Blog - Sunday April 19, 2009 - 13 Comments
What If Your Dream Job Doesn’t Exist Anymore?
I was talking to an experienced, but not-yet-discovered, on-camera, news/talk person at one of my Social Media Networking Parties. She was asking if I could give her some advice about getting in front of the “right” people in New York. Not a problem. I’ve got a couple of friends in the biz, so I asked her, “What are you looking for?” She said, “I want to host a talk show, anchor a news broadcast or be a field reporter for a local news station in NYC.”
Somewhat stunned, I asked her to explain. And she replied, “It’s my dream job. I want to be a famous talk show host or anchor and make a lot of money.” Thankfully, at that very moment, several people joined the conversation and I was able to make a stealthy getaway.
I thought to myself, what made her think that any of the jobs she is dreaming about actually exist? As a practical matter, they don’t. You can’t go from 34 year-old, female, third-string, foreign language, cable news reporter to NYC-based talk show host. In fact, you probably can’t get there at all. Not because of personal talent, but because the job doesn’t exist. There is no locally produced talk show that is looking to hire a host. That’s not how talk shows work.
Over the next several weeks, this conversation was replayed several times with several different individuals. Each person was asking me about a job that either no longer existed or worse, never existed at all. Then it dawned on me — if you ask the wrong question, you are guaranteed to get the wrong answer.
While all of this was going on, WNBC-TV announced that Len Berman, the venerable sportscaster, was being let go because of budget constraints. But wait! Len is a fixture in NYC, he’s a sports brand, he’s one of the main reasons people tune in to Channel 4 … um … nope, he’s a very big budget item that could easily be cut to make room for a bunch of high quality, low cost, good looking young people who can read, write and speak on camera.
Do you think they made a good decision? Go ahead, name all the “branded” sportscasters in the New York DMA. You can’t? Neither can anyone else. The job of “venerable” _____caster at a local TV station no longer exists - everyone can be replaced with younger, fresher, cheaper talent.
Well, that’s pretty depressing. Yeah, I think so too. But that’s not where it ends. How many people are now looking for jobs that no longer exist? If you used to be a computer photo typesetter, you were replaced in the 1980’s with desktop publishing. Now, if you had that skill set, you probably could have opened a boutique desktop-based print pre-production house and done fine. Or, you could have looked for work in the transportation or food services industry. They are all about as related.
Perhaps you’d like to be a theme music composer for television or a graphic designer for the broadcast industry. How about a gig as a professional studio trombone player, or a cameraperson on a remote three-person news crew?
All of these jobs still exist in some form, but they are far from dream jobs. In fact, these production skills have been commoditized and practitioners can look forward to making about the same kind of money as they would waiting tables in a good restaurant.
I started asking some of my more seasoned friends about what jobs actually exist in their industries now (as opposed to the jobs that people think exist). The answers were truly stunning.
Last week I had the honor of lecturing to a classroom full of graduate students at the Columbia Business School and then later in the week I had an opportunity to address a similar group of graduate students (via Skype) at the Newhouse School. As I do during every lecture, I gave the students my email address and invited them to contact me with questions or comments. Just for fun, I asked about a dozen of them what they hoped to be when they entered the work force. The answers were a total surprise. To a person, they are aspiring to jobs that have devolved into commoditized low wage work, that they still perceive to be high profile, high paying careers.
We hear so much these days about workforce development and career guidance. But I wonder who is educating the educators? Who is communicating reality to the job counselors? Does it make sense to go to school to become a studio musician in 2009? The short answer is no. You can certainly go to music school, that is a privilege and a joy. But there is no job called “studio musician” any more. In 1980, being good at that job guaranteed a six-figure income. Today, you’d be lucky to make $50k per year in a big city, and away from the three major production centers, beer money. Do you know how many students are in music school thinking that there’s a commercial production business to go into? Now, substitute camera operator, editor, graphic artist, set designer, copywriter, news giver, spokesperson, model/actress, script supervisor, the list just keeps on going. And it’s not just the production side; the same holds true for the business side, the promotion side, all of it.
What would you do differently if you had the ability to accurately assess the total potential of your dream job and found out that it was no longer possible for it to provide the living you dreamed accompanying it? There’s only one answer … you’d look for a different line of work.
The pace of change being what it is, it is truly surprising how many people still laud and revere certain jobs in our profession. Jobs that, in reality, bear little resemblance to what they used to be. 
Shelly Palmer is a consultant and the host of MediaBytes a daily show featuring news you can use about technology, media & entertainment. He is Managing Director of Advanced Media Ventures Group LLC and the author of Television Disrupted: The Transition from Network to Networked TV (2008, York House Press) and the upcoming, Get Digital: Reinventing Yourself and Your Career for the 21st Century Economy (2009, Lake House Press). Shelly is also President of the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences, NY (the organization that bestows the coveted Emmy Awards). You can join the MediaBytes mailing list here. Shelly can be reached at shelly@palmer.netFor information about Get Digital Classes, visit www.shellypalmer.com/seminars
Comments
13 Responses to “What If Your Dream Job Doesn’t Exist Anymore?”James Bressi April 19th, 2009 2:04 pm
Shelly, this could be one of your best pieces. Hands down.
D. Oliver April 19th, 2009 3:13 pm
Amen. In radio your friendly DJ may be in a studio on the other
side of the country and news people are an endangered species. Many
would be broadcasters now look hopefully to new media but even when
similar jobs exist, they don’t pay or pay so little it’s impossible
to make a living.
Tim April 20th, 2009 6:53 am
Your assessment is true, but it’s nothing new. It’s been happening
for years. I started my professional career 20 years ago in
television production and I used to joke that broadcasting was the
only line of work where people would get a four year degree and
travel across the country to take a job for minimum wage. I moved
on from television to interactive about 10 years ago and I’m glad I
did.
susan April 20th, 2009 9:21 am
so what are the jobs that do exist? i’m a 50 year old producer at a
station still clinging to the old ways. if (when) my job
disappears, i’m looking at a complete career change… but what do
i tell all the interns and would be production assistants that
still flood us with resumes every summer?
William Todd April 20th, 2009 10:09 am
As always some stellar insights from my favorite renaissance man. I
suspect that the ‘re-alignement’ of which you speak will be further
exacerbated by the current economic downturn.
Wally April 21st, 2009 9:41 am
While I agree with the central premise offered here (BTW, I
personally know about the disappearance of the studio/freelance
musician gig in the 80s), the lack of a description of what job
opportunities exist is glaring. High-paying glamour jobs may not
exist, and yet newscasters, talk show hosts, producers, set
designers, etc. are still needed. So I agree, what jobs do exist?
Maybe we need to look at more complex economic factors that have
led to Wal-Mart wages and quality throughout America, but that
means figuring out the opportunities and dangers presented and
asking hard questions about the distribution of wealth and
opportunity or we’ll quickly descend into a digital version of the
Middle Ages.
bill dyszel April 22nd, 2009 7:35 am
On the contrary, it’s easier than ever to get your dream job . . .
. you just can’t get paid for it anymore. Details, details! -Bill
Dyszel
Rich April 22nd, 2009 11:20 am
I agree with Shelly on this. As a long time video production
person, It’s been disappointing to see writing, editing, shooting
and graphic design become less valued over the years. As a member
of a digital media group within a television network, I have seen
several areas grow over the last few years (this not based on any
stats or research, purely on what I have seen): - Information
Architecture (people who work on website design, but not
designers.) Using research, design and technical knowledge, these
people figure out how to best lay-out websites, so that users can
best navigate and find the information they need. - Website
Developers - Obviously, websites are in many ways replacing news
papers and television stations. This is a growth area, because as
sites grow and have more features, they become much more
complicated to program, involving integrating a great deal of front
end and back end operations. - Research - In the digital world,
research is a valuable tool. Its even getting to the micro level
where large commercial sites record mouseclicks and crunch that
data in hopes of learning where exactly a user goes when they
navigate around a site. This helps companies figure out how to best
monetize their sites and sell advertising. - Marketing - As Eric
Schmidt of Google put it: “Corporate marketing is the last bastion
of unaccountable spending in corporate America.” Not only have I
seen several marketing positions created over the years, I have
seen entire marketing divisions pop up. Selling banner ads is dead,
but selling big sponsorships is alive and well.
Mark Joyella April 22nd, 2009 11:31 pm
Shelly, Wow. And wow. You have truly hit a nerve with this piece.
As Len Berman signed off tonight, he definitely took a piece of not
just New York television history with him, but a big chunk of what
“local news” means in general. As you said, the jobs the students
you have spoken with yearn for exist, just not the way they did
when we were itching to “make it” years ago. I know some of the
professors I’ve spoken with get the massive transition underway in
media, but what about the rest of them? Please tell me they aren’t
teaching to the 20th Century. Mark
Sheryl Breuker April 27th, 2009 12:26 pm
I was going to comment here. I’ve been thinking about this for a
while. Instead I wrote a post. I hope you’ll read it. Please. :)
http://stardustglobalventures.com/2009/04/27/i-have-a-dream-and-whats-wrong-with-that/
Dream Jobs or Relics from a Bygone Era | (iverson's) currentbuzz April 30th, 2009 8:28 am
[...] clipped from http://www.shellypalmermedia.com [...]
Carolyn Schuk May 26th, 2009 11:43 am
The tragedy is that people looking for their “dream jobs” are so
blinkered and lacking in imagination. You don’t find a dream job –
you invent it, and it’s called a vocation, not a job. And you don’t
get there by identifying an objective and then pursuing it
systematically, like solving an equation. Instead, it’s more like
solving a crossword puzzle, and the the process is like Alice’s
Looking Glass world; Go in the opposite direction to maximize
opportunities for serendipity by trying anything and everything
that crosses your path. Take me as an example. My first step to
becoming the maven of mobile TV was taking over — on my own time
– as editor of my former (and last) employer’s customer magazine
simply because it seemed interesting. The second step was covering
charity fundraisers for a community weekly. There are so many new
and interesting opportunities that continue to open up results of
the democratizing power of IP - here’s one:
http://broadcastengineering.com/products/yourself-mobile-coming-soon-pc-0317/index.html.
As someone one said, Let the dead bury the dead and follow me. That
isn’t some ancient deity — that’s your own soul talking. Real life
is infinitely more interesting than any day dream or fantasy. You
just have to “show up” for it.
Outdated Education « Painfully Hopeful May 29th, 2009 8:37 am
[...] No Comments A couple of weeks ago I read a blog post over on
ShellyPalmer.com entitled, “What if your dream job does’t exist
anymore?“ It was all about a several conversations that
Shelly had with people trying to break into [...]