This week, I was building a resume to send to potential private lending partners for real estate deals. It got me thinking about the jobs I’ve had. Not just the flashy ones. The ugly ones, the dull ones, and everything in between. I dug back to the beginning of my relationship with work. It was weird to think about.
I found lessons, and story lines interwoven across the tapestry of my career. If you’ve never sat down and written out every job you’ve ever had, I recommend it. Reflecting on where you’ve been could tell you a lot about where you should go. It could stir some things up, and remind you about where you came from. If you do it, please share some of the crazier jobs in the comments or on Facebook!
Here’s my list:
- Landscaping installer – My first summer job was Freshman year in high school. This was a brutal job. We would try to start by 6 AM to avoid the sun. I definitely learned about hard work here.
- Gym Janitor – Sophomore year I asked a gym owner to give me a job. He said I could wipe down the equipment a of couple days a week. It was weeks before I realized that I was a janitor.
- Christmas Tree Sales – One of my favorite jobs! The smell was amazing, and 4 of my friends worked this job with me. I learned how important it is to work with good people.
- Duke Alumni Fund Cold Caller – This was terrifying at first. After a while, I got to be pretty good at cold calling people and asking for donations. Getting comfortable with this makes you feel like you can do anything. I think everyone should spend some time in a cold calling job.
- Duke Engineering Dept. Accounting Assistant – Less exciting than cold calling. The best thing about this job was that I listened to 3-4 business books per week while I was filing papers.
- Trading Assistant – I saw an ad looking for filing help for a stock trader. I told him I would work for free, if he would let me ask a ton of questions about trading stocks. He gave me a great foundation of market knowledge. Most significantly, my eventual career at Bright Trading stemmed from an introduction this trader made.
- Financial Advisor – I wanted to be a trader. After interviewing at a couple NYC firms, nothing panned out. I got licensed and began training to be an adviser at Merrill Lynch in Birmingham. Since I never took economics in college, so this was my crash course. I did well at the nerdy finance part, not so well at the sales part. This was my launching pad to the career I wanted.
- Equities Trader – As I wrote about in another post, this was a unique arrangement. I definitely brute-forced my way into the career that I wanted. It was also my longest job. In this job, I learned that success is ALWAYS about people. You would think that numbers are the only thing that matter in trading. This just isn’t true. I wouldn’t have made it past month three without the people I met.
- Realtor – I got my license to learn more about real estate and to help with investing. It’s done so much more. I’ve met tremendous people in the realtor community. Realtor’s really understand marketing, which is something I had to learn. It’s one of the reasons I started this blog.
- Real Estate Investor – Since the beginning of this year, I’ve been buying more rental properties. Believe it or not, this career has more emotional ups and downs than trading did. Bad things happen almost everyday. But so do amazingly awesome things! More than anything, this career has driven home the lesson that it all starts with people. As I’ve gotten to know more and more all-star performers, my business has continued to flourish.