The three-minute turn

For the first ten minutes of dinner, an old friend told me why he couldn't keep up with his industry anymore. He'd worked in it for more than fourteen years. The work was changing faster than he could make sense of it.

About three minutes later, we were talking about what he could try next. We hadn't learned where his industry was heading in those three minutes. I keep thinking about that.

We talked first about how much of the pressure came from changes beyond him. Other people were trying to understand them too. The consequences weren't equal for everyone, but his difficulty keeping up wasn't, by itself, evidence that he was no longer capable.

Then we talked about acting before the uncertainty cleared. Knowing exactly where an industry is going would make choosing easier. Waiting for that knowledge could take indefinitely. There might be something worth exploring while the larger question stayed open.

That left room to talk about what the changes might make possible. The risks were still there. They had stopped occupying the entire conversation.

We went from "but what do I do now" to "okay, what's possible from here" in less time than it takes to order. We spent the rest of the evening on the second question.

I'm familiar with the first one. I've spent much of my adult life anticipating downside, with a mixed track record at best. Most of the awful outcomes I planned around never arrived. Most of the good things were things I hadn't modelled at all. I could spend hours worrying and come away feeling as if I'd learned something about the future.

At dinner, we'd stopped trying to settle the future of an industry and started considering decisions within his reach. That was a question we could do something with.

I've had some version of this conversation six times this year. I don't think the lesson is that worried people need a more optimistic friend. There are real reasons to be afraid of changes in work. A conversation doesn't remove them.

What I want to remember is how quickly fear can take over the whole discussion. My friend still had the same uncertainty to go home to. He also had possibilities we hadn't spent the first ten minutes considering.