If you want to feel powerful and influential in the workplace, you should always focus on what you can control. Most employees focus on what they can’t control as such remain in what I call Economic Slavery. One of such things that you can’t control is job security.
You may have done a great job yesterday doesn’t mean you have a lifetime job. Things may happen overnight that will cost you your job the next. Most employers are loyal to their business more than they are to their employees. They can retrench to protect their business.
Employees who operate in economic slavery are dependent on their employers for their jobs. They will do everything including selling their souls to remain employed. The goal for every employee should be to move from economic slavery to economic mastery where they are in charge of their economic security.
Salary should be the starting point not the ultimate for employees. If you look at the history of work and job, you will understand why so many employees are still trapped seeking job security. When you get a job as a young person you may want to try several jobs. However, as you begin to build a family, you become desirous of job security: you want to stay in a place that will guarantee you a salary that will take care of your needs.
The moment you start seeking job security, you stop taking risks. You want a guaranteed income and feel entitled. You are faced with limited and diminishing opportunities. You develop a scarcity mindset. Your focus is on your salary and nothing more. All your plans are based on that.
It was easy economically when you were alone with not many expenses. As you work longer in a job, your salary gets to a place and freezes. When you are still dependent on your salary after ten years of working, you are an economic slave. That is to say when your salary is your only source of income. That is why job security gives you. It makes you dependent.
The more certain of an income you are, the more chances you will seek job security. However, those who focus on economic security have to focus on building their ability to create value. They are not dependent on their employer for jobs but rather are dependent on their ability to create value. That makes them masters.
No one can guarantee you a job for life, but you can guarantee yourself that your economy will be right for life. You cannot create value for your employer if you are very much dependent on them for your survival. You will want to conform rather than be different.
In the Value Giver Coach program, employees will have to make the Value Creation Decisions. There are seven of these decisions. These decisions are based on their choice to be in charge of their economic security and not seek job security. They want their future to be far better and bigger than their past. These decisions taking together free the employee from dependency and entitlement to partnership, value creation and Total Money Freedom.
One of such decision is to depend on your ability to create value for your economic security. This ensures that you are always focusing on growing and improving.
The second decision is to ensure that you never seek a promotion or raise without first creating value for it. This ensures that you are not depending on your employer for a raise but are constantly looking for ways to create value. You are always learning and creating.
The third decision is to always be giving more in value than you are receiving in compensation. This ensures that you are making your future bigger and better. It is an investment that will pay off. It makes you more valuable than the position you are occupying.
When employees going through our program make these seven decisions, they get liberated from dependency, entitlement, and seeking job security. This help enrolls employees in the never-ending process of learning, creating, growing, and improving. They invest in themselves to develop the Value Creation Mindset and Value Creation Capability.
In economic slavery, your income and what you do is determined by your employer. You are told what to do and what you can earn. The only thing you have to do is get to work and do exactly what you are told. Employers lose because they never tap into the potential of their people. To move from economic slavery to economic mastery where employees are in seek economic security, employers need to provide coaching. That is why we have the Value Giver Coach.
Employers place a great limitation on their employers when they promise them job security if they do what they are told. You need employees who can think for themselves and create value. You need employees who know that their lives and income is their responsibility. They will constantly get involved in creating value for you rather than wait on their employer to do that for them.
While other employees seeking job security may complain and wait for opportunities, employees seeking economic security will be developing their mindset and capability, creating value for their employer, and making progress. As a result, the life of such employees is characterized by endless growth, rewards, and more satisfying opportunities and fulfillment.
Employees in economic mastery are constantly seeking new tools, strategies, and methods to expand the freedom and enlarge the future of their employer. They are focused on creating greater value and opportunity for their employer. They know that as their employer gets more freedom and the future gets bigger, their own freedom increases and the future get bigger.
Oladimeji Olutimehin is a keynote speaker and value giver coach