The Importance of Finding and Creating Demand

In the year 2000 I needed computer programmers in our company more than anything. At the time, however, it was exceedingly difficult to find a good computer programmer. I went through a lot of tough times trying to hire and keep computer programmers. Computer programmers seemed to have their pick of jobs and they would switch employers every few months, as they were offered better and better jobs, more stock options and other employee perks. One day I hired a programmer and he immediately started working on an important project that I had. He worked for a few hours and then asked me to order him a pizza. He ate the pizza, and afterwards he worked for about 20 minutes and then came into my office. “This project is not that interesting,” he said. “I think I am going to just go back to my old job.” As hard as this may be to believe now, a decent programmer could easily go back to a job he or she had quit back then. The reason was that there was just a huge demand for programmers. Programmers could easily move between jobs, go back to an old job they quit, or find a new job–all in a matter of a few hours. The job market for programmers in California at the time was absolutely nuts. Programmers would show up to interviews with an arrogance, and without a care in the world because they knew that they were in control and that the hiring companies really needed them; if they could do the job they hardly even needed a résumé. By the year 2001, the market had turned and programmers were barely in demand at all. There were almost no programming jobs available anywhere. It seemed as if, just as quickly as the demand for programmers had arrived, it was gone. Programming résumés started getting much more polished, and prospective employees were humbled. Suddenly programmers started showing up to interviews in suits and ties, talking about what sort of value they could offer. As the 2001 recession grew on, I started getting cold calls from small programming outfits trying to tell me they could offer this or that service to help our business. Programmers came into interviews with suggestions and ideas about what they could do to help the company. In the job market and in life, if we are not in demand we need to either (1) find the demand, or (2) create the demand for whatever it is that we offer. This is the nature of looking for a job and planning to succeed at everything we do. In order to have the job you want, or the life you want, you need to either find the demand or create a demand for what you are doing or selling. Find the Demand. When I was in college I had a professor who was grossly overweight. She taught an anthropology course about Africa. She had spent most of her career traveling back and forth to Africa while writing and teaching about it at the University of Chicago. In the rural area of Africa where she had worked and lived, the characteristic that was considered more attractive above all others was to be overweight. Women drank cream and sweetened milk all day in order to be and look as obese as possible. Carrying extra weight was a sign of wealth and the ability to endure famines that stalked the areas; therefore, someone who could be obese while others were starving was considered to be very, very attractive. The woman told our class that she was considered incredibly beautiful in the part of Africa where she worked. “If I spent all my time in the United States I would probably do everything I could to be thin,” she told our class. When I heard this and later read various anthropology articles about this subject, I found it increasingly fascinating. Here this woman was in demand and was even sought out at least partially due to her attractiveness in one part of the world due to being obese, whereas she did not nearly receive this sort of attention in the United States. This is how it is with many of our careers. We have goods or [Read more]