Finding Alternatives to the 9-to-5 Work Routine
Rutgers professor shows people how to 'get a life, not a job.'
By John Chadwick

Paula Caligiuri, a Rutgers professor, is also a renowned career counselor who has a new approach to attaining job security.

In the fall of 2008, with the nation’s financial crisis worsening, Paula Caligiuri began hearing from stunned friends and relatives. Some had lost their jobs. Others knew someone who was laid off.

“They were asking: ‘Paula, what just happened?’ ’’recalled Caligiuri, a professor of human resource management at Rutgers’ School of Management and Labor Relations. “I knew exactly what was happening. Companies were becoming more surgical about the positions they were keeping and those that could be replaced with contingent workers.”

Caligiuri was worried about her friends, and understood their urgent need to regain their jobs or seek similar positions with other employers. But she also saw that the rules of the game had been irrevocably changed. The traditional compact between employer and employee – the foundation for economic prosperity in mid-20th century America - had eroded. A single, conventional career at a company was no longer a guarantee of long-term economic security.

Caligiuri’s understanding of the shifting currents in the American economy fueled her acclaimed new book, Get a Life, Not a Job, which was published in 2010 and provides what she calls a “radically new approach” to finding meaningful work and job security. Rather than telling readers how to ace the job interview or craft the killer resume, Caligiuri encourages them to become activists in reshaping their working life by developing creative alternatives that complement their interests and lifestyle while generating income.

“I use the metaphor of an investment strategy,” Caligiuri said. “You would never take your money and put it all in one high risk fund. So you shouldn’t invest your skill set into one career proposition.”

The book focuses on the need to create “multiple career acts” - anything from starting a side business to tapping a potentially lucrative hobby, to returning to college for an advanced degree. Career acts, Caligiuri says, aren’t necessarily second jobs. They’re alternatives culled from people’s own particular interests and talents, and carry the potential to generate income and reduce dependence on company jobs that could very well vanish.

Her overall aim is to provide readers with a step-by-step method for “owning” their career and negotiating the new normal.

“I still hear a lot of people say they want security and so they’re looking for a traditional job with an employer, which makes sense, because it comes with benefits and a guaranteed paycheck,” Caligiuri said. “What concerns me, however, is that once they get the job, they become incredibly passive about their career. People are trained to believe that once they land the job that’s it. But that’s not reality anymore.”

Writing for Forbes, the journalist and career expert Kerry Hannon included Get a Life on her list of “10 Great Books for Career Changers.”

The book tells the stories of many who developed multiple career acts: A nonprofit professional who does grant writing on the side; an IT worker who started a business designing websites; a former teacher who tutored special needs students and then started an additional sideline of training tutors.

A career act doesn’t have to be entrepreneurial in the traditional sense. Caligiuri knows a lawyer who also works as a drummer. “He’s booked for a year out,” she said.

But developing career acts is a challenge that requires time, self-awareness, planning and frequent reassessment, Caligiuri said. And there is no one sure way to accomplish it. For some, it may begin with volunteer work. Others may leverage a particular talent or hobby. Still others might make use of “passive income” such as owning rental properties.

Caligiuri has developed her own career acts, adding career counseling, writing books, and guest lecturing to her main act as a professor at Rutgers.

“The truth is I have no idea how many hours per week I ‘work’ because I have crafted my career acts, over time, to include the activities I enjoy,” she wrote in the book’s opening chapter.

She recently added a new one – providing her expertise on CNN. Caligiuri appears every other Sunday on a segment titled “Reclaim Your Career.”

“It is such an honor to be asked to speak to a broader audience to motivate them to own their career,” she said. “If I can offer a piece of advice that helps then I am thrilled.”

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