Yesterday I participated in the Annual Planning Meeting for The Canadian Education and Research Institute for Counselling (CERIC). And during some brief down time I shared a quotes/concepts from Alain de Botton’s The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work with on of my mentors, Marilyn Van Norman.

“All societies widely have had work at their centre; ours is the first to suggest that it could be something more than a punishment or penance. Ours is the first to imply that we should seek to work even in the absence of a financial imperative. Our choice of occupation is held to define our identity to the extent that the most insistent question we ask of new acquaintances is not where they come from or who their parents were but what they do, the assumption being that the route to a meaningful existence must invariably pass through the gate of remunerative employment.” (page 106)

“Among all other, better-established businesses catering to a elements far down our hierarchy of needs – businesses offering assistance with gardening and cleaning, accountancy and computers – here, finally, was an enterprise devoted to the interpretation of the critical, yet troublingly indistinct, radio-transmission of the psyche.” (page 116)

Clearly, career practitioners are the most important professionals in the world. And there I sat amongst talented, intelligent and charismatic people who have dedicated their careers to the theory and practical application of work. It’s what we spend most of our lives doing. And yet, our group of professors, counsellors, directors, coaches, advisers, managers, and educators would probably agree that our profession(s) and field is/are generally undervalued by, well, everyone.

Kids today might not be able to name more than five or six different professions (most of ’em will get Doctor, Nurse, Lawyer, Police Officer, Firefighter, and – maybe – pirate). University and college students* don’t do much better – many of our clients in the world of post-secondary education want to be “consultants.” Of what? Well, that will sort itself out after the first 100K is in the bank, because, as we know, consultants make a lot of cash.

Finally, the most interesting thing in all of this is the lightspeed evolution of the world of work. Students will enter university today and graduate into a job that doesn’t currently exist. West Virginia will have exploded all of its mountains by 2020 and, suddenly, coal miners in that region will be thrust – perhaps unwillingly – into the North American knowledge economy. And a recent study by McKinsey & Co found that the African consumer economy will reach $1 trillion per year over the next decade. Amazing trends. And the vast majority of people involved in this from-local-to-global transformation of work will not go anywhere near a career practitioner to, as Neitzche said, become who they are. Oh, and all of this is happening while over 75% of people on the planet range from being somewhat-to-totally dissatisfied with their job.

And in 2020 – possibly with me in the Presidential Chair – the members of CERIC will be sitting around our solar-powered boardroom engaged in meaningful dialogue about how to make our organization – and the field of career development – sexier and more relevant. Because, when you get right down to it, experts on humanity’s relationship to the world of work should be sought after and approached by their communities all the time. Right?

– JCH

*this is not true of students in the MM-ECM program at UBC’s Sauder School of Business, who understand the myriad range of career opportunities with incredibly profound insight.