Who Are You? What Are You?

 I’ve had a couple of interesting conversations in the last week about networking, including a conversation about why I believe its important to network down as well as up and aside. These conversations reminded me of a time that Independent Singapore (As a matter of disclosure, this is a website that has on occasion picked up my blog pieces), interviewed me as an interesting case study as someone who had “fallen through” the cracks and had to work as a waiter. As part of the piece, they wanted videos on my stints waiting tables and I was advised that the videos should be as “pathetic” as possible.

The piece never aired and I wasn’t actually very good at looking pathetic working as a waiter in my late thirties and early forties. If anything, I looked, for the discomfort of most middle-class professionals, probably a little too comfortable doing the job. Yes, the job was effectively a dead end. However, I didn’t think of it as such. If anything, the job turned out to be a necessary part in giving me the stability that I needed to start building some savings and I am grateful that I still have the chance to wait tables.

 

 Washing Cups at Bruno’s Serangoon Branch

The other thing that this job did involve an incident where I ended up working a lunch shift and when I took an order, the German customer actually remarked to his work colleagues that he had never felt “so commanded” before. I remember this incident because the question of what defines social status and success has come into the conversations that I’ve been having in the last week.

 

 Serving Drinks at Bruno’s Serangoon Branch

I’ve been thinking of this incident because the question “Who you are,” and “What you are,” often get confused as the same thing. Since this is the common understanding, I’ll go with it. The “Who” question should be a question of character. For example, if you were to ask me who I am, I’d say that I am an all-round gentleperson who believes that you should speak nicely to everyone. The “what question” should refer to what do you do and what do you have. I am, for the purpose of this, the business development director in a professional firm that specializes in liquidations.

Unfortunately, the who and the what often become synonymous and we start to assume that what a person does for a living or where they live or what car they drive, define them and their character, talents and abilities. I think of someone who tried to rub it in that I was an inferior being because I was competing with people who drove “Ferraris” for her attention.

In a way, it’s what you call, a sad truth of how the way the world works. Hence, we all exaggerate on our CVs because the person judging you will inevitably be impressed with “what you are,” and hire you based on that believing that its “who you are.” I am guilty of it; hence I talk about the “glamorous” parts of who I worked for, which function I was seen in and who I rubbed shoulders with.

Unfortunately, confusing who you are and what you are doesn’t just get you a job, it has a way of deluding you into believing that you are the job you work in, your zip code and the car you drive. One only needs to think of a young lady who talked about her “uncaring; elite face.” What was she? The daughter of a very senior civil servant who made plenty of money. Who was she? A sad brat setting herself up for a kicking.

One of the most difficult moments for a lot of people, particularly the high-powered ones, is retirement. Suddenly, the job with the big title and the swanky office goes. The people who flocked around them start to slink away because they’re no longer useful. There’s an argument to say that men, particularly high-powered ones tend to have miserable retirements because they lose their purpose in life. Shutting up and letting your successor get on with it is not natural for someone who has grown used to being in charge of things (hence the Singapore solution of creating retirement cabinet jobs for senior ministers and dare I say “minister mentors” for Prime Ministers who can’t let go.)

Its best to avoid confusing the two and you find that the people who are genuinely up there, don’t. It usually the sad ones in professional circles who get confused between the two and often do their best to hide impotence by being nasty to those they believe are beneath them because they think that what they’re getting is social respect.

Some of the most successful people that I have the privilege of knowing (people who create listed companies or have access to wealth funds) are the people most willing to take the subway. I think of the way Polaris, now Intellect Design Arena remembers me – the man who got the Chairman to ride in the MRT. These are the guys who have separated who they are from what they are and been successful in both aspects of their persona. Warren Buffet who has made more money than most still lives in the same house he did three decades ago. Surely there’s a lesson there.