by Dana Perino
ZIP IT
Sometimes the best thing a person can say is nothing at all. Listening is often more valuable, but that’s seldom practiced in my profession of politics and media.
Once I watched Vice President Dick Cheney get asked in an interview why he didn’t speak very often in meetings. He said he’d learned that leaders need to let people in their organizations speak freely and without judgment. He said that if a staffer thinks that someone higher up the ladder will attack him for his opinions, then he’ll be less likely to express his thoughts. When that happens, the bosses don’t get to hear what their people are thinking, and they can miss something important.
So that’s why the Vice President was so quiet in policy discussions. He never pulled a face or showed any reaction except openness to hearing more, and we all felt like we could say anything in front of him. Only at the end of a meeting would he ask questions or express his opinion. He saw the President regularly, and that’s when he’d weigh in on the issues. I thought that was an excellent management approach.
One of my favorite sayings from Cheney was, “You never get in trouble for something you didn’t say.” Exactly!
LET IT GO
A good memory isn’t always a positive. I have an excellent memory (this is a blessing and a curse—just ask Peter) and I can remember anything that’s ever hurt or embarrassed me—from childhood taunts to breakups to a misspelling on a PowerPoint presentation that elicited snickers from a client. I even let little mistakes eat at me while others couldn’t even remember the event, and it was President Bush who taught me to let those things go.
When I was a deputy press secretary, the communications director, Dan Bartlett, suggested that the President take some time to meet with David Ignatius, a columnist, about Ignatius’s recent trip to Iran. Dan was going to have me sit in just to monitor the discussion. But there was a miscommunication between Dan and the President. The President didn’t want Ignatius to think that he was getting an interview about Iran because he didn’t want to give the impression that he was negotiating with Iran through a newspaper columnist. That made a lot of sense. But Dan and I knew that Ignatius expected to come out of the meeting with something he could use in his columns, so we were stuck.
The President put his foot down—he said he’d listen to what Ignatius had to say about his recent trip to Iran, but he wasn’t going to give him something on the record. Addressing Dan, he pointed a finger at me and said, “Therefore, she doesn’t need to be here.” They both looked at me and I slunk out of the Oval Office.
I was mortified. I called Peter and whispered to him what had happened when I’d been told to get out of the Oval. Thankfully, Peter gave me a better way of looking at it. He said, “Just think—for the rest of your life you’ll be able to say, ‘I’ve been kicked out of better places than this!’ ” That helped me laugh about it. But oh, was I embarrassed.
On the President’s book tour in 2010, I asked him if he remembered how mad he’d been that day. He had no recollection of it. I said it had worried me for years. He laughed and said, “You’re going to have to let that one go.”
The President was very good about not letting little things get to him, which meant he could focus on the important things. One of his mottos was, “The President doesn’t get do-overs.” He’d learn from things that happened and applied those lessons to whatever was ahead, while I wasted valuable energy fretting about trivialities.
It’s not always easy to move on from things like that, but when I am able to do it, I find space for more productive thinking.
Big Picture
PASS IT ON
This is one of my favorite tips—everyone should practice good career karma. What goes around definitely comes around at work.
First, you need to build a strong network of allies. Everyone you start working with could one day be in a senior position and you may need their help at some point. Plus, as you get more management responsibility, you have a smaller circle of peers whom you can trust, so it’s best to make sure that the relationships you have are solid.
I started on Capitol Hill answering phones, and nearly twenty years later, the friends I made then are still in my network. They’re running the shows now, and so we’ve climbed the ladder together. It’s good to have these friendships at work.
Another thing to do is pass on advice to younger staff, especially if they want a mentor. Tell them what you learned that you wish you’d known when you started. Employees learn best from hearing the stories of people they admire, and they’re eager to be advised on what they can be doing to succeed. Besides, you never know if one day a kid like that could end up as the boss.
A final point about helping others at the office—if you’re a manager, it’s really important to encourage your employees to grow so they can be promoted or even move on to another job. Losing an employee can be inconvenient, but it’s really a testament to what a good manager you are if they move up and out. If an employee is stuck, ask yourself why… it may not just be their fault.
In addition, young people who have good jobs should help their peers find jobs, too. Networking isn’t just about making sure your needs are secure, though favors do get returned. Be willing to open a door, pass on a résumé, or make an introduction. Try not to think of job seekers as competition but as ongoing contacts. Building your network of allies doesn’t necessarily yield direct benefits, but that’s how karma works. You never know when your good deed will be returned.
TO SCHOOL OR NOT TO SCHOOL?
There’s an important ongoing debate right now about whether college is worth it for the majority of American students. I believe it is—every statistic I’ve seen shows that over a lifetime, a college degree helps a person achieve and earn more than someone who didn’t go to college. Even “some college” is beneficial. It is, however, very expensive, especially at some schools, and so student loan debt is a major consideration for most families.
Across the country, there are some good innovations that are disrupting traditional colleges, including some online university course offerings, which give a person more flexibility to take classes when and where they need. And while those are interesting developments, changes there will take time to mature.
In the meantime, many young professionals are also asking the question of whether they should get an advanced degree—in business, law, or another profession. They want to know if it will matter to their future, help them get a better job, and command a better salary after graduation. They ask if they should resign from their jobs and go to school full-time or try to find a part-time program where they can continue to work while they study for their master’s degree. Others think they need to go to law school but worry they don’t really want to practice law. And almost everyone worries about how they would pay for it.
The answers to all of those questions vary. An advanced degree can certainly help focus the mind, enhance skills, and give you a leg up on your competition. In my case, I became a better journalist, especially when it came to news writing. In my graduate school program we all flunked our first assignments—that was a real wake-up call.
I also fretted about how to pay for it, and I was very hesitant to take out a student loan. I never thought, however, that I wouldn’t end up going straight into journalism—and if I had known that, I’m not sure I’d have gone to get my master’s degree. But I’m glad I did, because I use what I learned there every day. So for me it worked out, but these are some questions that I ask young people to think about before they make a decision about whether to apply to graduate school:
• Is there something that you really want to study?
• Does your profession respect or even require an advanced degree for promotion?
• Will an advanced degree increase your chances of getting a job that you want?
• Do you have the flexibility in your life to leave work and study full-time?
• Financially, are you able to pay for graduate school, or hav
e you asked whether your employer has any funds that will help pay for additional studies?
• Are you thinking about graduate school because you don’t really know what you want to do? Or are you bored in your job and looking for an escape?
My bottom line on graduate school is that you shouldn’t go just because you don’t have anything else to do. That’s an expensive and time-consuming venture if you’re not sure what you want to get out of it. But if you can’t find a job in your field and know that an advanced degree would help you land one, then by all means it’s worth pursuing.
However, there could be other ways to spend that time—I always advocate for young people to try to work in Washington, D.C., on Capitol Hill for at least a couple of years. It’s like getting a master’s degree—and even if you don’t want to work in politics or government, everything you learn on the Hill will be useful in your life. Not to mention the contacts that you’ll make that you’ll have throughout your career.
I also don’t think that parents should pay for their children’s graduate or law school. Helping a student with a four-year bachelor’s degree is very generous, but an advanced degree should be considered a personal responsibility. That will ensure that the coursework is taken very seriously and makes the young person take ownership of their degree. And when they graduate, it’s a shared accomplishment that the whole family can be proud of. But do not encourage graduate school just for graduate school’s sake. Work experience is much more valuable if the decision comes down to that.
MOVE OUT TO MOVE UP
At Minute Mentoring events, one of my top three pieces of advice is “don’t be afraid to move.” A reluctance to move is part of a growing general aversion to risk of all kinds that is taking hold across America. Whenever I mention this tip, I get nods of recognition and “I needed to hear that” smiles. In the back of their minds they’re worried about being stuck in their careers because there are no additional career opportunities where they live, but staying put can be far worse than leaving. Whether for love, career, or change of pace, relocating can be one of the best things you ever do for yourself.
There are a lot of reasons that people don’t want to move—family, climate, lifestyle, and familiarity. Actually, those can be the same reasons for wanting to move!
Today, most people relocate two to three times in their lives, but still there are some young people who feel pressure to stay near to where they grew up because their moms (and sometimes dads) make them feel miserable about leaving. The parent anchor can be heavy.
This happens all over the nation, but is more common in America’s smaller towns. Some people worry that if their children leave their small town, they won’t come back, and that’s true, many of them won’t—at least not right away.
Devoted parents might not even realize that they are pressuring their kids to stay nearby, or their children may be too nervous to go out and try something in a new place. If that’s the case, then parents ought to encourage their kids to be more adventurous. Kick them out of the nest for a while—they’ll return if they have to.
Another thing I’ve found in Washington, D.C., and New York City is that young people don’t want to leave the energy and excitement that a large metropolitan area offers. They love city life and can’t imagine being in a “backwater” with nothing to do. I get that. But young people also want to get promoted at work and to earn more money so that they can live one day like their bosses and the owners of the company do.
Sometimes you have to leave one location and get more experience under your belt, so that you can return at a higher-paying level. That means you shouldn’t frown when your boss says there’s an opportunity in Fort Wayne, Indiana, and they’re considering you for the job. Don’t turn down an opportunity because it is three thousand miles away from home. Don’t mope when you find out the company is moving its headquarters to another state because they want a better tax structure. Don’t give up on a new job opportunity just because the office isn’t in your preferred location—small and midsize towns are worth a shot when you’re working your way up the ladder. Small towns have a lot going for young people—they’re trying to lure talent so it’s worth taking advantage of that.
Likewise, don’t let fear of experiencing something new hold you back from a career opportunity and a mind-opening experience. There are hundreds of ways to keep in touch with family and friends (in some ways there are too many). And if it’s a cold climate you worry about, there are these things called coats that work rather well.
Leaving a big city could be exactly what someone needs. Many young singles find it nearly impossible to meet a like-minded life partner in a city—it’s strange that the more people that live in one area, the lonelier one can feel. And it’s difficult to become fully immersed in a community if you’re in high-rises all day. There’s something to be said for getting out of the concrete jungle and choosing a place where you can make a difference—where your skills are unique and appreciated. Think of the laws of supply and demand—in a city, there are thousands of people with similar skills and experiences, so the competition for the great new jobs is fierce. Why not go somewhere else and shine?
If I were starting over, I’d head to a place like North Dakota, where there’s an energy boom and a 3.5 percent unemployment rate, the lowest in the nation. That doesn’t mean you have to be in the energy business—people living and working there need a lot of things and have money to spend. It’s a great place to open a restaurant or a fitness club, take a risk on real estate development, or teach school because the state has money to invest more in education than other states.
North Dakota is the Wild West with Wi-Fi. Regulations aren’t strangling people there (yet). People have more disposable income there than in other states, which they can save or use to buy something they’ve always wanted, like a Corvette (automobile dealers are selling a lot of cars up there!). And the schools are thriving—it’s a great place for young families to start out. You never know where your career will take you, so why not take a chance on a place where you’re more likely to succeed?
And remember this if you’re worried about making a move: If everything falls apart, and you just can’t stand to be away from your hometown or the exciting city that you love, the good news is that you have a great option—you can always return. As the old saying goes, “Home is where they have to take you back.”
IT’S OKAY TO LEAVE A BIG DOG EMPLOYER, TOO
Being willing to move applies to leaving your employer to pursue new opportunities, too. This is especially true of companies or organizations considered the gold standard in their industry, whether in finance, media, technology, publishing, nonprofits, or government. When you work for the best, it’s sometimes very difficult to leave it behind because you worry that nowhere will ever measure up.
This was certainly true at the White House. Almost everyone in politics wants to work in the West Wing someday, which means the White House gets the pick of the very top performers. However, for younger or less experienced staff, breaking into the White House was tough and moving up within the White House could take a long time because few people left the top jobs.
My advice to those people was that they consider leaving the White House to take on more responsibility and gain more experience somewhere else—on Capitol Hill or at one of the federal agencies. That way they could get some experience relevant and useful to the White House and possibly return at a later date.
Emily Schillinger did just that—she started answering phones in Vice President Cheney’s office but she had higher aspirations. Jeanie Mamo (a friend who ran the Office of Media Affairs) and I told her she needed to go work on Capitol Hill, where someone young like her could be hired as a House press secretary, get some on-the-record experience, and learn more about the legislative process.
Well, she took our advice, and then two years later, when I needed to hire an assistant press secretary in the White House, Emily came to mind because she had network
ed and kept in touch with me. All of a sudden, she was working in the White House press office with us and then went on to run communications for a United States Senator. Not too shabby!
GET OUT OF TOWN
Now let’s say you don’t need to move—you’re in a city or town you love, the career opportunities are good, and you’re likely to meet a guy or gal and fall in love. If you’re not going to move, then you have to get out and travel a bit, to see some of this country, even parts of the world. Nothing opens up the mind like visiting another place. Seeing new things gives you a lot more to talk about, which can also be useful for networking. Stories about your travels can help you break the ice at awkward meetings and make a connection with someone if you can say, “Oh, you’re from Flagstaff? I went through there on a road trip once.…” That makes for a great conversation starter.
If money is tight, go for a road trip until you’re able to fly somewhere. And make it fun—come up with themes for lifetime travel goals, like visiting all of the national parks or Presidential libraries, finding the best BBQ, or going to the hometown of your favorite author.
FEED YOUR BRAIN
When we started Minute Mentoring, almost every mentor would suggest that a young woman should read more. That’s pretty bland and standard advice, so we asked them to be specific in their recommendations. What would they suggest a young person read? And why did they think it was important?