111： Upgrading Your Career ｜ Kevin Kermes
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Summary
Kevin Kermis is the founder of Career Attraction and has helped more than 80,000 people stand out in a crowded marketplace. He is a man of action, who loves to live life to the fullest, embrace his fears, and boldly chart his own path.
Transcript
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Study after study has shown that most men are dissatisfied with their career in some
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form or another, and yet finding new and more meaningful work seems to be more difficult
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My guest today, Kevin Kermis, talks with us about why that is, how you can make your current
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position more meaningful, how you can make more money, how you stand out in a crowded
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marketplace, and how you can upgrade your career to one you love.
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You live life to the fullest, embrace your fears, and boldly chart your own path.
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When life knocks you down, you get back up one more time, every time.
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You are not easily deterred or defeated, rugged, resilient, strong.
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At the end of the day, and after all is said and done, you can call yourself a man.
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My name is Ryan Michler, and I am the host and the founder of this podcast, The Order
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I want to be the first to welcome you to what I would consider, and of course I'm biased,
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As I'm sure you know by now, we interview the world's most successful men, Navy SEALs,
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elite warriors, New York Times bestselling authors, and so many more.
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We extract their lessons and we deliver them straight to you.
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Many of you also know we just got done with our second ever live event, The Uprising, and
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We had 30 men come in from all over the nation, and we focused on the physical and the mental
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and emotional aspects of what it means to be a man.
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I know each of them walked away with a new set of tools to take their lives to the next
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If you are interested, and I've had a lot of interest over the past several weeks, in
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our next event, I want you to stay tuned because over the coming weeks, we will have some more
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And I promise you, we will sell out of the event.
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In the meantime, make sure that you join the, I believe, without looking at it right
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These guys are having some amazing, amazing conversations about what it means to be a man.
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And this is all done inside of our Facebook group.
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There are literally dozens of conversations happening each and every day.
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You're going to be able to answer your questions.
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And you're going to be able to have some conversations that frankly, just aren't being
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So if you want to join again, the 28,000 men, you can do that at facebook.com slash groups
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And second, there's always a smaller percentage, of course, but there's always a smaller percentage
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of men who really want to take their lives to the next level.
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And they want to go a step beyond just having those conversations.
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And that is where our mastermind comes in, the iron council.
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This is an opportunity for men to do, to do more than they talk about doing.
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This is an opportunity for them to get the guidance and the resources and the direction
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We're standing shoulder to shoulder and really trying to accomplish big things when it comes
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to our relationships and our financial situation and our health.
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And if you are interested in learning more about that exclusive mastermind, you can do so
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Now I am looking forward to introducing you to my guest today.
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And after watching some of his videos, digging through his blog, learning more about what he
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was up to, I can tell you that this is the perfect man to talk about why your career
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might not be as rewarding as you would like it to be.
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And more importantly, how you can actually make it that way.
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Kevin and his partner have more than 30 years coaching clients, including executives.
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He's placed executives in fortune 100 companies.
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Uh, they help corporations find great employees.
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In fact, they've helped more than 14,000, 14,000 people stand out in what you and I know
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He helps them make more money and of course, get the fulfillment they deserve in their careers.
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I've seen a lot of studies out there and the numbers quite honestly are staggering.
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I've seen up to 70, maybe even 80% of people who are surveyed are unhappy with their job
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The study, I think it was done a couple of years ago by Gallup and it ranged from fully
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So the percentage, and I think it's like 82, 83% of people are considered actively disengaged,
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which, and I'm sure if you have anybody at work that's sitting around you championing
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mediocrity on a daily basis, you know, these people are, right?
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And the reality is, is that I think we, in many cases, I mean, I know I've been there
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before, you know, where does it, where does it come from?
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And more importantly, like, what do you do about it?
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And I tend to believe that it comes from people focusing on the wrong things when they're looking
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at trying to find work that they love or work that fulfills them and not the follow your
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passion stuff, but stuff that satisfies your soul.
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And you and I were talking before we came on about serving in the military.
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If you've been in roles like that, that purpose is a really hard thing to find when you get
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In many cases, it starts out with individuals targeting jobs simply based off of job title,
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I had a conversation with a potential client the other day who all he was focused on was,
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I've been looking at X, Y, and Z jobs because that's how much I need to make.
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But unless you can make a compelling case to any future employer, how that investment
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in you, you're going to return 10 X plus easily.
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Like, it's fantastic that you've already allotted where your W2 is going, brother, but nobody
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So some of it's that, you know, kind of having a, having a bigger picture about where it
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Cause as my years as a headhunter and I did that for about 10 years, I don't care how good
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anybody was, there was no way you can sustain when you don't like what you're doing.
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There's like, there's a limited lifeline to that.
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What's the difference between finding work that satisfies your soul versus the passion
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thing, which it sounds like you're not in favor of.
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I mean, for some people, right, it's just how they define those words.
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So maybe a distinction without a difference, you know, passion to me is, okay, I love to
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I don't do either one of those things well enough to where anybody in their right mind
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And, and I also think that if I were to do them and I was getting paid, now it may suck
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I always, when we'll look at people, we have clients who come to us and we start looking
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They know they want to move somewhere else and they're not quite sure what that looks like.
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And pivots used to be maybe indulgences or, or things that we weren't necessarily going
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And now as rapidly as things change, change is a constant for all of us.
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Like that's, that's not even, it's not even a paradigm shift in terms of the work.
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When you kind of take that into consideration, I think that what you need to do is detach from
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the job description, detach from the job that you're in and focus on the things that you
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do really well, the outcomes that you produce for other people.
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And to me that typically it's very rare that there is not alignment between that and stuff
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It's a really rare situation where there are things that we do exceptionally well that we
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That's where we try to focus in with people and that's where we, you know, we encourage
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So if I understand you correctly, it sounds like passion might be more something that may
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be a hobby, but work that satisfies the soul might be maybe your ability to provide value
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And this is an exercise I did coming out of the army and granted it was like more years
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I was a rifle platoon leader and then a rifle company executive officer.
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And I put together my resume and I thought I knew all the things that I did that were
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valuable and it was all the stuff that I was proud of.
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But particularly as an XO, because I had four different commanders, I went to each one of
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them and said, okay, when you think of me, what do you think of?
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And what is it that I did that made your life easier?
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And I honestly can't tell you what the response was, but I do remember at that time, and this
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is before I ever became a headhunter, realizing, man, you know, these are the guys who hired
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Their perception of my value is different than mine.
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But the reality is their perception matters because that's my market.
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You know, we go through these exercises with clients around messaging and, you know, they'll
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say, God, do you like the message we come up with?
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But it doesn't matter what I think because I'm not the market.
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The market's going to tell us what resonates, what doesn't, where they find value.
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And where people fight that, it's, I mean, it's like trying to fight gravity.
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I mean, that perception is of others is so, so critical, whether you're trying to find
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How do you, how do you identify or begin to even maybe observe what other people's perception
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of you is so that you can maybe find more meaningful?
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So when the whole personal brand thing came out, I remember this came out when we launched
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our company in 2008 and personal brand thing is starting to become big and everybody
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And I had a friend of mine who did this work and said, you know, the reality is you have
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It's just a question of whether you have any control over people.
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And a personal brand is an opinion that then is shared when people are like, hey, man, do
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As people are doing their backdoor reference checks on people or as just the degrees of separation
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I think that going to people who you've worked with before, worked for before, if you've had
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vendors and anybody who's coming into contact with you and asking them candidly.
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You have to be selective about how you do this because some people are not going to be honest
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It's just sort of like going and asking for professional advice.
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But what you mean, and I just before you move on, I want to clarify on this and make sure
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When you say they're not going to be honest with you, I imagine they're going to be overly
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I want to make sure I got so kind of quantifying the feedback.
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And that feeds into the next point, which is asking for professional feedback from people
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I'll use like an anecdotal example and then one that's kind of an analogy.
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I'm sure you've experienced this in business when when you're going and asking for advice
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on where you're going to pivot or maybe the next evolution for order of man.
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You're typically going to people who have achieved the things that you want to achieve, not someone
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Even in communities, when you ask for opinions on things, you've got to make sure that the
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feedback you're getting are from the most qualified people.
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So the mastermind, the community, the Iron Council that you have, that's the best place
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for you to go get feedback because these are customers.
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These are people who have voted with their wallets.
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And these are the people that I want to attract more.
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And I know, by the way, whether you work for yourself or you work for somebody else is
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just, well, first of all, we all work for somebody else.
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You were all serving someone else or serving some outcome.
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All this stuff applies whether you are an entrepreneur or whether you're working in a Fortune 100 company.
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As you're looking at that feedback, you want to find people who've done the things that you
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that you've done that have gone the places that you want to go.
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People who have worked with you versus friends and family.
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I mean, if I ask my mom the best things about me, I mean, I'm going to feel fantastic.
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I'm not sure I'm going to pay the mortgage with that, right?
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And the flip side, I use this example all the time of having sold houses in the past.
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And one of my chief frustrations that I've always had with real estate agents is, you
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know, you hold an open house and they give you this feedback.
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And then when I say, OK, well, if I fix X, Y, and Z for these people, would they buy?
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And they say no, because they're looking at a house that's $300,000 cheaper than yours.
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It's particularly harder to weed that out when if you take this and take it to the extreme
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when you're in the midst of a job search and you're trying to look for feedback on why
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you didn't move forward in the process somewhere, it's compounded with people are not going
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Because let's say you're interviewing over and over and over again and you're trying to
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I mean, you're not going to get much feedback from somebody who chooses not to hire you.
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So how do you find out how your skills are when it comes to presenting yourself?
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Is it just a matter of going to other people like you're talking about?
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So if you're if you're getting the offer and you're getting the offer that's aligned with
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So, you know, the question is, can you do the job?
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And if we're looking at it through the lens of the person hiring you and I'm not talking
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about HR recruiters, I'm talking about the individual you work for.
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So much of the advice that is out there comes from recruiters and HR professionals.
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And moreover, they are disconnected from the actual pain that you're going to address because
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a job description is never going to tap into what's keeping your future boss up at night.
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What is the thing that they're sitting there thinking, OK, Ryan left.
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And every day that this position is open, I've got to offload that work on to other people.
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It's reflecting on me with my boss that I'm not able to get top talent in here.
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Maybe it's reflecting that I've lost top talent.
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Conversely, if somebody had to be fired because they were underperformers, those things, it's
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First thing that you focus on is you focus on the issues of your ex because that is the
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If you go all the way back to starting this process, the information and the data and
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the intel that you're getting, if it is driven off of an online job description, nobody's
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And it's certainly nobody sharing as you get into more senior roles where the gaps really
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are in their leadership or the severe problems that a privately or publicly traded company
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is having in marketing, in sales, in operations, whatever that the position is going to fill.
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So how do you get to the heart of the matter knowing that there's probably more going on than
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So this comes full circle and that's figuring out what is the thing that lights you up?
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Seth Godin wrote a book, Linchpin, years ago, which is about being a linchpin and not the
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I mean, I read that and I was like, oh my God, this is kind of like, this is what my work's
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And instead of trying to be all things to all people, which all of a sudden, by the
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Right now you're lumped in with everybody else.
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Do exactly what you see entrepreneurs doing exactly.
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You are not morphing the message at order of man to whomever comes in the door.
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You are crystal clear on who you serve, what you can do for these men, and you don't deviate
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And the fear that somehow or another you're going to miss out, which I know is powerful.
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I mean, you had a guest on talking about how powerful the fear of missing out is, right?
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And the fear of missing out detracts people from the one thing, those things that you do
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exceptionally well are the things that are going to get you paid exponentially higher.
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And not everyone is going to resonate with that.
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But when you lead with that message, then that person who's sitting in there with that
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position open, who is the decision maker, is going, oh my God, this is the person I need
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to talk to because what they are talking about is the exact problem I'm dealing with right
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And everything else, all those other job descriptions, there's no question about why did you leave
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You're now talking about the thing that is the biggest number one emotional driver for the
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And just like when we buy stuff, we hire people because we are chasing an emotional outcome.
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How do you communicate that effectively in a short period of time?
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Because like, for example, it sounds like you've listened to the podcast, you know a
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little bit about our message, and I've been going for two years versus, hey, I've got 20
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minutes with you to impress you enough to give me another chance, a second interview or whatever
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I'll say number one, in terms of a broader message, before you even get to that meeting,
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there's a technique that I use called the XYZ technique, which is I help X do or understand,
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A good friend of mine, Ryan Lee, taught this to me years ago, going two layers down.
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So whatever your market is, go two more layers down.
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Maybe it's early stage technology companies that are past their Series A funding.
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Or like order a man, it might be married men with children or something like that.
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That it gets clearer where people are going, that's me, that's me.
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The problem should be that thing that keeps them up at night.
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So it's not I help companies increase revenue, decrease expenditures.
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It needs to be that thing that, yeah, it's going to weed out a lot of people.
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It's about connecting with those people that say, I have that specific problem.
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What is the thing that you want somebody to ultimately, and this is where you've got to
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take this out and test it and there are iterations of it, but you need somebody to go, that's
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And oh my God, if only life looked like that and get very targeted.
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So that's kind of the broader thing that you want to be able to hand off to.
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These are the things that your spouse, that your wife should be able to say when somebody
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I, I, you're, and I'll share the story really quickly.
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My wife is my number one, biggest advocate, bar none, exceptionally smart woman.
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And one of her friends was describing what her husband did.
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Now, this is not an issue of her not understanding it.
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Your number one, biggest advocate doesn't articulate to people who are asking what you do, what you
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do, which, which if you look at it, like you've got all these people who can carry
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To me, I think that's a big lesson for all of us to arm that message and arm those advocates
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And that goes beyond our spouses all the way into colleagues and anybody we're ever going
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So going back to the question you asked before, when you're sitting in that interview, one
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of the things that people are always going to ask is the tell me about yourself question,
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which is just like, and the older you get, I turned 47 this year.
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And I guarantee you 99% of it you don't care about.
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Turn it around and say, you know, listen, I've got a long background in talent acquisition.
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I was a headhunter, started a couple search firms, sold them.
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I've had this company since 2008, we reverse engineer.
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But what I have found is I'm really good at these three things and to be able to break
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Or if you have a broader skill set, I mean, I would contend with you that if you've got
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more than three things, you're probably watered down, right?
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I'd ask them and say, look, I've got a, I've got a really broad background, turn it around
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Well, I was going to say, it sounds like what they might really be asking is tell me about
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something in your background that would help us get what we want to have.
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That's probably the real question they're asking.
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So you just turn that question around on them and say, tell me in this role, like what
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are the, what are the things you're looking for?
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What is it that is critical to the success in this role?
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I'm sure you got a lot of people walking in here with 20 plus years experience, 10 years,
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15, whatever, whatever the range is, like what's critical stuff?
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And then they start talking about their problems.
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You're not having the same conversation everybody else is having.
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More importantly, you're having the conversation that is about the thing that is most important
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What you'll find out is whether they've actually thought through that because a lot of times
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It basically sounds like a fundamental shift between somebody going in to be interviewed versus
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me as the person, quote unquote, being interviewed, actually interviewing the company.
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You're driving the conversation because you're also sitting there.
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I know everybody says this, but I don't think a lot of people believe it.
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You're sitting there assessing whether or not it's what you really want to do.
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One of the first things I experienced when I was a headhunter is you get the wish list
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And it was hilarious because I worked in finance and accounting initially.
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I like I high five myself and I balance a checkbook.
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So it blew my mind that I had companies paying me an absurd amount of money to place controllers
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But they would always say back then it was big five accounting.
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We want somebody with a big five accounting background.
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So what they were telling me is their perfect prom date, but they didn't have it.
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And for me, the reality was like if I line those people up in there, they're going to walk
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in and go, I want to find people from Anderson, E&Y, Deloitte, KPMG, PwC.
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Like they're not going to find any of those people.
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But if you take that forward to, again, just driving things off of a job description,
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most of the time you're just chasing your tail.
00:21:38.260
Gentlemen, I just wanted to take a quick minute, a quick pause in this conversation to tell you
00:21:42.760
again about our exclusive mastermind, The Iron Council.
00:21:45.240
This, as you know by now, is a brotherhood of men who are interested in surrounding themselves
00:21:50.780
with those on a very similar mission with regards to their families and their businesses,
00:21:55.660
their financial situation, and their life in general.
00:21:59.300
There is nothing that can replace a group of strong and dedicated men who have your back
00:22:04.740
and who are willing to say and do the things that need to be said and done to help you achieve
00:22:10.240
So if you're ready to improve your life, your relationships, your business, your health,
00:22:14.240
your bank account, I invite you personally to join The Iron Council.
00:22:17.980
You're going to get all of the tools, the guidance, the resources, the direction that
00:22:23.880
And you can learn more about what we're up to and claim your spot at orderofman.com
00:22:29.120
This month, we're talking all about wealth building, and I hope to see you there.
00:22:32.800
Now, let me get back to my conversation with Kevin.
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Because I don't think I would have a problem doing that.
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It certainly doesn't sound like you would have a problem doing that because this is your
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But how does somebody who maybe even desperately needs a position go in with the balls, frankly,
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to interview a company versus the other way around?
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I'm going to channel my inner Jocko Willink and just say, you just do it.
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You make the decision to shift and create this as a habit.
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But this is definitely one of those places where you are going to run into the lizard
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brain kicking back against you constantly because there's a lot of friction.
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There is the internal friction of, am I good enough?
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You can always find, I mean, unless you are just massively self-absorbed, you can always
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I mean, on the broad continuum, are you the absolute best?
00:23:29.780
Are you the best athlete sitting in front of them right now?
00:23:37.300
But to your point, yeah, I mean, the statistical likelihood that you are the absolute best,
00:23:40.940
whatever in the world that means, right, is like slim and none.
00:23:44.780
But that's where we start tearing ourselves down.
00:23:47.680
And what I would say to those people who are introverted, and I am, contrary to how I may
00:23:54.280
I go to one-on-one events or, you know, like I was in Baltimore for the last couple of days
00:24:01.080
If you find that you are introverted, and this is challenging to you, just make the
00:24:08.220
Just find out as much as you possibly can about them and asking questions.
00:24:14.700
That's when you're telling stories that are germane to what their issue is and are going
00:24:19.680
to have value for them and are going to help them.
00:24:22.120
And if nothing else, even if, and this is the one thing I would say, is you're doing this
00:24:29.620
If you look at how information flows, which is the most valuable thing in terms of relationships,
00:24:36.600
If I know what's important to all of the people who are kind of in my inner circle, then as
00:24:41.640
information passes through me, I can connect other people, which is how I stay top of mind.
00:24:47.000
If you're new to the concept, the best place in the world to start is when you're out looking
00:24:51.340
for a job and you find out about opportunities that aren't a fit.
00:24:54.480
You don't stop with not gathering information about them anymore.
00:24:57.860
You gather more information because now that's collateral.
00:25:00.420
That's collateral that you can trade with other people.
00:25:02.660
It's information you can take out to headhunters who are good, who you want to stay top of mind.
00:25:06.880
And instead of always asking them what they can do for you, you're demonstrating what you
00:25:11.780
To me, the information is one of the most powerful collateral that you can have.
00:25:15.580
It almost sounds like the analogy that I would use is going to a car dealership for a negotiation.
00:25:20.700
You should not go into a negotiation with a car dealership without having some really
00:25:24.740
good information about the worth of the vehicle, the cost, the wiggling room, all of that stuff.
00:25:32.160
I want to back up in this conversation because I think it's really easy to look externally
00:25:37.340
And so a lot of guys will say, oh, if only I had that job or only if I wasn't here trapped
00:25:43.280
But I do think there's something to be said for looking internally.
00:25:47.420
And I'm really curious how a man who may be dissatisfied with his current position or
00:25:52.720
his current employment might make the most of where he currently is.
00:25:57.080
I'm not a big believer in, you know, like some cost.
00:25:59.960
I think that's one of the biggest fallacies out there.
00:26:02.340
But if you're inside an organization, you have spent time there.
00:26:06.140
There are definitely things that you find positive about the organization.
00:26:10.380
If you feel like you're aligned with them, right, because that that's the stuff that
00:26:14.060
Like when we get down to purpose, you can functionally go do what you do anywhere.
00:26:17.600
But are you aligned with the other people or, you know, if you got the right environment
00:26:21.120
around you, you owe it to yourself to figure out are some of the things that are holding
00:26:25.180
you back things that you could potentially fix.
00:26:27.900
I mean, I would honestly say I would imagine that most people who are listening to this
00:26:31.420
podcast are going to fall into that category of having some level of self-awareness,
00:26:36.760
if not a high level of self-awareness or desire to heighten their level of self-awareness,
00:26:48.280
And I know you've talked about this and I know you talk about this in the Facebook group
00:26:52.240
The thing, in my opinion, that will propel you forward or hold you back more so than the
00:26:59.880
There is like no heavier anchor in the world than having people who are not on the same
00:27:07.900
I'm not talking about like Pollyanna supportive, like, oh, it's great.
00:27:15.320
And truly believe in it and want to help you move forward in whatever it is you're doing,
00:27:19.680
whether it's one small area you want to improve in or you want to make some massive
00:27:24.060
I mean, this makes sense, obviously, just the ability to surround yourself with people who want
00:27:28.100
to go in the same direction as you is critical.
00:27:30.820
How do you begin to explore some of the activities and interests and then start crafting maybe
00:27:38.080
your job search around the things that you might be passionate about or would satisfy your
00:27:43.080
Well, I think going back to what you the last question, first of all, start where you are.
00:27:48.640
In most organizations, particularly small and midsize companies, the the beg for forgiveness
00:27:54.180
approach is a much better, much better one to take than saying, here's my job description
00:28:01.940
You know, my I've got my left and my right limit and that's I can't go beyond those versus
00:28:06.940
saying identify there's a problem and don't necessarily go ask for something to be given
00:28:13.740
Maybe go to your boss with it with a slow you identify that there's an area that you want
00:28:21.260
Go to your boss and and say, look, I see that X isn't being done well or I think that there's
00:28:27.720
an ability to improve this by five, ten percent.
00:28:35.700
You're not asking for anything other than an opportunity to a improve productivity, drive
00:28:40.940
increased revenue, decrease costs for an organization.
00:28:44.040
Well, that's B. A is you are giving you on your own dime in your own time.
00:28:52.460
And think about I tell you how refreshing that is.
00:28:55.040
You don't want anything because here's the thing you want.
00:28:58.640
You want the because once you've got the outcome, once you have done something, now you've got
00:29:02.840
a narrative to take forward and people will get caught like when when people are unemployed
00:29:07.060
and we run into this all the time where they say, well, I want to do X.
00:29:10.400
I've been doing it, but I haven't been getting paid for it.
00:29:12.640
Nobody cares whether you've gotten paid for it or not.
00:29:16.820
Like that, that's, that's infinitely whether you've produced the outcome is infinitely
00:29:20.160
better than you used to get paid for it and you sucked at it.
00:29:23.180
So, so is there a danger then in going into this and expecting something out of it or
00:29:29.840
where's the balance between, Hey, I'm going to do this because I want to prove my worth
00:29:33.120
versus I expect a raise or I expect a promotion or I expect them to create this position for
00:29:38.600
There is the quid pro quo in this is that what's valuable to you is that you get
00:29:53.660
Consultants come in and they fix one thing and then they're able to diagnose and they've
00:29:59.340
got a value proposition around the fact that they've delivered a specific outcome and
00:30:02.900
they can say, you paid us X and we gave you a five to 10 X return.
00:30:11.340
Cause actually you've just generated the money to be able to fund, which you can further do.
00:30:15.000
This is no different to be able to go to your boss and say, I did this.
00:30:18.500
What I'd like to talk about is doing this on a broader scale.
00:30:21.080
And since that's going to increase my responsibility and you've got to do your math, you've got to
00:30:25.380
figure out what's it worth, what's it producing for them, lay it out for them, make the case
00:30:29.840
because in most cases they're not, I mean, unless they own the company and even if they
00:30:35.380
The more thinking they, it's like anything else in life, the more thinking they have
00:30:38.440
to do about it, the more processing they have to do, make it a no brainer, lay it out for
00:30:42.960
And then if here again, if the lizard brain's kicking in and saying, ah, they wouldn't do
00:30:50.000
Now you can go market the outcome externally because I guarantee you there's somebody out
00:30:57.400
So they have, instead of it's very, to me, it's very short, short sighted to look at taking
00:31:03.700
a project like that on and think, well, I'm not getting paid for it.
00:31:06.760
If you can produce the outcome, now you have something of value that, that no one can take
00:31:13.980
Nobody can, they can't take this away from you.
00:31:16.160
Like they can take title away, money away, job away.
00:31:22.920
Well, I was going to say, I imagine there's a level of comp, not imagine.
00:31:25.460
I know there's a level of confidence and swagger that comes from doing a job well done outside
00:31:36.640
I'm going to rewind here a little bit because one of the terms you used, which we use in
00:31:40.140
my financial planning practice is this idea of sunk cost fallacy, which is the inability
00:31:45.880
or desire not to give up on something because you've invested so much time or resources in
00:31:50.140
But talk to me about what you mean and why that is something guys should try to avoid.
00:31:54.560
The study I always think about is when Netflix first came on the scene and Blockbuster, you
00:32:00.120
know, was the, was the brand to beat and Blockbuster doubled down on physical stores while they were
00:32:05.280
clearly watching their customers stop coming in and order DVDs online and get them delivered
00:32:11.100
And that decision to stick with this large brick and mortar structure that they could
00:32:18.180
clearly see wasn't working because they had spent all this money on it was exceptionally
00:32:28.420
We say, well, I've got 15 years doing X, no one's going to hire me.
00:32:38.380
If you're, if you're kind of mired in where you are, I think it's a Bureau of Labor and
00:32:43.680
I, you know, I've got a son who's three daughter, who's 20, my three-year-old, when he enters
00:32:48.260
the world of work, 70% of the jobs that he will do are estimated to not exist now.
00:32:54.240
So the, so the pace at which we change, you tell me, could you have told me five years
00:32:58.800
ago, this is how you'd be generating revenue and running a business?
00:33:01.640
I couldn't even tell you that two and a half years ago.
00:33:03.920
If you told, if you told me when I came out of the military, what I was doing now, first
00:33:07.780
of all, I wouldn't have understood what you were talking about.
00:33:09.740
Like a low home would have set in like 30 seconds after you started talking to me.
00:33:17.840
So the more that, the more that people get defensive about, well, in my industry, this is how it
00:33:23.860
Or my industry only allows me to move this far, or I do X and I could never do Y that limited
00:33:31.400
thinking, not only is a self-fulfilling prophecy in terms of you've already, you've already
00:33:36.740
made the decision on how far and where you're going to go.
00:33:39.680
But moreover creativity, there's a, there's a great book out there by Tyler Pearson who
00:33:45.540
wrote a book talking about the, and I can't remember the, the name of the title of the
00:33:51.800
Cause I feel like I'm rambling on, but we'll find it.
00:33:54.860
He talks about the fifth, like basically the fifth economy, which is it's, it's knowledge.
00:34:01.860
And that goes right back to Seth Godin's linchpin, the ability to solve problems and
00:34:06.700
the ability to creatively solve problems will do nothing but open doors for you.
00:34:11.900
So irrespective of what industry you're in, the second that you believe that you have
00:34:16.380
these limitations, which that that's the manifestation of some cost is believing that
00:34:20.860
somehow or another, because you have this much time in an industry, you have this much
00:34:24.160
time in a role, or you've only done this for a job is the thing that commoditizes you.
00:34:30.500
So now you're competing against everybody inside particular salary brackets versus the high
00:34:36.660
They're not moving from one job to another for a 10% increase.
00:34:39.780
Sometimes they are doing a 50%, a hundred percent, 200, 300% increase.
00:34:47.640
I mean, we had a guy just within our iron council.
00:34:51.860
He said he was offered a promotion at work and initially they offered a 5% pay increase,
00:34:57.500
but through his understanding of his own value, he actually turned it down.
00:35:02.360
They came back a couple of days later and said, we'll give you a 45% pay increase for
00:35:09.860
Well, Hey Kevin, we are scratching the surface here.
00:35:12.540
Obviously we can go on and on and on about this, but for the sake of time, we've got to
00:35:15.780
wind things down, but this has been an enlightening conversation.
00:35:18.520
I want to ask you a couple other questions as we do cap this off.
00:35:21.340
The first one is what does it mean to be a man?
00:35:28.040
And I know most guys are familiar with that and that is being strong enough to protect
00:35:35.360
Whether that's your, whether it's your family, it's your business, it's your friends.
00:35:44.480
And obviously something that we, uh, we subscribe to as well.
00:35:47.340
And we've talked about it with a couple of different guys on the podcast as well.
00:35:55.640
Tell us a little bit more about where we can connect with you.
00:35:58.620
And I know you've got an ebook available, maybe even make mention of that.
00:36:01.500
So the guys can check that out if they're interested.
00:36:06.820
You can also Google my name, Kevin Kermes, K-E-R-M-E-S, but careerattraction.com.
00:36:12.320
You can download our bestselling career upgrade roadmap.
00:36:15.600
This is the step-by-step process that has been validated over more than 14,000 clients
00:36:20.840
that we've worked with and help them find work they love in less than 90 days.
00:36:25.760
80% of the people have found jobs in less than 90 days.
00:36:28.120
So it's not, it's not one of these books that, that stops halfway through and says, oh, by
00:36:32.720
the way, if you write us a check, we'll give you more.
00:36:36.540
I mean, it, it's everything we, and we talk about this constantly.
00:36:38.840
What, what we charge for is to work with our consultants.
00:36:42.240
We operate like a big four consulting firm working one-on-one with clients in trying to
00:36:47.180
accelerate their job search, be their trusted advisor, accelerate some of the professional
00:36:52.980
But we also share the information and the framework openly.
00:36:56.840
If you want to do it self-directed, you know, we just want more people to be successful.
00:37:02.180
And I appreciate you taking some time to come on the show and talk with us today.
00:37:13.860
Mr. Kevin Kermis here to talk with us about improving your career, making more money,
00:37:19.860
If you want to know more about what Kevin is up to, and I highly, highly suggest that you
00:37:23.720
do this, I would tell you to head to order a man.com slash one, one, one as an episode
00:37:31.040
You're going to get all the links and everything that you need in the show notes there.
00:37:34.560
Also, if you are ready to take your life to the next level, make sure again, that you
00:37:38.240
join the 270 other dedicated, ambitious, motivated men inside of the iron council.
00:37:43.600
This month, we're talking all about wealth building.
00:37:46.820
So if you want to build more wealth in your life, you want to get out of debt, whatever it
00:37:51.260
We're going to be talking about all of those things inside of the iron council this month.
00:37:54.400
And I promise we're going to help you take your life to the next level, specifically
00:37:57.620
this month, take your wealth to the next level.
00:38:00.400
Again, you can do that at order of man.com slash iron council guys.
00:38:05.360
I will look forward to talk with you on Friday for our Friday field notes, but until then
00:38:09.220
take action and become the man you are meant to be.
00:38:13.120
Thank you for listening to the order of man podcast.
00:38:16.000
You're ready to take charge of your life and be more of the man you were meant to be.
00:38:19.800
We invite you to join the order and order of man.com.