How I came to be recruited without an organizational background
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I am taking a break from working on my consulting profile. Submitting my profile will mean having an agent for remote work. I was invited to do so as an outcome of publishing on my own as an unknown. In corporate speak, I have been recruited.
I am now creating my portal to the remote working community and scaling into the larger world where I have traditionally found greater acceptance. I have not the conventional background but the movers and shakers are not necessarily looking for conventional. All you have to do is watch a few TV series to know that!
Right now I am watching the latest season of Billions. I remember it being more interesting than it is this season. The characters seem to have become more wooden or maybe they always were but it didn’t bother me before. It is useful to watch at this particular juncture because the show probably has a lot right about corporate culture. The characters are all super talented perfect people who always listen to and take in one another’s ideas even if they are at war with each other. Every communication is boiled down to pristine insights, No human meandering, This could actually be depicting a community of very advanced robots. Perhaps the show is building up to a surprise ending.
The rhythm of the show should translate terribly into subtitles. One can get worn out quickly reading the speeches delivered at warp speed. None the less the ideas are interesting, even if the world is portrayed as too perfect. Its the ego of corporate America let lose on the script with corporate culture’s propensity to publish ideal behavior patterns and a God-like image of themselves. Back in the eighties they were forth right about it. They just called themselves the “Masters of the Universe!” easy peasy, as simple as pie, make you rich in the blink of an eye!
Changing the channel back to the real world, internal quanta fluctuates from focusing in to withdrawing away from the project at hand. That is normal but not at such high frequency. Publishing a remote work profile can be a very productive move but it also has to be right. I want to make a lot of money but I want to do so while using my energy in the most appropriate form for my life. I am the brand. That is the mantra. Everyone who gets here probably knows its a lonely place to be, but also an inspiring place and so the light flickers in and out like a firefly. The signals will tell when it is right. At this moment, “visualizing the life you want to live” makes more sense than it ever has before. This is an exciting time to be alive!
The function the platform will handle is similar to what the function Orcid performs for the research community. In a global community there needs to be a way to establish trust, which is the essential roll played by the platform.
I am an independent researcher, working outside the established system but I have a Orcid ID because I reviewed an economic development paper at the request of Palgrave Communications, now called Humanities and Social Sciences Communications, a subsidiary of Nature.com. I did not get paid, The organization did not offer and I did not ask. I had no experience in review writing but in my experience it is very difficult for an independent researcher to establish communication with organizations. My instinct was to just go with the flow and review the paper, no questions asked. Just do it. The most valued end result for me, today, is I have an Orcid ID, which is not easy to get in a system that seems to be a closed circle in which gaining entry into the circle requires already being there.
From what I have been able to discover, one cannot approach this circle as an unknown, but Humanities and Social Sciences Communications approached me as an unknown, shortly after I published this story in which I independently reviewed three research papers on the Bronze Age,
If I had not written a review of the economic development paper for Humanities and Social Sciences Communications, and perhaps if my recommendation had not been acted upon, I would not have an official Orcid researcher’s ID, but to submit my own work on Orcid, I have to do so through a trusted organization. Humanities and Social Sciences Communications is the only organization on my list of trusted organizations. I have found that research organizations in my own State, Maine, where most of my research is focused, are also a closed circle and do not respond to correspondences. I wonder if I were to include my Orcid ID in my email signature, they would respond differently- this I have not tried as it is only occurring to me as I speak that an Orcid ID is somewhat like an entry key badge.
After I submitted my review to Humanities and Social Sciences Communications, it was accepted and I am now a “preferred source”, and so I thought I would submit a work for peer review to Humanities and Social Sciences Communications but soon discovered that the fee for submitting a paper is very high, much more than I can afford and so I dropped the idea at the time.
However today I realize that having a work of my own posted on Orcid would be a very good reference for the profile I am currently composing. Its never too late to ask, and there is nothing to lose in doing so and so I did- as in, How about accepting my paper for review without charging me in return for my reviewing a paper without charging you? The auto response says that no one is in the office until January 4, 2021.
I am fortunate that a private company has recruited me for their team. There are illustrious and interesting people writing for the platform and I am honored to be included in such a diverse group coming from the high halls of the corporate world to independent unknowns such as myself. The diversity of the mix speaks for itself.
I hope this helps some others who may find themselves dealing with a similar situation. This is an era when we carve our own paths. Interesting times are upon us.
Published in Medium’s An Idea (by Ingenious Piece) Dec 29 , 2020