When The Bottom Rung of The Economic Ladder Gets Uncomfortable

     What is the difference between a person earning minimum wage in a phone room and a person earning big money in a office?

     I will bet if you were walking through the mall and I asked you to point out someone that is working at a no future job and someone that seems to be doing fine and moving ahead, you could.  You could just look at them and tell.  How?  What about the way they are dressed?  Can you estimate how much money someone is making by the way they are dressed?  Can you estimate how much responsibility someone has by the way they are dressed? 

     In large factories they call the leaders "suits", as if it were a pejorative word.  It is not a pejorative word.  It is a compliment.  Dressing well has helped people advance their careers for a thousand years.  Dressing poorly has held people back throughout history.  That's the rules.  If you want to advance in your career, dress as well as you can afford to when you are working. 

     If you want to advance your career (that is a big if), what is next?  Do you have any written down goals to get out of the phone room?  Have you thought about it?  Here is some hot news.  You become what you think about.  You become what you think about.  Start thinking about what you want to do next.  You are not going to win the Lotto.  I am sure.  Set yourself some goals to earn more money.  Money is important.  Set some goals to learn more.  If you work on commission, you can get better at what you do very quickly.  You can learn to ask ask more questions.  You can learn to answer a question with a question.  You can learn to answer objections.  You can learn to close.  These are learnable,teachable skills.  The sooner you learn these skills, the faster you will start to make more money.  It is not luck that some people earn more money than others.  It is skill.  It is a learnable skill. 

     You can get more education that will demonstrate to an employer that you are a desirable employee.  If you don't have a high school diploma, get one.  This enormous problem is not going to stop being a problem.  Twenty years from now, you will apply for a job.  Your interviewer that is half your age will ask you if you have a high school diploma or GED.  When you answer no, he will stand up and thank you for applying and bid you good bye because a GED is a requirement, just like it was for the last twenty jobs you didn't get or didn't apply for.

    Whose fault is that?  When you figure out the answer to that question, you are half way home.

     If you have a high school diploma, don't stop there.  Get a college degree.  There is no time limit.  What if it takes ten years?  How old will you be in ten years? 

     What about that criminal background?  Is that holding you back?  Here is a pearl of wisdom.  Don't accumulate any more.  Pretty soon that assault charge or shoplifting charge will be ancient history.  Especially if you fill you resume with  other stuff like you have been teaching Sunday School for ten years or you have become so skillful at your job that anyone would want you working for their company in spite of that ancient DUI charge. 

     You don't have to go to school and pay tuition to learn.  The public library has more books and audio books than you have time to read and listen to.  What is  the last book you read?  The last book I read was, "Start Small, Finish Big" by Fred DeLuca.  He is the guy that started Subway Subs in 1965 at age seventeen with one thousand dollars of borrowed money.  If you are not reading books that will lead you out of the jungle, you might stay in the jungle for a long time. 

     When the bottom rung of the economic ladder gets really uncomfortable,  start giving more than you get.  You can read any book about getting ahead,they all say the same thing.  If you are not giving more than you are getting, you are already over payed.  Give your employer two day's work for one day's pay. This is not in the book about how to get along.  It is in the book about how to get ahead.  Be the most valuable employee .  If your bosses' boss old him to fire half the staff, be certain you are in the right half.  If your bosses' boss told him to fire ninety per cent of the staff , you be sure you would be the last to go.  Give more. Show up earlier.  Stay later.  Work harder.  Try this.   See what happens.  In his book "Think and Grow Rich", Napoleon Hill calls this going the extra mile.  He says it is essential to success.  

    This is just some advice.  Like all advice, you can dismiss it as not being applicable to your unique situation.  You can also start today to figure out that the bottom rung is at the bottom of a big ladder.  It is not the government's fault.  It is not your employer's fault.  It is not your parents' fault.  It is not the Florida lottery's fault.  It is your fault.  If you are doing poorly or well, it is your fault.  You can have all the credit when you are doing better. 

     The government doesn't care.  Your parents don't care.  Your preacher doesn't care.  If you keep doing stuff that doesn't work, we can assume you don't care either.  Only you can make your life better.  Start today.  Start learning how to get off the bottom rung or whatever rung you are on and start moving towards the top.  You might amaze yourself.  I'm cheering for you.