A guide for a lifetime of work. Albert Triola publishes How to Succeed in a Multinational (Management 2000), a review of tricks, tips and secrets to take advantage of your professional career from the first steps as a junior to the jump to manager and leader of large teams.
Lessons that he affirms are useful for everyone and that can be applied beyond large international firms. Because Triola approaches the work reality with a human vision: he knows that today having time for family or leisure can take precedence over climbing the organizational chart or earning more money. Putting in more hours doesn't have to make you better. And that factors such as the humility or happiness of the workers are essential.
The book is largely a review of his experiences, from when he entered the professional world upon graduation to his current position. Today he is general director of Oracle Spain and senior vice president of Support Renewal Sales in the Europe, Middle East and Africa region. Between both positions he leads thousands of people.
Succeed in a multinational. Why only a multinational?
I have been working in one for 33 years, my experiences and experiences are associated with that. But they can be used for any profile, from any sector and country. The starting point of your career is to define what trip you want to take, what really motivates you and what makes you think that you are in the best place, learning and growing. Whether it is in a multinational, a startup or an SME depends on the person's vocation.
You talk about defining the journey, having a purpose. Many people aim to take the place of their boss.
My father started working in a company and retired in the same company, in the same job. These trips no longer exist. Today everything goes very fast and it is not correct to aspire to occupy your boss's position. I try to recommend not looking for very concrete and specific goals, that position can disappear, organizations change a lot today. In the end it can generate frustration, stress and that is the least advisable.
So what is there to do?
Better to think about what skills you have and what you need to improve, and over time it will take you to one place or another. Success is where ambition meets opportunity. The opportunity will arise when it arises, it may be replacing your boss, changing roles or the project you have always dreamed of. You can control the development of your skills, but you cannot control the future, what opportunities arise. So you develop your skills, preparing yourself for an uncertain and very changing future.
If that opportunity takes a while to arrive, you can end up desperate and burned.
Technologies and organizations are very dynamic, they generate new opportunities and others disappear. Perhaps at a faster pace than we imagine: in the first industrial revolution, inventions took up to 100 years to impact the entire society at a global level. Today ChatGPT is released and in a month it is on the covers of all the media.
And if you are not clear about that, if you try to assume that you are good, comfortable and that your position will last a lifetime, it is a mistake. That's why curiosity must always accompany you. You have to learn every day. It doesn't matter how much you dedicate to it, but you do have to have the rhythm of reading and learning daily. This will help you reflect, question yourself, and have constructive criticism about what you are doing and where the next opportunities may be. If you are in a place and you are burned out it is very difficult to continue. At that moment you have to start thinking about what's next and address it with the tools you have developed.
You should also promote diverse networking. Build a network of very different people, from different sectors, because that will open up opportunities that perhaps you had not imagined before.
Regarding curiosity, you propose continuous recycling. Uninterrupted learning. You make the simile of a software, updating itself every 90 days.
In my calendar I have come to have an hour reserved for me each day. With Albert Triola. I need my time to read, study every day, if I don't I will be left behind and my employees and I need to be as updated as possible. Each one will have to define their deadline, if they want to do it every 90 days, if they want to do it every day, if they want to do it... Nobody is going to think about leaving you an hour free to study, that is not going to happen: or it is you the one who decides and you reserve some time for yourself or I can guarantee you that it is not going to happen.
You recommend doing 5 things a day at work. Focus only on them…
I have met people who told me that I had a schedule that flowed. They get up and say “let's see what the day has in store for me”, they let themselves go. Others who make to-do lists, without a date. When you see the list only growing, you get frustrated. What you have to do is make things happen. It can be 5, it can be 8, but if you set things that have to happen that day, you make sure that they happen. If you can do more later, you do more, but this way you get less frustrated and you don't have as much stress. You see that you achieve things.
From 5 to 5… You talk about trying to change roles or jobs every 5 years.
When you take on a new responsibility, project or position, which you have not had control of before, you feel vulnerability. For having assumed a responsibility that you do not control or for which you have experience. It is normal. It's time to discover what you can contribute and how. That accelerates your growth, you explore new skills.
Each change means new learning, you will be able to interact with unknown people, everyone will give you new ideas, new ways of working, new tools. Even if you change sectors. All of this helps to develop what I call power skills: learning to learn, emotional intelligence, knowing how to tell stories, listening... They will help you be more flexible and adapt to opportunities that may arise.
If they offer me something that I don't feel prepared for, what do I say?
First say yes, then you'll see what you've gotten yourself into. Opportunities arise when they arise. If you don't see yourself capable, you are not the person who has to reflect on the decision, because there are others who have decided that you are capable, so you better think about what you are going to do in that new responsibility.
The vulnerability that is generated should activate you, discover what you can contribute. New jobs, new challenges, new functions, new skills... They are opportunities and the only thing they are going to do is help you in that growth. It is not about seeking growth just because, but because the sectors and markets demand it, they evolve a lot.
What if I'm stuck with a bad boss or in a bad company?
If a boss doesn't help you grow, you're not in the right company. We've all had a moment of having a boss we don't like. In my case, when I wasn't having a good time, I assumed that it was going to be temporary. That would have a beginning and an end. I learned many things from that boss that I didn't like, I thought that if I was ever the boss, I didn't have to do what he did.
Someone has told me “I have a boss that I don't like”, “I have a boss that gives me a hard time”, “I've been in the hospital for two weeks”… In those conditions you think about your next step. There are enough opportunities in the market, if you are curious you can take advantage of many of them. We must encourage those who do not feel comfortable, who cannot take it anymore, to change, really. We dedicate many hours to work, even more than to family, so it has to be something that motivates.
Precisely for some, not everything is work and earning more money. Time and family are prioritized. It seems to be getting worse. Is it a correct view? Because it clashes with this growth within the company.
One thing does not remove the other. The important thing is to grow in the skills that will make you stronger for your journey. I find more and more young people who highly prioritize the company's values or their social activities. You have to decide how you want your trip to be, without going to extreme detail. “I want to be CEO of a technology company.” No, if you define it that way you have it complicated. You have to look more for values, elements that fulfill you. It may be what you have defined: success for you is happiness, not becoming a top manager in I don't know what position. A painter came to our house recently and he was super happy painting the house. He would send his wife photos of him being proud of him. She fills him with that a lot and for him that was happiness, don't talk to her about developing skills in the world of technology because she didn't care.
But more than happy, everyone I know talks about stress, overwhelm...
Stress is unfulfilled things, it is due to how you structure your day to day. You have to be very clear about the things you have to do, the 5 that we mentioned before, save points in the agenda for those things. For unforeseen events, look for spaces, but also dedicate some time to yourself, to your reflection. It could be meditating, playing sports, a hobby, reading a book... At the time I gave up the guitar and sports and I still curse it. I'm getting it back, help. You must have your work world very structured and look for those things that make you disconnect.
Maybe we make the mistake of managing our lives around work and it should be just another part and that's it.
People have a very well-structured work schedule from Monday to Friday. But… have you planned your weekend? In life you have to complete things that you would like to do. Think of three things you would most like to do and move to achieve them. As if it were a trip to see the northern lights, it took me 20 years to get it... But they are there.
Today the debate is about working fewer hours. It is necessary?
It is important to see the time based on the type of work. The concept of hours can be fluid if you work on what you enjoy. Try to find that what is relevant is not that you drop your pen at 5, but that working makes you happy.
More than hours, what is relevant today is being able to manage by objectives. If you have some objectives and you are able to deliver them with fewer hours, you can dedicate the rest to whatever you want. We still do not have that culture of management by objectives, with assigned tasks. Perhaps in the world of multinationals it is more deeply rooted. The debate should be more on productivity, on being able to set and meet objectives.
