Lessons - Dave Ramsey's Career Coach on Why Most People Hate Their Jobs | Ken Coleman - 2x Bestselling Author & Co-Host of The Ramsey Show

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In this lessons episode, discover how life mapping can reveal the strengths, values, and experiences that should shape a career.

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Understand why clarity often comes from identifying what truly matters.

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Explore how autonomy drives fulfillment at work and uncover why recognizing personal strengths and purpose can lead to a more meaningful professional path.

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Talk to me just so people understand, because they're listening to what you're saying.

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They're trying to understand how they can achieve this in their own life.

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And I find some of the best ways to do it is to walk through, for example, how you came to this confidence and clarity, because this is not your first version of your career.

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This took years to discover.

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That's right.

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Well, so for me, I was in a season of life in my early 30s where I made a departure from this direction, this path that I had been on since the age of 16.

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And that was I really felt my calling was to serve the public as an elected official.

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So governor, senator, you know, whatever, you know, I mean, you're talking 16 here.

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So you're thinking, oh, you got a shot at the White House, you know.

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And so in my early 30s, a distaste for the political system as a whole led me to a real crisis of belief.

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In other words, do I believe that that's what I'm actually supposed to do?

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And I came to the conclusion, not right now, and maybe never.

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So now what?

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And so that's a very disconcerting feeling to be on this one path for a long time and all of a sudden come to a clear realization.

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That's not the path.

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So what path is it?

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And so I was friends with a couple of really awesome executive coaches that I had gotten to know, and they gave me their materials.

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They were like, these guys were partners, and they were like, hey, you can figure this out on your own.

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They, quite frankly, knew I couldn't afford their services.

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So they gave me their life mapping material.

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And I did the life mapping.

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In other words, I went back and I was in a place of confusion.

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Where am I supposed to be if not here?

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Which way?

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And I went back in the process of I looked at what I'm really good at, began to look at, okay, what do I know?

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My whole life I've been complimented for this, this, and this.

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You begin to gather the facts.

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And so I'm really talented at these things.

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This is my bucket.

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It's not a big bucket, but I got a clear bucket.

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And that's not false humility, by the way.

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I am not the most talented guy.

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But I have a couple of really good power tools, and I realize that.

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So I go, okay, that's good.

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And then I begin to go back and look at what's moved my heart.

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What made me angry?

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What made me sad?

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What made me happy?

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And I'm looking for clues throughout my life because that gives you a sense of what you care deeply about.

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And so begin to gather that information.

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And that got me to a place where I realized I'm good at communicating.

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And I really enjoy the performative nature of that.

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In other words, the pressure piece.

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And I care deeply about people.

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So that's all I really knew as I'm doing this life mapping.

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Those clear themes were coming at me.

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And so as I begin to wrestle with it more, and I'm making a very long story as short as possible, that's how I was able to determine that broadcasting was a similar path to being a politician.

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A different application of what I'm good at.

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but there were similarities in what I care deeply about, which was the people component.

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I grew up in a small church home.

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My dad was a pastor of a very small church.

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We were lower middle class.

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I watched my mom and dad serve and love people for all races, all backgrounds.

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This was not a mega church.

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This was...

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Real church, I call this real church, loving and serving on people.

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My dad would clean the toilets on Saturday and preach on Sunday.

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I saw two people who cared about people.

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The true, true representation of what Christianity should be about.

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They just loving on people, man.

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Didn't matter what you had done in your life.

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They were like, God loves you.

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We love you.

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Come on.

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And that developed in me a real sense of loving and caring and coaching and cheering people on.

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So those were the early themes.

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And I was like, okay, if I can broadcast to do that, that's why I didn't go into sports broadcasting.

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I dabbled in it.

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But the sports broadcasting was missing the serving people piece.

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And so I was like, okay, the Dave Ramsey's of the world and some of these podcasts early.

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I was like, that's what I want.

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I want to broadcast broadcast.

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to help people.

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And so that's kind of how I began on the journey.

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You know, you mentioned something because even when you went on this journey and you found all these different components of what you wanted to include in your vocation, in your job, in your life,

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There's still so many outlets for that.

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I mean, like broadcast is like 70% aligned and then maybe a fun podcast could be 80% aligned and then maybe live coaching is like 90 to 95% aligned.

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But even doing the work, like the fact that you were able to get to the point where you could look at this plethora of different careers and then start to see where you want it to fit, that's already more work than most people do in their entire life.

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And you probably see this all the time.

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And I'm just, I'm very curious.

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In this post-COVID gig economy, people were laid off in masses.

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People are comparing themselves to individuals on social media.

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I would assume that a lot of the people that you deal with are just tired, stressed, depressed, confused.

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What is the climate like right now for the majority of professionals and people that are just trying to figure out their life?

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Does it seem like this?

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Am I correct in assuming that it's much worse than it was five years ago?

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You're frontline.

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So I'm just I'm trying to understand where people are at in 2024.

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Yeah, well, simple answer is the data is showing us that the world of work is getting worse.

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And this is Gallup.

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I mean, Gallup is the gold standard.

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I read everything Gallup puts out every year.

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They put out a state of the American workplace and I read through it like it's the Bible because it's the Bible as it relates to what America workers are saying.

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So there's no question that the environment of work, that's what I mean when I say world of work, it's gotten worse.

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There are a variety of reasons for that, and I could go down any tributary you want, but to answer your question very specifically, yeah, it's worse.

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And so what people want is autonomy.

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Now, autonomy, fancy word, just means freedom.

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And, you know, Jefferson wrote in the Declaration of Independence, life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

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He stole the idea of the pursuit of happiness.

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That was not his wording.

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He got that from John Locke, a great British Enlightenment thinker.

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Locke got it from Socrates and Plato and all of the Stoics.

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I mean, so this idea of the pursuit of happiness...

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tied to life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness.

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It's all one phrase.

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So he says life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

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Liberty is very much tied to pursuit of happiness.

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And what he was saying comes from, again, all these great enlightenment thinkers, and I've read all this stuff, so I don't want to nerd out too much on this.

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But that's where we see and understand autonomy.

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I want to live...

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My life, one of the top five regrets of the dying, as written in a runaway bestseller by an Australian hospice nurse, was I didn't live the life that was really true to what I wanted to live.

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So when I say autonomy, I want to back, I've given you context, and let's get back right into that, okay?

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We want to feel as though our day at work

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that we are doing something that we are good at, we are doing something we enjoy, and we are producing a result that matters.

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This is what we want, and we want to be recognized for it.

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So to the extent that that's not a present opportunity for workers, that's why we see the data year after year after year from Gallup that says 68% of the American workforce is not engaged in,

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It doesn't mean they hate their job.

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They're just not engaged.

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That's why quiet quitting took off that turn.

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Because people just went, you just described in one sentence how I feel.

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I'm going to do an adequate job so I don't get fired.

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But I'm not coming in fired up, ready to go, like you'd see a professional football player, a professional athlete that's coming in at 5 a.m. to hit the gym, studying film all day long.

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Why does an NFL player do that?

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They love the game.

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They love the game.

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They want to be good at the game.

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They want to stay at the top.

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There are American workers that are like that, but the majority are not.

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68% says that the majority are just kind of making it through.

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The reason behind that is the context that I just gave you a couple of minutes ago.

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Inherently, we desire to make a mark, and we want to be recognized for that mark, and we want to care about that mark.

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And so it's gotten worse.

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It's gotten worse and worse and worse because we have a leadership crisis in the American workforce because the MO in American work is you do a good job and you keep doing a good job.

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And at some point I got to promote you.

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And after about two or three promotions, I put you in a leadership position that you might not want.

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You might not be wired to do it.

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And we're not even going to train you how to do it.

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And so this keeps perpetuating itself.

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But we wonder why.

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People don't want to go into work.