that you can put on a CV and say, Hey, look, I know that.

The personal skills, the more things that you can show in an interview and say, Hey, look, like I do this stuff. I can show it to you because I can smile on interview and say, I'm really good at it. Uh, and then the industry skills are more of the things that only you could say because you have the knowledge of the industry.

Thank you for breaking it down, Charlie, because I know like many people, even like myself, like hearing like soft skills, hard skills, like personal skills, industry specific skills that can be very overwhelming. So it's nice to be able to break it down and explain to other people that, oh, how can they be able to apply for professional growth as well?

And even like personal skills is like learning all these different jargons and breaking it down into layman terms so they can really understand it and help it with their professional growth too. Yeah, for sure. I mean, to become an expert, you normally have to realize how little, you know, uh, about an industry.

And then you have to, then even with knowing how little, you know, go and explore it and learn as much as you can anyway. And then when someone asks you about it, [00:18:00] if you can then explain it simply, that's when you're pretty much an expert. Yeah. And like, what would you say that the roles, like what roles do personal skills such as communication and adaptability play in a person's career success?

And how can they be developed? So I'd say the personal skills are crucial. Often overlooked, people focus a lot on hard skills. I think the personal skills are everything. Yeah, you could be, you could have zero really hard skills and just be amazing at talking to people. And if you double down on them, you maybe apply like a bit of.

Uh, bit of a hard skill, like public speaking might be defined a little bit like a hard skill, but if you're great with personal skills, it's like inspiring the people communication and being adaptable, then you can sell yourself massively. Yeah, like I've seen some of the best people in business succeed because they are great with people because it's all about leading, interacting people because you might be thinking about this.

In a technical role where you're focused on a hard skill, like maybe you're a graphic designer or maybe you're a UX designer or a coder, like great, that's awesome [00:19:00] roles, you can get paid quite a lot for them, but often the next roll up is a manager role, is one where you manage teams, and that's all about people, so if you are like not setting yourself up for personal skills, you're almost limiting your potential growth within the company and within roles as well.

And for you to make anything impactful in the world, you often need to bring together people. You to work with others to go further. And so that involves interacting with people. And so that's pretty much why they are pretty crucial as well. And think about them. This is how I think about them. It's like amplifiers.

The personal skills amplify the hard skills and the industry skills you have. They allow you to fully leverage the knowledge that you have in those two areas. Yeah, like you said, there's no I in team, right? Yeah. Yeah, like. Like being able to like, um, like come together like a community to like really like people from like all different skills and mindsets and like being able to like come together on like one, maybe like safe space or like any, anywhere where you guys have things in common [00:20:00] that really like build something that will help the other people around you, right?

Yeah, yeah, exactly. And it's like a. If you want to go fast, go alone, but if you want to go far, go together. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And like, even like, going on with it, like in today's like competitive job market, what are some industry specific skills that are highly sought after and why are they crucial for job seekers and professionals?

So ironically, the answer here is it depends on the industry. Yeah. Um, but it also depends on what you want to do as well. And no one expects, in a lot of roles, For you to have deep knowledge straight out of university, they expect the university graduate to be basically a fresh play. Yeah, you're going to have high potential, but you're not going to have industry specific skills at that stage unless you've maybe done a master's in something else.

So you might do a master's in one of the classic ones is like environmental policy. You might go do a master's in that and then join a climate consulting team that you would otherwise not be able to get the role without having done that. [00:21:00] So I'd say see the undergraduate. In a lot of cases as the kind of baseline and then if you want to do more industry specific learning in academia, the masters is probably the place to apply some of the industry specific knowledge, but often you can develop it on the job, like some of the classic career parts of.

Uh, consulting, uh, banking, uh, they require you to go and learn by doing it rather than by saying, you know, a lot about it, um, as well. So I'd say it depends massively, but some of the trends we're seeing defense is pretty big right now. Obviously we've got a war going on in Ukraine. So anyone that knows everything about defense, uh, do pretty well, pretty hard to develop at a young age.

So that's kind of more for the seniors who have been working in. Uh, more military roles for a while, but other big ones, climate, say global warming, increasingly becoming aware of that happening and Anyone who's working the climate spaces tends to be well sought after. And then the third one is like well being as well.

Like I'm talking [00:22:00] about here about the future of work, how it's changing, and that sort of engagement of employees at work. I think it's some crazy stat about like 21 percent of people are actually engaged at work. Like the rest of the 79 percent aren't like, that's a crazy mad stuff. I think anyone that can bring an understanding of wellbeing to help people, or even as a more selfish business goal, engage their employees.

They become more productive. Like that's super valuable, but even as a more like, you know, human goal of actually having people enjoy life. Uh, also grateful to, so I'd say it depends on where you want to play. I'd say pick a industry or space that you want to play for the next 10 years. And be able to stick to it.

I don't follow the kind of wins of that. Oh, here comes AI. Here comes crypto. Here comes web three. Like that can be quite fun and great. And it's cool to explore. But actually those things, they often fads a little bit and they go up massively and then come down. I, I would say my AI isn't, isn't a fad. It's going to keep increasing, but, um, at a rate that's slower than everyone [00:23:00] projects.

So I'd say, do not necessarily do it because it's sought after. Do it because it's interesting to you and you can do it. So that for your heart, right? Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. I even like, I can even relate to some of the points that you said. Cause I remember that I also got like a master's degree straight off the university as well.

Cause I remember like a couple of years back when I finished that uni, I was like, raw, like I'm not actually prepared for the work industry. Look at the job requirements. It'd be really like, it could be like an entry level world. It'd be like, Oh, you need to two years experience in that studio, they feel like they need a cover letter, or you need to be using that Python, C HTML, CSS, I was like, nah, man, I wasn't ready.

So I was like, let me like a master's degree. And it really helps me like shape my skills. So cause I learned. like what I really want in terms of like being able to be like an artist, being able to develop in different skills, such as video editing, being able to animate, learning different softwares, including blender, which is something I've never used [00:24:00] before.

And looking that is like, I know it's my idea because you feel like it's intimidating to use. And it's like, um, once you get into it, it's like, you realize that how easy it is. it is to use as well. And even outside of that, like YouTube's your best friend as well. Cause you'd be able to like, find like lots of different like tutorials as well.

And even like right now, like you can even like find like tips on Tik Tok as well. Cause I'd be scrolling from my 4U page and I'd be looking at appropriate tips, how to do this, how to do that. And it's like, wow, like they're really trying to like help like upskill like young people to really get into like whatever field they want to go into.

Yeah, for sure. There are ways of learning online. Uh, I personally wouldn't recommend it to myself. That's your way. That's cool. Normally discovery platform of like you become, Oh, that's interesting. That's like a one minute solution to a problem I have. And then you get more into it. So I'd say if you're unsure about what to explore, maybe this platform is a good for you.

Just like try loads of things. But then when you want to like about deep knowledge, Personally, I'd [00:25:00] say avoid the old social media and get stuck into doing a thing, learning about doing it. Yeah, and even like what you shared about like mental well being, that, that stats honestly surprised me. Oh yeah, it's crazy.

Yeah, 79 percent to 21, so like even like, even those sort of fields like, like if there are people that are passionate about it, like they could like go into those sort of fields too to like help young people, like help everyone be like productive at work too. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. And, uh, what would you say is that in terms of like hard skills that, that technical, technical proficiency are often emphasised, can you share examples of hard skills that are particularly valuable in various industries?

So some classic hard skills like graphic design, copywriting, project management, programming, data science, they're pretty valuable regardless of where you go, yeah? Like you could work in a startup, you could work in an agency, you could work in a corporate. They're all going to be valuable pretty much regardless because everyone needs a great graphic designer.

Everyone needs [00:26:00] someone who can turn words into sales scripts, um, operating. Everyone needs people who can actually manage projects. Everyone needs someone who can write, well not everyone, but most companies now need someone who can write code, or at least build a website, programming. And everyone's got this big data problem with loads of data, but nothing, no idea how to do anything with it.

So data science is also pretty big too. Um, so I'd say, yeah, it depends on the role, um, but I'd say most industries value those skills in some way. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And like, even like into, into the next point, like how do personal skills, industry skills, and hard skills complement each other in a person's career journey?

And how can they be harnessed? for maximum impact because you know, like how there's like the hard skills, which are, which are things that companies are sorting after. But there's also things that industry schools and personal schools, and they need to be like in unison as one. So they can really create like a big impact.

So the way I like to see it is like, think about E, I'll put it upside down for you. So the backbone is the soft skills. These are the things that [00:27:00] you almost need to do really well with the hard skills. Without them, the other bits kind of fall apart. You can't interact with a team. You can't really play in a role.

So the backbone is the soft skills. And then the hard skills become the different, um, elements of the, the user parts, the top and the bottom. And then the industry skill is the middle bit. So the industry skill is something that you want to develop deep knowledge of. The hard skills, you want to often combine multiple hard skills together.

So if you're a great, uh, project manager and you're a great graphic designer, there's probably some unique application to that. Like maybe you want to work in, uh, agency, the agency world of creating great assets for companies and manual projects. It's probably something that applies when you do two hard skills together.

So great backbone of soft skills, two hard skills on one entry skill, those elements together, help you create your competition of one. And the way I think about this is how do you as an individual become only competitive with yourself? How does no one else have the same experience, knowledge, [00:28:00] understanding that you do, and how can you be the one that's like the obvious best fit for a role or the obvious best fit to sell something to someone else?

And so with the compliments of the like two different hard skills and the industry skill, you should be able to do that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So like being able to like have like the, being able to like break it down and like make it, and like try not focus on different things at different times to like really help, like really help like grow each part at the same time.

Right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, for sure. And I mean, take an example here. Let me try and find a more relevant one of that a graphic designer, hard skill, a data science, hard skill seem kind of irrelevant, maybe they didn't really go together, but then you may put in an industry of education and you go, okay, this person then understands how best to ask for data through surveys by creating great experiences of survey data collection.

And then they can better analyze that data to more the education space. Like that's pretty unique already, um, you can obviously add in more Over your career develop quite [00:29:00] a few industry experiences. So you might have more like Ends or prongs to your E as well. So it might become like, I don't know what else to call it, a ladder rather than an E shaped model where you have multiple different steps on it too.

Yeah, that's so interesting to hear, you know, thank you for sharing that one, Charlie. And can you also share like anecdotes or examples of professionals who have effectively combined a diverse set of skills to achieve success in their careers? Just like what you said, like the graphic designer going into education, like do you have any examples of like professionals who have done the same thing?

So I'd start with people that you already know. So someone like Joe Rogan, hopefully you've already heard about. Uh, this guy, obviously, you know him for his podcast. Before that he's been like a comedian and UFC presenter. Uh, he's also got involved with boxing, UFC fighting himself. And for him, he's like deep.

Curiosity and understanding of the world helps him create a better podcast because he has a broad level of knowledge of like [00:30:00] hard skills in different areas that he can then ask his guests about in a way that's a lot more interesting and open than perhaps people that would just specialize in one area would be like Joe Robbins, a great example of a.

Like a polymath, more potential client than a modern person. We also have someone say in our TBC, the portfolio collective community, there's loads of people here who are great examples, but I'll pick out one that's really good. Um, called Nicola and she is both like a founder right now, a coach and an event specialist.

But beneath all that, she has her like values focused on like play and freedom. And so whenever she applies for roles that are maybe part time that fit in that event specialist role or in her own work, helping others through workshops, it's all on the play and freedom aspect of what she really values in the world and how she applies.

Uh, skills of facilitating to that as well. So pretty interesting. And then one from the past is someone like Da Vinci, who is one of the best examples, a true polymath. This guy can paint. This guy can engineer. This guy can go and do sculptures. He's a mathematician. And [00:31:00] like all of that together, he combines to create very unique art that we now know and love as well.

So I'd say there are examples in the past to look to who are polymaths. There are examples today who are living it too, which are super, super cool. It's basically that kind of people that do like lots of different things, but tap into like different fields. Like it can be like an actor one day, the next thing you'll have like a podcast.

It's kind of like, well, well, I don't know if Will Smith, Will Smith counts here. Cause like, he was thought of like the Fresh Prince and then he done that rap hit, like rapping. And then he went into acting with the Fresh Prince of Bel Air and now he's got his own family and they're doing like books as well.

So would you say that's kind of like an example? Yeah, for sure. For sure. Like it's building on those different skills. And I think it's. overlapping what they do as well and it's being able to embrace the fact that you can actually learn more than a few things and the fact that you combine them together makes you unique.

So for for what's meant it's probably partly like being a comedian um and also being like a great actor and then [00:32:00] probably also the family values of you know being able to bring up other young people how it looks like what it looks like to have kids and then being able to combine them together in a unique way is always really good.

Yeah that's so now now it makes a lot more sense Thank you for explaining it Charlie And even like in the, uh, coming up to the last question now. So in a rapidly changing work environment, what schools do you think will be most in demand in the next two to five years? So this, that's pretty interesting.

It always depends on how things change. Some of the most, like favorite job roles that I've seen are things like an AI prompt writer. Mm-hmm. . So we're seeing right now obviously the rise of ai. Uh, a big part of that is how do you best write prompts to get out, say of Mid journey, a great image or of, uh, open AI chat, GPT a great response.

So being able to create great prompts is a super valuable skill. Mm-hmm. . And a lot of that comes back to how we best interact with technology. Think about the skills going forward as like technology [00:33:00] management. So rather than you doing the work yourself, you becoming a manager of other technologies and AI is that becomes a really important skill. So beneath that, there are other interesting examples here, which, uh, metaverse event directors, things like how do you organize great events virtually? Pretty interesting question, especially if we're doing more of that online. Um, I mean, things like roadblocks fortnight and massive right now, and they'll continue to grow beneath that.

There is the problem of like, how do you create great clothing on the platform and avatar clothing designers, again, an interesting skill. So there's always jobs being created and it depends on where the technology goes, but as a trend, I'd say managing the capabilities of AI technology is crucial and.

Things like no code and AI together are really important. And no code is where you can build platforms or websites or applications without ever writing a bit of code. It's amazing. I've developed a bit of a [00:34:00] skill in this and it's super cool, but combining that with AI is wow. Okay. Next level. That means you can ask a chapter to build your website for you.

Like those skills are incredible. Thinking about how they're changing. It's always going to matter depending on which industry you're in, but. There's always going to be a way of managing AI. And I think one of the most important, perhaps reverse questions to this is what skills won't change in the next two to five years and things like sales, marketing, management, anything grounded in human psychology is always going to be relevant regardless.

Yeah, that's so interesting to hear. So when you say like technology cool, like management, would you be like managing like softwares at mid journey and like chatGPT then and make sure they all run smoothly for the content? Yeah. Imagine this is a classic example of like before we might have contact centers where people would answer phone calls from people who need support with.

One of the devices. Great. Now that might be a AI chapter chat [00:35:00] bot that might be managing the chatbot responses and improving the data collection and being able to improve the answers and analyzing if they're getting it accurately or not. Yeah. And that makes a lot more sense now. And like, thank you for taking your time out to speak with us, Charlie.

That was really having you on board here. And I just want to ask, like, where can we find you on our social media platforms? So the big ones for LinkedIn. So Charlie Rogers on LinkedIn is where you'll probably find me. That's just hit 10K followers.

The one old plug is a mass breeding of twenties. I typed that in on. Um, Google Magic 20 sub stack. Hope you'll come up and that's very right about the future of world has changed, Jen said. So that's the place for it. Uh, cool. Thank you, Charlie. And if you want to follow us on hundo, hundo.xyz on all of our social media platforms.

And if you want to follow me, Albert, I go by @AlbzMadeIt on Instagram, TikTok as well. So yeah, thank you guys for [00:36:00] watching our CareerCon Monthly today.

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