Why is Hannah asking the wrong question?

Hi  guys, I have written about people asking the wrong questions and this is another one of those instances. Allow me to share with you what happened at my gym: I am a volunteer coach at my local gymnastics club and so I got talking to another coach at the sports center "Hannah" (not her real name). She asked me what I did on a day by day basis at work and I ran through some of the tasks that I do on a daily basis and so I explained that I am basically "Mr Relationships". I am responsible for building relationships with our existing clients and also finding new relationships with people/companies to work with. Hannah asked me, "But wait, don't you have to be really good with maths to work in banking?" I explained to her that it was one of the biggest misconceptions about banking - I'm forbidden from doing maths because of human error. A computer will never put the decimal point in the wrong place whilst I might if I am tired or even careless. So Hannah did this double take, "woah Alex, you mean to say someone like me can do your job even if I never went to university?" I pointed out to her that a degree may be useful in some circumstances but even though I am a graduate, nothing I studied at university was relevant to what I am doing today - I have a degree in geography and that has absolutely nothing to do with finance. What I do find very useful are the languages that I spoke which allows me to build relationships with my many clients from all over the world, but I didn't do a degree in languages. So at that point, Hannah said, "damn I should quit coaching and go work in banking instead, then I can be rich. I'm so sick of being poor!" 

Then Hannah asked me, "can I do your job Alex?" My answer is yes, she probably could - but not immediately. She couldn't hit the ground running but if my company were to give me the budget to hire someone to work under me and I would be given the resources to train this person then that would be a good start. I can't promise that Hannah would become super successful in the banking industry but if someone gave her a chance to learn then why not? However, she didn't ask the right question. It doesn't matter whether or not she can do my job - the right question she should have been asking was, "can I get a well paid job like yours Alex?" And the answer is no, you can't. The answer is simple: whenever a good company in the financial services industry has a vacancy, that would always attract a very long list of applicants and needless to say, most of these applicants are going to be of very high calibre. Would the company be able to hire every single person who is capable of doing the job? Of course not, they will only hire the number of people they actually need at that time. Naturally, the company would try to identify the best candidate for the job so that means that a lot of very highly qualified, competent applicants may be rejected as a result, not because they can't do the job but because there's only one position available. Of course, I didn't have the heart to tell Hannah that it was highly unlikely for someone like her to get a good job in banking - she didn't go to university, her parents were immigrants and she has a working class background; how is she going to compete with other applicants who are graduates, whose parents are middle to upper class? I'm not saying it is entirely impossible - I'm just pointing out that the odds are stacked against her. 

Allow me to use two examples to illustrate this point: this afternoon when I was alone in the office, I  was bored and started singing this Belinda Carlisle song that I had stuck in my head. This was the kind of music I grew up with in the late 80s and early 90s. So whilst I can sing many of Belinda Carlisle's songs in that I know all the lyrics, I know the tune but would anyone pay me to be a singer? Would I be able to make money as a singer? Of course not, I'm not good enough at singing. Just because I am capable of belting out the greatest hits of Belinda Carlisle doesn't mean that anyone is going to pay me to do it. There is a sliding scale of course from singers like Belinda Carlisle who have enjoyed a great deal of commercial success worldwide to people like myself who will sing for fun but have no chance of ever making a living from singing. It's often the people  who are at the very top of their game who can monetize a skill that most of us have. My friend Tom plays football for fun with his friends and enjoys it very much, but would he ever be paid to play football like Cristiano Ronaldo or Lionel Messi? Of course not, even if Tom does play well when he is with his friends, he simply isn't in that top 5% of football players in the world who are able to make a living from football. No, instead Tom holds down an job in IT, he plays football just to have some fun and get some exercise. Thus in both examples, sure I can sing and Tom can play football, but unless we're amongst the world's top 5% in those fields, the chances of us making a living singing or playing football are negligible - we're just not good enough to 'turn professional' in those fields. 

Hannah probably thought, oh I have relationships with my colleagues at the sports center, I am good with people, I am popular with my friends, I am effectively trilingual so I can most certainly do Alex's job. Whilst I've got no doubt that Hannah is indeed good with people (for the record, she is well-liked amongst the coaches and the gymnasts), she simply isn't good enough when it comes to quality relationship managers in the commercial world - at the very least she is an untested entity. If she really wanted to try to do what I do, perhaps she could start off with a small local business where she could get some work experience dealing with customers and that would at least a start. As a gymnastics coach, she has had no relevant work experience and thus she has to start somewhere. After all, the gymnasts who show up for her class have already paid for the lesson so she doesn't need to 'sell' them anything or convince them that they want to learn gymnastics. She gets paid the same regardless of how much (or little) her gymnasts enjoy her session. Could Hannah then develop the skills to become a good relationship manager in the commercial world? Perhaps she could if given the chance. But it would be quite unrealistic for Hannah to think, "I could do Alex's job" when she has no relevant work experience - certainly nothing to convince an employer that she has what it takes to handle and nurture relationships with important corporate clients. I managed to get my current job because it is a similar role to my previous job which I had held for five years within the same industry and thus my employers know that I have done all this before.

Now you may say, Alex you talk about being in the top 5% to get a job doing this, is Hannah in the top 5% of the world's gymnastics coaches? Well no, she clearly isn't but then again, if you were to go to your local McDonald's for a meal, your burger wouldn't be prepared by a chef who ranked in the top 5% either. The reason is simple: both Hannah and the cook at your local McDonald's are not paid much - poorly paid jobs will not attract the most highly qualified staff. McDonald's isn't trying to offer their customer a high quality gourmet experience, but they are competing on price. If you want a hot lunch at a decent price whilst in town, then fast food like McDonald's offers a decent compromise as not everyone can afford to go to an expensive restaurant for lunch. Thus there is the assumption that the 'easier' jobs like working in McDonald's pay less because of their low level of entry, they do not require their staff to have any experience and will give them the appropriate training to work in their restaurants. Whereas if you wanted to work as a doctor, you need ten years of training to become fully qualified as a GP and 14 years of training as a surgeon - the bar of entry is very high when it comes to doctors. This is why doctors are often command a higher salary as this high barrier to entry limits the supply of doctors available. Even with good singers and footballers, there are music schools and football academies that can train such talents to nurture the most talented young prodigies to try to make them successful. But there isn't really the equivalent 'training academy' for what I do in terms of being a great relationship manager within financial services, so that was the part that confused Hannah and made her think, "yeah if it's just being good with people then I could do that."

So what does Hannah need to do if she wants a job like mine? Well, she has to start somewhere in the commercial world to prove that she is good with customers. However, the challenge is to not start too low otherwise there are too many rungs of the ladder to climb. In a post I did a while ago, I talked about a friend John (this time, this is his real name) who started doing customer service type jobs after he moved to London but got stuck, unable to move up the ladder because he was essentially dealing with low value products. Let's contrast that to an estate agent who is selling luxury property worth millions, the estate agent stands to earn a much bigger commission each time he makes a sale compared to John, thus the estate agent is always going to earn a lot more. The problem with John was that he didn't structure his career development properly and what he could have done was more actively pursue customer service type roles with luxury brands of higher and higher value. He certainly has enough work experience under his belt to apply for some of these jobs with luxury brands with very expensive products but somehow, he just got stuck in a rut, constantly working with lower value brands. Hannah would need to make sure she avoids that mistake by being a lot more ambitious than John - she would also need to accumulate relevant experience and knowledge within a particular industry to make herself more attractive to employers within that industry. This would allow her to become a specialist within that industry - John didn't do that, unfortunately. He moved between different industries over the years and so he missed that vital opportunity to add value to his service by offering product-specific knowledge when dealing with customers to build those relationships. 

Hannah didn't go to university, I don't see that as a major problem but I think her bigger challenge is that whilst working full time as a gymnastics coach, she has no contacts in the business world. Her parents were working class immigrants so they would be of no help whatsoever in this aspect. So not only do you need relevant skills and work experience, you also need contacts within the industry and that's something Hannah lacks. The young people who grew up in middle/upper class families tend not to have this problem: many of their parents, uncles, aunties and adult family friends would already be in professional jobs. Likewise, they're more likely to go to good universities where they would also be able to make friends with others who are likely to develop very successful careers. A good example of this is how I was able to get my nephew a job in Singapore - my regular readers will know that my nephew's national service has been delayed a year due to his PES status (long story) so suddenly, he found himself having to wait a year with nothing to do in the meantime. So I spoke to a few old classmates and managed to arrange a job interview for him with an old friend who has a very successful company in Singapore. Now to give my nephew credit where credit is due, I merely arranged the interview and opened the door for him - he managed to convince my old friend during that interview that he had something to offer. Call it nepotism or family connections, but of course I went out of my way to help my nephew in such a scenario. But unfortunately for Hannah, she does not have a "kind uncle" like that who could get her a much better job.

However, like Hannah, I didn't have a "kind uncle" who opened doors for me when I was a clueless young person struggling to get a job as I am also from a very working class family. Likewise, my parents were simply not in a position to help me find a job. So I want to point out that it isn't impossible for Hannah to try to start networking from scratch, especially online through networks like Linkedin. I have already written a piece about this, about how young people should try to expand and develop their professional networks rather than rely on school, university or courses to teach them everything they need to know to get a good job. Ironically, two of my gymnasts have actually asked me for help with their career development: I managed to get one of them an internship and I had arranged a job interview for the other one. But that's where I draw the line: if someone comes to me and asks for help,  "Alex, can you help me with this?" Then of course I would always go out of my way to help them - others have helped me before in the past and this is my way of passing on the good karma. But in the case of Hannah, she only had a casual conversation about the topic, "can I do your job?" Note that she didn't ask me for my help with her career, hence I did not impose myself on her - after all, she may be perfectly happy with her job as a gymnastics coach and was simply having a casual chat with me. The irony is that the two gymnasts who have asked me for help were both rich, middle class university students who were quite used to having their parents and other family members help them out with matters like that whilst someone like Hannah really needed my help but yet it didn't occur to her to ask me for it. Maybe she would in the future, but she has not done so yet. 

I think Hannah is somewhat naive about how competitive the corporate world is - allow me to give you two situations to compare and contrast. When I was just seven years old, I remember my teacher us giving a maths test that was relatively easy. The questions were like 7 + 8 = ____ and 19 - 3 = ____ you get the idea, it wasn't difficult even for kids that age. So technically speaking, if every single student in the class got all the answers right, the teacher could give everyone full marks and heap praises on every student for performing so well whilst silently congratulating herself for being such a brilliant teacher. Let's contrast this to a cross country run that I did with my secondary school some years later - there was only trophy to be won and that was for the winner who crossed the finish line first. So even if you were running really fast, as long as there was one person faster than you, then you will not win that trophy. In the cross country run, the benchmark is set by the fastest person taking part whereas in the maths test example, the benchmark has already been set by the teacher who got to decide whether it was going to be an easy or difficult test. In the case of the maths test, you have a situation where everyone can win but in the case of the cross country run, there can only be one winner. So if Hannah took part in that cross country run, I think she probably would declare to me, "no problem Alex, I'm a fast runner!" But even if that was indeed the case, you're still not going to win the trophy because you're going to be competing against some experienced runners who are much faster than you, you're never going to beat them in a race. 

If Hannah took part in a cross country race and finished top ten with a very respectable time, then sure she is going to gain praise and respect from her peers. But when applying for a job, there's no consolation prize if you're not chosen. The best you could hope for is some honest feedback from the decision makers as to why you were unsuccessful and try to learn from that. I suppose this is why Hannah is a gymnastics coach - the exams to qualify as a gymnastics coach are very easy, sure they cost money and take time to complete but the bottom line is that at entry level, those exams are virtually impossible to fail. The only reason a coach has ever 'failed' the exam was because of the very extensive background checks they conduct prior to allowing you to work with children and if you lie on your application form even about a minor crime in the distant past, you would be rejected. But when it comes to the actual exam, they are so easy. There are various levels for the coaching exams - level 1 is entry level, then as you progress up the ranks of levels 2 and 3 etc then the exams get more and more difficult with each progression but the level 1 exam is the equivalent of that maths test I took when I was 7, it is so easy you really can't fail. It is really only the 'high performance' coaching qualifications that are actually more difficult to prepare for - it is the difference between passing a maths exam for a 7 year old and completing a degree in mathematics at a reputable university. For someone like Hannah who mostly works with young kids who do gymnastics once a week, their skill level is so low that she really only needs a level 1 or 2 qualification to do her job. Ironically, if she had any qualification beyond that, she will then be over qualified to do her job. 

So could Hannah potentially become the kind of coach who works with 'high performance' gymnasts and coach the British gymnasts going to the 2028 Olympics? Let's examine what stands in Hannah's way to pursue that career path: there are many children who participate in gymnastics on a recreational level - that means they attend gymnastics classes only once or twice a week, their skill level is very low and they usually do not participate in competitions and even if they do, they would only compete with other kids who do recreational gymnastics. The parents enroll the kids in recreational gymnastics simply for them to get some exercise and have some fun. Then we have 'squad' gymnastics - the word 'squad' is used because they are part of the training squad and these gymnasts usually train 5 to 6 times a week, chalking up between 20 to 25 hours a week of training - it is very intensive and they have the aim of making the national team, so they could represent the country at international competitions. Needless to say, the vast majority of gymnasts in the country are simply doing it at a recreational level whilst a tiny minority are squad gymnasts pursuing it at a much higher level. Thus the vast majority of gymnastics coaches (like Hannah) who work with recreational gymnasts only need a level 1 or 2 qualification whilst those working with the squad gymnasts need to be far more qualified to coach at that level. So if you wanted to become a squad coach, it is tough to get that job! Even if you do have all the paper qualifications, there are just so few gymnasts training at that elite level that the gymnastics club will only pick the very best coaches to work with them and it is very competitive for the coaches vying for the few well-paid coaching positions. 

I can already hear you saying, "there's nothing wrong with teaching recreational gymnastics, it is the same kind of job that PE teachers do at schools, they perform a vital role in the health and fitness of their students." Whilst there's nothing wrong about that argument, there are plenty of reasons why coaches would much rather work with high performance elite gymnastics - firstly, you get paid more, a lot more. Secondly, the student to coach ratio is much smaller at that level (usually between 8:1 and 5:1) and you get an easier time dealing with these very motivated elite gymnasts; in sharp contrast, Hannah has a student to coach ratio of 20:1 and she has to teach 5 to 7 classes a day, so that's she can't even remember the names of all her students as she teaches well over 100 kids a day and she works 6 days a week. Trying to remember 600 to 700 names, that's virtually impossible even for the most enthusiastic coaches. The high performance coaches tend to work less hours as well because they command a much higher salary whilst coaches like Hannah have to clock in an insane number of hours to make ends meet as they are paid by the lesson (and Hannah gets very little for each lesson). Furthermore, the elite coaches get to travel with the gymnasts when they take part in competitions and everyone including the coaches get treated like VIPs by the hosts at such events. When your gymnasts win the gold medal, the parents will be lining up to ask you for private lessons then you can state your price. It's an incredible career choice if you can coach at that kind of level and of course, Hannah would love to do that kind of coaching but the fact is most coaches will never ever get to experience that kind of elite coaching - they will be stuck convincing fat kids to join in the class whilst dealing with the unreasonable parents who complain that little Jonathan isn't enjoying the class enough. 

The way Hannah has started her career as a gymnastics coach has lured her into a false sense of security: she probably thought, okay those exams were easy and I'm now a qualified coach! The problem for her though is that coaches who work with recreational gymnasts get paid very little and it is only the coaches who work with the elite gymnasts who earn serious money. In order to become one of these coaches at the top of the game earning big bucks, she has to fight her way to the top not by simply getting the qualifications but by being extremely competitive when it comes to proving to the owners of the gymnastics club that she is better than the other coaches there. I just don't see Hannah being the competitive kind of person and therein lies her problem. She doesn't recognize the challenge facing her which is that of scarcity: there are many people looking for good jobs but there are very few good jobs out there. She lacks the killer instinct. So in order to get your hands on a good job, you either need a 'kind uncle' to use nepotism to get you to the front of the queue or you need to be super competitive and fight your way to the top. It is not enough to simply be able to do the job - you have to fend off stiff competition from everyone else applying for that same position. This is why Hannah will probably spend her career encouraging very fat kids to exercise whilst looking across the gym at the coach who is producing the next Olympic champion and thinking, "actually I could do that, I know I'm a good coach so why am I not coaching the elite squad?" If Hannah is content helping fat kids to exercise then whom am I to judge her, but if she is wondering why she is not accessing these better jobs she thinks she is capable of doing, well, then we know the answer.

So there you go, that's the case of my friend Hannah who could be doing a lot more with her life but isn't - I could nag at her like a parent (I am like 20 years older than her after all) but I don't want to do that, it isn't my place to do so. But what do you think? Should I say something to her? Have you ever met anyone like Hannah before who are oblivious to why they are stuck in a poorly paid job when they are capable of doing something a lot more lucrative? Why are people like Hannah who aren't stupid or incapable not achieving their full potential? How could people like Hannah be helped? Why is Hannah oblivious to what is actually holding her back?! Please leave a comment below and many thanks for reading.