Racing- A good influence on Career?

I have blogged before on the negatives of yacht racing on a career. There are of course positives. What is the balance? Why am I so darn ok at sailing and flopped in several jobs?

Why I am good is because:

1) it's a very motivating environment and both an escape and a focus. It's very æsthetically pleasing and rewarding on many levels- even spiritually!

2) It is something that can be learned - both the technical, physical and social sides.

3) You have fixed responsibilities yet team work is everything and you can contribute outside your physical job

4) It is something I have stuck at and become expert at.

Why am I bad at jobs?

1) I do not relish poorly defined responsibilities, micromanaging bosses and lack of informaiton and training available

2) I do not take the correct route to 'ownership' an d 'co-ownership' of tasks

3) I am awkward, proud, stubborn and slow whitted.

4) I feel I can contribute at any time to overall strategy and decisions above my head.

5) I have chosen to stay in an area where the above are all important to avoid or do. I have chosen an area which is uncomfortable for me and others- in needing to convince people all the time. Always being on the back foot, or being too hard on the front!


My summation is that I have in many ways taken a wrong career route, and never quite found a team to really fit into. In sailing I get on in many teams because you get respect for what you do, not so much who you are or how you look and sound. As I always said though, marketing is a great intellectual exploit and sales a resonable entry level job to route into marketing. But there is so much competition and it is so much a function in need of self-justification that it means it is all ludicrous! I should have been poking at the big brand names and flying in FMCG but have never even got onto that runway!

Communication skills are those I just supposed I had until I had my big fall in 2001. The problem is that my mind just doesn't often work on a listening wave legnth. I'm not with the team or the customer. I have more rigid opinions on things, basically I am very male and headstrong like a stupid rushing bull often, or when passive, like the rabit trapped in the head lights...

There we go again! Assertiveness , lack of- being aggressive on the one side and passive on the other pole of behaviour swings.

This is a key problem for me. In sailing I can spend much of my time as the Bull because I have well defined tasks and am good at them, while I can take moments to be more feely touchy " i just pose the question" when I want to. In business life you have to be far more touchy feely in marketing and be far more sophisticated.