419: Aligning Your Career with Your Definition of Success with Lizette Ojeda

Pete Mockaitis
Lizette, thanks so much for joining us here on the How to be Awesome at Your Job podcast.

Lizette Ojeda
Thanks for having me, Pete.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, I’m super excited to dig into your wisdom. I understand one thing that you’re super excited about is skydiving. What’s the story here?

Lizette Ojeda
Oh gosh, I’m super adventurous and a lot of people don’t know that about me because I’m introverted.  But I’ve done it three times. I told my husband that I would chill on that until the kids got out of the house just in case there are any broken bones or bruises or blood involved. But when you’re up here, the exhilaration, the excitement of seeing the world from a whole different perspective, and the silence, it’s just an awe-inspiring moment for me. I just love it.

Pete Mockaitis
So you’ve done it three times or how many?

Lizette Ojeda
Three times, yeah.

Pete Mockaitis
Three times. Yeah. I’ve done it once and I thought it was awesome. I’d like to go again. I’ve heard that actually the second time can be scarier than the first. Is that your experience?

Lizette Ojeda
Well, apparently not because I did it a third time.

Pete Mockaitis
Maybe some people like the fear and then the conquering of it. I just thought it was so fun. It’s like, at last I am flying. This is what I wanted to do since I was a kid.

Lizette Ojeda
Yes. What a great way to say that you can do anything if you put your mind to it. You can be whoever you want to be.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, totally. And just there’s that sort of feeling of accomplishment. It’s awesome and it’s a thrill. But my wife also would like for me to not jump out of planes during this phase of family living and I have obliged for now. We’ll see if that needs to be renegotiated.

I also want to repel off of a skyscraper, which I understand there is an organization that does that, often collaborating with nonprofits, which just seems like a good time.

Lizette Ojeda
Wow, that sounds amazing. In Houston, where I’m at, there is a pool up on a skyscraper that has a see through bottom, so you can actually see your way down all the way to the ground. It’s pretty, pretty scary.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s wild, yeah. Cool. That’s something that’s exciting over in that world. I also want to get your take on – you’ve done a lot of different counseling and coaching for people facing career decisions and situations. I’d love it if you could kick us off by sharing what’s been the most fascinating and surprising discovery that you’ve made from all these conversations.

Lizette Ojeda
Yeah. When it comes down to it and I hear about what people want in their career, it comes down to people thinking that it’s just a part of who they are rather than an extension of who they are. The way I see it is that your career is not separate from you. It’s an extension of you. It’s how you show up in the world doing things that are within your zone of brilliance that you’re also passionate about and that is also a demonstration of who you are.

I think that a lot of times people have this idea of what a career should be and then throw into the mix of expectations of what you should be doing, whether that be internal voices in your head based on what you grew up being told or just people making suggestions to you about what path you should take.

I think it’s something that’s really personal and difficult to separate the professional from the personal because they both influence each other. When one is not doing well, the other one ends up suffering sooner or later. You just can’t separate it.

Pete Mockaitis
I agree. When you talk about some of these shoulds, could you get a little bit more specific. What are some common shoulds you hear again and again and again?

Lizette Ojeda
Let’s say if you have kids, you should be a better mom, you should bake homemade brownies. These different expectations of who you are for women based on the current things that you have going on.

You’re expected to be able to do it the time well, and that’s just not a reality and it starts to make women wonder “Is this really the path for me?” Unfortunately, even to the extreme of opting out because they don’t think that it’s possible for them to bring their whole true authentic self at work and be awesome as they are in the current stage that they’re in.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. I hear that pressure and the shoulds and the expectations and feeling like you’re failing, you’re screwing up, you’re not enough, you’re not good as a professional or parent or both at the same time. Not so pleasant. I want to dig into your framework when it comes to making career decisions, when it comes to get it, pivot it and quit it, very succinct and interesting to say. Can you unpack, what are these key components?

Lizette Ojeda
Yes. What I’ve discovered is that with every move that we make, with every career decision that we’re about to make, it really comes down to one of three options. That’s either you’re going to get it, go get what you set yourself up to do, whether that be a promotion, whatever that is, whatever you have inside. You are deciding to go get it and just need to figure out what strategy, what support, what path that is.

Sometimes you need to pivot meaning you’re not going in the direction you thought you wanted to go after at all. This one can be really difficult for people because sunk cost comes into play, whether “Gosh, I put in all this effort, time, energy and this is no longer the direction that I want to take. What’s on the other side?”

It can be really scary, but they know that there needs to be a change. They’re just not sure if it should be a lateral move, changing industries or changing just positions or companies, but they know that there’s a change that needs to happen. It could also even be a change in strategy, a change in environment. But that’s mostly what’s going on there.

Then the quit it, that’s when you decide to let go of what you’re doing now. It could be recognizing that after evaluating your core values and the current phase you are in life right now and then getting really clear on what you want your career to look like long term. You decide that this isn’t it anymore.

Sometimes it might be a fancy title, that you decide to let that go, especially if it comes at the cost of your health, your sanity your family, all these other things that are really important to you, but a lot of times it conflicts when you’re not clear on what your core values are in the first place and you try to do everything and not get anything done. That’s where you have to start making some big decisions because it’s just gotten to that point where something has to give unfortunately.

Pete Mockaitis
I see. It sounds like when you’re doing your career coaching, you’re sort of looking at three very different flavors in terms of what it is we’re trying to solve for. Are we trying to solve for how do we get that thing or how do we make the best change or how do we sort of escape. Is that fair to say?

Lizette Ojeda
Yes. A lot of times the people I talk to, they feel stuck. They’re overanalyzing things, just spinning their wheels. They end up maybe making some changes, but they end up right back where they were and they don’t really get to the core underlying issue.

I walk them through this decision-making process of helping them figure out is this something you want to stick to, but maybe just not in this way. Maybe the path that you’re taking isn’t the right one for you, but the destination still is because not every destination is led by the same path, so it will look different for everyone. Instead of just giving up on something that you have your heart set on, you may be approaching it in a way that isn’t a good fit for you.

Pete Mockaitis
Tell me a little bit more about getting to sort of the core or root situation. Can you give us some examples of folks, they think the problem is one thing on the surface level, but that’s really symptomatic of something deeper? Can we see how that looks in practice?

Lizette Ojeda
Yes. For example, let’s just talk about money. A lot of times people will give it their all at work because they want a raise, for example. Let’s just go with that. But then they realize that once they got there, they’re looking down and they’re like, “Okay, now what’s next? I thought this is what I wanted and it really is not.” The money that they make no longer can compensate for the meaning that is lacking.

Tony Robbins says it really well that “success requires for you to feel fulfilled otherwise that’s your greatest failure,” if you’re successful without fulfillment. Being really clear on what success even looks like for you because you can be chasing different things that maybe are not something that you value, but that you think you should value, societal indications of what success looks like, for example.

But you have to define that for yourself and be okay with it and allow yourself to show up in this world standing strong in what you believe in. That could be really difficult especially when you have other people who maybe don’t support you.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh totally. The money example or sort of the status situation, folks might say, “Are you crazy? Why would you ever leave that job? This is nuts. I would love to be making the kind of money that you’re making or to have the influence or the control or the prestige or the whatever that you’ve got.”

Lizette Ojeda
Exactly.

Pete Mockaitis
But that’s not doing it for you.

Lizette Ojeda
No, and you’d be surprised how many people tell me, “Lizette, I feel so bad. Who wouldn’t love to have what I have? Who wouldn’t love to have this position? But I just feel so empty. I’m not really doing what I’m meant to do. I don’t feel like I’m contributing the way I know how.”

It comes down to this combination of just not feeling fulfilled, a lack of getting what they desire most, and then feeling like they haven’t really reached their full potential and there’s a part of them that’s withering away. There are these indicators of status and success, like you said, but it’s just – at the end of the day, research shows that money can only take you so far. Once you’ve reached a certain level, more money isn’t going to fill that void.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh yeah, that’s right. I think that Daniel Kahneman did some research on that. I captured that number at one point and adjusted it up for inflation. It was somewhere around 85,000-ish dollars. Is that right?

Lizette Ojeda
Yes, but I would say that it also depends on where you live. It’s going to go a different way if it’s in San Francisco, for example.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh certainly. And if you have six kids or zero kids.

Lizette Ojeda
Yes, definitely.

Pete Mockaitis
I think that’s in the mix as well. But kind of the aggregate overall is in that realm. I think that having been on both sides of that number, I think there’s really some truth to it in terms of what you’re really gaining in terms of your life experience and how it’s shaped by having those dollars handy.

Okay, we talked about not falling for the shoulds when it comes to planning out your career and making those choices. What are some of your pro tips for zeroing in on what really, really, really, really, really matters most to you?

Lizette Ojeda
Yes. This is going to require some self-reflection, so thinking on how you make decisions. What patterns are you noticing? Are you noticing that you make decisions based on more self-care, for example? Are you making decisions that open up more opportunities for you to go to different conferences and present?

Your values guide your decisions, so if you don’t know what your values are, then I encourage you to work backwards. How are you making decisions? What are you deciding on and against? And what does this pattern-

Pete Mockaitis
I guess it doesn’t need to be decisions you feel good about if you’re trying to decode what’s the underlying good value there.

Lizette Ojeda
Yes, but the decisions you don’t feel good about can also be very informative.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay, there you go.

Lizette Ojeda
Because that’s telling you you’re not in alignment. You’re making decisions that aren’t based on what you value most.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. If you say, “Hey, what’s a decision you felt great about?” it’s like okay, well then, that is serving a value. And “What’s a decision you felt not great about?” is a value that you have compromised. Can you maybe give us an example of how someone might work through this in terms of “Oh, hey, here’s a decision I made and here’s what that’s telling me about a value?”

Lizette Ojeda
Yes. I would ask you to pay really close attention to your reactions. Thinking, what kind of thoughts are coming to your mind as you’re making this decision. What are you feeling? Do you start to feel kind of fluttery? Do you start to feel at peace? Do you start to feel like your throat may be closing up? Figure out what your body’s signs are.

I would really encourage people to do that because that’s really going to tell you when you’re making decisions based out of maybe fear or maybe wanting to please other people or maybe feeling like an imposter. It could be so many different things. Listening to what your mind and your heart and your body are telling you is going to help you really dial in on how you make decisions and when you make certain decisions in a certain way.

Pete Mockaitis
I’d love it if you could zero in on the body part of that in terms of can you pinpoint a couple particular bodily sensations to a couple of particular messages?

Lizette Ojeda
Yes. This one’s a big one. Right by your collarbone in the middle of your neck, you’ll start to get a little red when you start to feel uneasy. Yeah.

Pete Mockaitis
So just look in a mirror and behold.

Lizette Ojeda
Yeah or your friend might be able to tell you that. It’s because your body is kind of preparing itself for the fight or flight, but there’s nothing to fight. It’s just all in your head because you feel like you’ve got to make the right decision and it could be life altering.

Pete Mockaitis
What else?

Lizette Ojeda
Yeah. I was talking to a client recently and she was telling me how they were forcing her to make a decision at work between two different job opportunities within the company that she needed transition … pick and she needed more time. She just couldn’t tell them that she needed more time. She felt like she had to make a decision and then she started to get sick.

That’s an indication that your body is repelling against something that you’re forcing it to do. Being able to take that information and not ignore it, because then what’s going to end up happening, you’re going to burn out, your performance is going to go down, it’s going to spill over into your personal life. It’s just going to become a huge ball of mess, so being really in tune with your body and these signs. Then responding accordingly.

There’s this fear involved there. It doesn’t have to be something that is horrific and catastrophic. How can you approach this? Decide to just go ahead and move forward with what is being requested because you understand the pros and cons and are willing to risk the consequences or just go ahead and say, “Okay, this is making me really anxious, but here’s how I can deal with it.” Either way, figure out how to take back control over the situation, how you react to it.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Excellent. I’d love it then if you can talk about some of the particular questions you really recommend folks ask themselves when they are exploring these career decisions, wither the decision is to get it or to pivot it or to quit it. What are some of the power questions you found that time and time again when folks engage them, they see good insights on the other side?

Lizette Ojeda
Yes. One of things that I want to mention of where people get stuck is that they think that decision that they make today is going to be their forever decision. That often keeps them stuck from making any decision. Thinking about “What do I want most right now?” will really help you make a decision that is in alignment with what you want most and asking yourself why do I want it.

You have to ask yourself that question until you can’t really ask anymore, kind of like saying, “Well, I want a Lamborghini,” let’s just go with that. Why do you want it? It’s not just because of that. It’s because of what it will allow you to do, who you will become, how you will feel. Asking yourself as deep as you can, “Well why? Well why? Well why do I want this promotion? Well, why do I want to work for this person instead of that person? Why?”

Then when do I want to do it. Is this the right time? Maybe it’s something that I need to table it until I’m in a different position to be able to take this on. And having the support that you need to help you make this decision because a lot of times we can stay in our head and it’s really hard for us to figure these things out unless we have some support to be able to have somebody have a more objective perspective.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s good.

Lizette Ojeda
A lot of times, yeah, we make things bigger than they really are or we’re not able to see solutions that are right in front of us because it takes such an emotional toll on us to be able to make these decisions that have huge implications.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah. Do you have any pro tips there when it comes to finding a place of calm or peace or rationality when you’re in the grip of some of this emotional stuff?

Lizette Ojeda
This is what I do. I ask myself, “Okay, what is the worst that can happen and what do I really want to happen? How likely is the worst to actually happen?” If it’s very minimal, then I’m going to go for what I really want. If I couldn’t live with myself if what I really don’t want actually happened, then that would be something that would carry more weight.

Pete Mockaitis
Could you give us an example of what are some things that would be yeah, just kind of a bummer versus, “I cannot live with myself if this happened?”

Lizette Ojeda
Yes, okay. Okay, I’ll give you an example. My kids are in pre-K and they had a school activity. I really wanted to be there, but I also had something at university, which is where I’m a professor, so I had to pick. I decided that I didn’t have to choose either one; I could have a little bit of both. I just went to the most important part of each of those.

Being able to think it doesn’t even have to be either/or sometimes. Sometimes you can make decision where you get at least 80% of your cup filled with whatever it is that you need.

Pete Mockaitis
Got you, yeah. Can you give us some other examples of – because I’m really intrigued by this worst case scenario thinking because whenever I do it I’m like, “I don’t want that. I don’t want that either. I don’t want that either,” but it seems like you laid out an interesting distinction between there’s some things that you could not live with that occurring. What is sort of the gravity of those things?

Lizette Ojeda
Yes, okay. This just made me think of sometimes, an exercise that I tell my clients to do. It’s making a list of your must haves to haves. What are the things that you must have and what are nice to haves and what are cannot haves. Then, what are your tolerables? Then once you have all those written out then you can make checkmarks as to whatever decision you’re considering, where it falls on that table of all the different nice to haves, must haves, can’t haves.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay, cool. Finally, I’d love to get your take on, could you maybe share with us a story of a client who just did this whole shebang in terms of they had some questions, they engaged some of the stuff that you’ve mentioned here and these kinds of ways. They reached some insights and then they went off somewhere and where they are now and how it’s going for them.

Lizette Ojeda
Yes. It’s a woman. She was in the oil and gas industry. She wanted to make a bigger impact, but was being held back because she felt like she was in a good old boys kind of network. There wasn’t a lot of opportunity for her to have more leadership and impact within her company.

What we did is like, “Okay, well, you want it. Let’s go get it. How are we going to get it? Let’s think outside the box. They’re not giving it to you, then you go get it somewhere else.” We found other opportunities outside of her job, so like being on boards on organizations in the community, being able to make an impact in that way.

She recognized that the decision she wanted to make in terms of having this part of her career fulfilled could look in different ways. As she’s working towards finding a different opportunity in terms of the job, meanwhile she can do these other things. It didn’t have to be either or, like suffer in silence and just keep doing this, but as I’m looking for something better, how can I still have this need met?

Pete Mockaitis
Lizette, do you have any final thoughts, things you really want to make sure to mention before we shift gears and talk about some of your favorite things?

Lizette Ojeda
Well, I think that it’s really important for you to think about what your career means to you because it’s not just a career; it’s a calling. It should be something that is in alignment with who you are. Figure out what exactly that looks like and how you can make that happen.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay, thank you. Well, now could you share with us a favorite quote, something you find inspiring?

Lizette Ojeda
Yes, one of my favorite quotes is that “Not every destination is led by a single path.” I love that because you can have the same destination, the same end result that you’re looking for, but it’s going to look differently when you inject your personality, when you inject your values. If you try to go down that path in a way that isn’t a good fit for you, then it’s not going to be enjoyable. When something is not enjoyable, you’re not good at it and we all want to be awesome, right, at work.

Pete Mockaitis
Right on. Certainly. Well, how about a favorite study or experiment or bit of research?

Lizette Ojeda
Yes, okay. What comes to mind is the Premack Principle. Have you heard of it? Premack Principle, it’s one of my favorite.

Pete Mockaitis
Premack, I’m not sure.

Lizette Ojeda
It’s when work expands to fill the time you allot it. I think that this is a really interesting concept because when you are busy at work doing things you love, it’s so easy for you to just fall into this trap of doing more and more and more because you give more time to it. What I usually do so that I can be able to do all these different things is give myself a little timer. That way I can only do something for a certain amount of time instead of trying to make it perfect.

That’s something that I encounter a lot of women who feel kind of overwhelmed with all these different things that they’re doing and starting to resent their career, I tell them to just follow that principle.

Pete Mockaitis
Thank you. How about a favorite book?

Lizette Ojeda
Oh my goodness, a favorite book. It would have to be Happiness by Diener and Biswas-Diener.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay, cool. Tell us a little bit about that one.

Lizette Ojeda
Yeah, he’s a big guy who does work on life satisfaction, which is also one of my areas of research, looking at what helps us feel happy in our careers and in life in general because they go together. He’s the guy who’s found some research that shows about that money thing that we talked about earlier and just looking at what factors contribute to our satisfaction with our life. It’s really interesting.

Pete Mockaitis
How about a favorite tool, something you use that helps you be awesome at your job?

Lizette Ojeda
I would say Asana, everything is so organized in there.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh Asana, A-S-A-N-A. I thought you literally meant a sauna. …. I could do a sauna.

Lizette Ojeda
Oh that’s nice too.

Pete Mockaitis
It’s like, that is a good tool. It helps to unwind a little bit. Okay, I’m with you. Asana, the task and project management application. Okay, I’m following. Thank you. How about a favorite habit?

Lizette Ojeda
Oh gosh. When you say yes to something, you automatically say no too. I have the habit before I say yes to anything, I’m like, “Okay, what do I have to say no to?” And yes, Netflix and naps count.

Pete Mockaitis
All right, noted. Is there a particular nugget you share that really seems to connect and resonate with your clients?

Lizette Ojeda
Yes, when you know that you’re not just showing up to work as a part of something that you do, but part of something of who you are, being able to put that together with your personal life as well, so figuring out how to make that happen so that you don’t have to sacrifice either one.

Pete Mockaitis
If folks want to learn more or get in touch, where would you point them?

Lizette Ojeda
You can find me on DrLizette.com or on LinkedIn, just Google my name.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Do you have a final challenge or call to action for folks seeking to be awesome at their jobs?

Lizette Ojeda
Yes, I would say that really think about where you want to go and why you want to do that, what’s holding you back and how can you get that out of your way so you can go and be awesome at your job.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, Lizette, thanks so much for taking the time and sharing the goods. I wish you lots of luck in professoring and researching and teaching and coaching and all your ….

Lizette Ojeda
Thank you, Pete.