Lessons from the Corporate World

I've had the honor of taking a few jobs in large corporations in my time and it's led me to wonder why society tells us that these are the kinds of jobs we should have. It's not as true in the United States but here in Australia, with the majority of the country's populations settled around the five largest cities, this surely seems to be the zenith of everyone's career. Or maybe I've just been hanging out with too many lawyers... And what's not to like? You get Amex cards, frequent flyer points, company cars, business lunches, expensive suits, and the (privilege?) of carrying two mobile phones (most likely a Blackberry and an iPhone). Being "incorporated" is cool and it means you've succeeded, right?

Well, I'm not convinced. Jeremy and I have this conversation quite frequently because as a lawyer who left law and then returned to Australia years later, he feels quite a bit of pressure to get back into it. He feels like if he doesn't, the world will look at him as a failure or as if he's somehow given-up on the dream, as if he threw away his education and is somewhat a fool for it. All of his friends from law school are working in large firms, driving new cars, buying houses, taking vacations to Rio, eating out every night, shopping every weekend at places we can't afford, and it feels like their kind of lifestyle is the answer to our own.

What is our own lifestyle, you ask? Well, we don't have much money (mostly because I can't get consistent work) but Jeremy makes a pretty average salary here and though we survive with a little bit left over each month, I'm still quite shocked by how difficult it is to live off one salary (how do people with families do it?!).

• We eat out maybe twice a month; we plan our meals and therefore our shopping list.
• We take the bus or ride the bike instead of paying for a car.
• We turn off everything when we leave the house; we try to take colder showers to cut down on the gas bill.
• We run fans instead of an air conditioner (not that we have one anyway); we keep a cheap apartment for our area ($360 per weeks is CHEAP for Sydney's inner-west!).
• We find free media outlets online instead of paying for movies and we don't have cable.
• We wear our old clothes (many of J's things were purchased before 2007 and he seriously has only bought one shirt since then; my clothes were either purchased in the US and sent here or I bought them at cheap t-shirt shops in Sydney).

I swear, we do everything we can to save a few extra dollars each month for our personal enjoyment and yet there is still never enough to replace old clothes or go out for drinks with friends. In fact, back in January when I'd had no work for a month and a half, I wouldn't even let myself leave the house because I was so afraid of spending money! Even bus tickets were a bit too much! Do you remember my blog about the American Dream? I feel like it's true of Australia too and I struggle everyday to find contentment with what I have and what I don't. (By the way, my friend Ruh has been blogging about her lessons with Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace University and I would encourage you to check out what she's learned--it's a good read!)

During that time when we couldn't even leave the house because we feared spending money, law seemed quite attractive and it seemed to be everyone's answer to our problems. And why is that? Either because they felt Jeremy was wasting his talent and education as a legal editor or because they bought into this whole myth that the corporate world is such a wonderful place where you make lots of money and get lots of respect.

But it's not. The corporate world is full of materialistic people who paid for that life with their happiness and integrity. Who grows up wanting to be a clerk? Who feels good at the end of the day when they laid off 50 people in order to make the books look like you're bringing in revenue? That's the kind of corporate life I've seen and it's not the kind of life I want.

In my experiences, I've seen people laid-off for no reason other than the one I previously mentioned. I've seen people yelled at for talking but I've also seen people waste an hour or two playing Bejewelled MSN Games. I've seen people treated like furniture and not acknowledged when they came into the room or asked a question. I've seen people put down the wrong product code on items because they couldn't be bothered finding the right answer. I've seen people seriously suggest "do what the last guy did" instead of seeking out the proper procedure. I've seen people pick up phones to call the person on the other side of their cubicle instead of just speaking to them directly. I've seen madness in corporate offices. I've seen inefficiency and failed integrity. I've seen people do their job without pride and without conviction. I've seen people sell their souls for an Amex card. There is no accountability in the corporate world because there is no personal pride.

And so, I must ask my peers why would I want the "respect" of a corporate job when this is the kind of crap the goes on? And why should Jeremy go back to being a lawyer if every 6 minutes of his day must be accounted for on paper? How would you feel if your worth was calculated in 6 minute units? How would you feel if you had to charge someone $300 for two hours of standing by a copy machine?

But more importantly, how do you feel on Mondays and Fridays? Are you dying to escape? Do you feel proud of your work? Do you feel like you've done something to improve your life and the lives of others? Are you always looking for another job or are you content?

These are the things Jeremy and I consider when we talk about our careers and our future. I am determined to never take a job that doesn't give me some sense of self worth, but he feels a lot more pressure than I do and I seriously question those who encourage him to return to a world that doesn't value him. I think Jeremy is worth a whole lot more than a Blackberry and a fancy title.

Money counts for something but it doesn't count for everything, so we struggle on. I don't know if he'll ever go back to being a lawyer and I don't know if I'll ever make it as a photographer. For him, he grew up with the dream of making lots of money; I grew up with the dream of just being happy. I think both of those are products of our childhoods but there's no reason why we can't have both (or at least enough to be comfortable), and, as a future wife who loves her future husband without end, I will never encourage him to settle for society's standard of success. Instead, I'm going to encourage him to make his own.