on this episode
A lot of people feel stuck in their jobs. Trying to break out can seem difficult or impossible (spoiler alert – it’s not actually impossible).
Adam Bloom felt stuck from the very beginning, even as he was about to graduate law school, and entered the workforce as the 2008 recession was starting. The longer he stayed a lawyer, the more he felt stuck. After several attempts to leave, he finally learned how to set himself up to pivot into what he really wanted to be doing.
What you’ll learn
- How Adam attempted to escape his legal career several times before making it out
- The importance of of knowing your strengths so that you aren’t stuck in the wrong career wasting years of your life
- How to overcome setbacks when you’re trying to get to your dream career
- Why taking chances on yourself can lead to growth and career happiness
Success Stories
It was extremely valuable for me, for a lot of reasons! Just getting ready to make a shift to some sort of understanding what my strengths are, and just really how to bring those to the table and bring those to the forefront in my work and find work situations that are satisfying that hit on those strengths. I owe that largely to our coaching sessions!
Rob Abilez, Chief Compliance Officer & Corporate Counsel, United States/Canada
Get the Full Backstory
as I was diving into the bootcamp at Happen To Your Career, and I was really trying to think broadly, I had this moment of thinking, "Okay, should I even should I be a lawyer? What should I do?" so I worked with Happen To Your Career really started trying to dig deep and lay a foundation… it was helpful to have Lisa through the interviewing process, and all the little events like "oh, someone responded like this, how should I respond?" How should I deal with all the steps along the way? I also had a tendency to form myself into what I thought they were looking for and Lisa helped me be who I actually am in the interviews.
Rebecca Maddox, Attorney, United States/Canada
Get the Full Backstory
“It’s hard to find something that fits, that’s why so many people change careers. When I finally understood my strengths and how I could apply them it all made sense. It just made it easier to see what types of jobs and roles would fit me. In my new career I get to do the marketing that I love with a company I’m excited about.”
Kirby Verceles, Sales & Marketing Director
Get the Full Backstory
Scott has been a tremendous help in bringing focus to my business. Scott enlightened my path towards concentrating on my strengths and doing what I love. I recommend Scott Anthony Barlow to anyone who wants clarity about what they should be doing, and the next step to make your business successful.
Jody Maberry, Began Copywriting & Marketing Business, United States/Canada
Get the Full Backstory
Adam Bloom 00:01
And so I left there and finally was like, I want to try some different stuff. But I was applying for jobs. And by that point I've been practicing for six, seven years. And when you're that far into a legal career, nobody wants to let you try new stuff. They want to hire you for the stuff that you know how to do.
Introduction 00:20
This is the Happen To Your Career podcast, with Scott Anthony Barlow. We help you stop doing work that doesn't fit you, figure out what does and make it happen. We help you define the work that's unapologetically you, and then go get it. If you're ready to make a change, keep listening. Here's Scott. Here's Scott. Here's Scott.
Scott Anthony Barlow 00:44
Usually, when people find this podcast, they feel stuck in their careers. Sometimes, it even feels like being in jail.
Adam Bloom 00:52
And I remember the first day they were walking us around and they said they were giving us our offices. And they showed me my office. And I looked in there and I was like, "Oh, no, no. Something is, you know, I'm not going in there." You know, it was literally like the scene in the movie where the guy's been sent to jail, and he's walking down the long hallway carrying his blankets, right? And he has to go like, "here's your cell." That's how I felt where I was just like, great, you know, lock me in this box, why don't you.
Scott Anthony Barlow 01:21
That's Adam Bloom. Adam finished law school, he entered the workforce, right as the 2008 recession was starting, perfect time, right. Just like Han Solo, he had a bad feeling about it from the beginning. But with the recession starting, he figured he could stick it out until things turned around. Only they didn't. So then later on, he felt pigeonholed not just in law, but even specific areas of practice. He attempted to leave several times trying to figure out how to make his excitement for writing into a career. But he kept hitting wall after wall after wall after wall. Eventually, we got to meet him. And he learned his signature strengths. He learned how to pivot into what he really wanted to be doing. Here, let me actually read you something that you wrote, almost a year ago, not quite a year ago, just maybe 10 days, 11 days, short of a year ago, you wrote in response to "Hey, why do you want to make a career change?" And you said, "I've never enjoyed practicing law. I love writing, especially screenwriting, I would love to transition out of law." And you also...
Adam Bloom 02:33
It's true then, and it's true now.
Scott Anthony Barlow 02:34
Yeah. So first of all, congratulations. Because like almost exactly a year later, guess what, you're out and your a week and a half into the new role here. And clearly, this is a much better fit. And I love the comment you made earlier about, you said something to the effect of, you know, "It feels like I have always been a quick learner. And I've always had that capacity for learning. But now that I'm actually doing something that I want to be doing, it's like taking off the ankle weights, and you can just run with it."
Adam Bloom 03:02
Yeah, absolutely. I think, you know, it's an interesting bit of timing for me. And we can do the short version, or the medium version, or the long version of my legal career. But I graduated law school in 2008. So I remember I've always thought back on the first day of work that I had, where I got hired by one of the largest law firms in the world called Jones Day in New York. And I was working in their New York office right in midtown Manhattan. And, you know, my dad, who was an attorney took me shopping, and we bought a couple of suits. And I put one on and I take the train to Grand Central. And I remember running up the stairs to get out of Grand Central onto the sidewalk, like, "here we go first day", and I arrived at work, and everyone was like, "Welcome. Here's the deal, the economy is collapsing. A lot of our big clients have gone bankrupt, we don't really have any work for you. We don't know what's going to happen to the firm, you know, try to hold on for dear life." And so immediately, things kind of went sideways where the opportunities that I thought I was going to have to explore options within the legal profession, or even explore options outside of the legal profession. Because the truth is that, I remember having conversations with friends in law school where we were like, "This seems like it's going to be completely miserable. What is your exit strategy for this?"And we were talking about, "I'm going to invest in real estate. I'm going to do this, I'm going to do that." We were already plotting and scheming how we were going to get out of being lawyers before we graduated. And one of the reasons that I went to New York was because in my mind, I always thought of New York as being the place in America that had the most opportunity per square foot that it's like, "I don't know what I want to do next. I've always tried to be open minded and sort of follow my nose and take opportunities as they come. So I'm going to go to New York, I'm going to have a little money in my pocket. I'm going to know people. I'm going to meet people and something will come up." Well that doesn't really happen when you're in the midst of one of the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression. So everything shifted from, you know, wide open horizons and, like, Mary Tyler Moore sitting around in the middle of the street and throwing your hat in the air to like, just try not to starve to death. Can we do that? How about we can pay the rent and eat food? Let's do that. And so it became a situation where there weren't really options to do anything in terms of exploring career alternatives inside or outside of the legal profession. And I got basically forced down a path of becoming a corporate litigator, and then tried litigation a number of different areas and just never really found a place in it that felt worthwhile.
Scott Anthony Barlow 05:30
What do you mean when you say felt worthwhile? What does that mean for you?
Adam Bloom 05:34
You know, it's interesting, I remember when I did orientation, my first year of law school was at University of Arizona, and then I transferred to UCLA where I graduated, but there was a speaker at orientation in Arizona, who gave this very impassioned speech about how being a lawyer was like being a samurai. And he said that one of his favorite feelings was to walk into a courtroom and know that everyone in the courtroom was against him. And he said, "And you take out your sword, and you just weighed in, you know, and you're just going to go and fight and come out with having persuaded everybody to be on your side." And I've worked in politics. And, you know, I kind of, I liked the idea of law as almost a fighting style, where it's like, "I don't want to get in a fight with fists, or knives or guns, I want to get in a fight with words and ideas." That's the kind of battle that I want to have. And that's what I want to do with my career. And I want to find, so I kind of felt like, you know, like Ronin, I was the wandering Samurai, I was looking for the fight that was worth having, you know. I can talk. I can write. I can think. I can strategize, who can I do this for that would feel satisfying would be worth my time. And I swear to you, in 12 years, I don't think I ever found it. And the truth was that the process of litigation was just not interesting to me. It was tedious and boring. And you know, mostly what I found was that the clients who could pay were mostly not worthwhile, and the clients who were worthwhile couldn't pay. And so if you want to have those two sides of feeling like your work is satisfying and having a comfortable standard of living within the legal profession, it's very, very hard. And the other thing that just fundamentally changed in the US economy, like the world just turned, was going into that 2008 recession. I saw the world one way and coming out of it, the world was just different. I mean, I was wrong. I had job offers with law firms in San Francisco, and I turned them down to go to New York, because I said "No, there's more opportunity in New York. New York will be more exciting" wrong. When that dust settled on that 2008 recession, the world revolved around San Francisco, it was Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Netflix, and Google, the Fang stocks, those were the people who were defining the future, running the economy, that's where it was at. And I had simply missed the boat. And it just fundamentally shifted the way I thought about where I wanted to be and what I wanted to do. You know, as I say, I just never found a home in the legal profession that felt like that combination of the things that you talk about, that you and I have spoken about at length. People who share your values, people who treat you in a way that, you know, you want to be treated, that you enjoy working with, who you enjoy personally, at least to some degree, so that you can spend a lot of time around them, and work that feels meaningful and feels like a fit, and also allows you to support yourself in a lifestyle that meets your needs and your wants, frankly, and I just never found that combination of factors in legal profession. And increasingly felt ridiculous where, you know, as a lawyer, you're working insanely hard on very complicated issues and making just a lot less money than people who are working much less hard on less complicated things that look like a lot more fun. And at some point, I think for me, I woke up and I said, you know, "I don't want to be the lawyer. I want to be the client. I'm tired of helping other people with their stupid ideas. I want to work on my stupid ideas."
Scott Anthony Barlow 08:51
Let me jump in here. You know what's really interesting here, a lot of different things. But one in particular, that orientation that you were talking about where he's describing the role that he has, and looking at it as the Samurai, like, clearly law was right for that person, or at least it sounds like, based on how he's describing it where that was... even though you wanted to be able to, you know, have that war or have that battle, or have that fight with words and being able to do it in that way, like clearly law was not right for you. But I think what's so interesting there is it's so much about finding what is right. And, I know from chatting with you, and just to give a little bit of context here, this isn't something that happens all the time. But Adam and I got the opportunity to do a little bit of work together. Because as you were getting into writing, I know I'm jumping ahead in your story here, part of your experiments were to take on different types of writing and we got to do a couple of projects together, which were super fun, and it allowed me to get to know you and your story a whole bunch more. And one of the things I remember chatting with you about is there were a couple really significant low points in your law career. So I'm wondering if you can describe some of those to us? And then what caused you to decide to make the final decision to transition out of law in one way or another?
Adam Bloom 10:09
Yeah. I mean, as I said, you know, well, first of all, yeah, I thought, I guess to say thank you. I mean, the opportunities that we had to work together were really helpful to me and the career change, both from the perspective of having work and writing work to do that was interesting and had some money coming in. And also, frankly, was extra free education for me and your, sort of, philosophy of career change and, sort of, a philosophy of life overall. Because I think the thing that I came to grasp more and more was this sort of holistic approach to... yeah, you need a good job. But the idea that your job is over here and your life is over there is silly. The two are intertwined in a way that is, you know, completely inextricable, and so you need to think, not just your ideal job, but your ideal life, and how does one fit into the other. And so I felt like, I got a lot of free career coaching out of doing that writing work. So that was extra fun for me. But yeah, I mean, low points in my legal career, you know, I remember starting when you are in law school, the way you get kind of brought into the profession is you get a summer job, and I took a summer job and you interview for them. It's a very intense interview process. You have to do it during the school year while you're studying. And you know, they do call back interviews, you have to travel for the interviews often and, you know, it's very difficult to get one of these jobs, and then you get one. And I remember the first day they were walking us around and they said they were giving us our offices. And they showed me my office. And I looked in there and I was like, "Oh, no, no. Something is, you know, I'm not going in there." You know, it was literally like the scene in the movie where the guy's been sent to jail, and he's walking down the long hallway carrying his blankets, right? And he has to go like, "here's your cell." That's how I felt where I was just like, great, you know, lock me in this box, why don't you. So immediately, it was kind of there were pretty clear signals that this was not going to be a long term fit for me. And then, you know, as I said, I mean, the experience at Jones Day was very difficult, because we were in the middle of a recession. And the firm, you know, was sort of operated on the idea that they always have more work than they could possibly handle, which when the world is not ending is true. But when the economy is collapsing, it requires a different level of planning and management acumen, which frankly, they did not have. And I hung on there for two, almost three years. And then just one day, out of the blue, got a call from the partner who ran my practice group, and he said, you know, "We're gonna have to let you go, you're going to have to look for something else." And I, you know, I asked him "why". And he said, "Well, the truth is that the quality of your work here is just not up to our standards here at Jones Day", which was nonsense, because, you know, I had had an annual review with him, not two months earlier, where he had told me verbatim, "You're a hard worker, and you do good work." Two months later, my work is not up to snuff. So it was ridiculous. It was just a cover for the fact that they had too many lawyers and not enough work, and the economy was not repairing. And so I had to go. So they gave me that notice, right in like October or November, which is the worst time to be looking for a job because it's the holidays. So nobody's thinking about hiring, everybody's thinking about trying to survive to the end of the year, and then getting to stop for a couple of weeks. So it put me in this, you know, in this awkward spot of trying to find a new job when no one was hiring. It not... let stand... I mean, on top of the fact that it was this terrible deep recession. So I ended up at the New York City Law Department, which is basically the city's law firm. They have lawyers who represent the city in various capacities, and I was hired to defend the city and civil rights lawsuits. So it was basically people who accused the police of using excessive force or corrections officers of using excessive force, they would sue the city and I would defend those lawsuits. And truthfully, they ran the gamut. There were some suits where we were wrong. The city was wrong. The cops had had misbehave, the corrections officers misbehaved. And we would look at that and say, "Yeah, we were wrong here." And we would settle, we would pay out. And there were some cases where, you know, people would come in, and the lawsuit would say... "so and so was standing on the corner of this street, and that street minding his own business, when the police grabbed him for no reason, threw him against the wall, handcuffed and slammed his head into the hood. The handcuffs were too tight. They drove him around for two hours before they even took him to the station." Say, "Oh, my god." and I would talk to the arresting officer and say, "What happened here?" They'd say, "The guy's drug dealer. He deals drugs on that corner. You know, we've arrested him dealing drugs in that exact corner. 12 different times." So sometimes we were right. Sometimes they were right. But the reason I had taken the job was because after the experience of doing corporate litigation at Jones Day, I wanted to try and find something that felt more meaningful. And when you're studying law, the cliche almost is that there's nothing more meaningful or socially beneficial than fighting for people's civil rights. So I say great, let me try and find a way into that world. You know, if I get a job on the defense side, then maybe I can pivot and to a job on the plaintiff side. Well, what turns out to be is that a civil rights plaintiff's attorney is pretty much like any other plaintiff's attorney, they have to keep the lights on, you know, somebody's got to pay for the suits and the haircuts and the office and the Secretary and the Mercedes and the apartment and the kids private school. And in order to do that, you have to represent some people who you would probably rather not represent. Some of them deal drugs. Some of them are career criminals. Some of them are innocent people who were attacked by the police. No question, right. Who were wrongfully hurt by the police, but some of them are not. And I just looked at that and was like, "Not a fit for me. You know, this is not going to be the long term solution here." So I moved on from that. And I moved, as I mentioned, graduated from UCLA law, and, you know, had wanted to go back to California. So I moved back to California, got a job with a small law firm. Thinking I've done a big law firm. I've done a public sector law firm. Let's try a small law firm. Well, I stayed there for two years and did not have a great experience. That's the short answer there. I was very bored. I wasn't crazy about the people I was working with. I was not crazy about the work that I was doing. It was just dull all around. And so I left there and finally was like, I want to try some different stuff. But I was applying for jobs. And by that point, I've been practicing for 6, 7 years. And when you're that far into a legal career, nobody wants to let you try new stuff. They want to hire you for the stuff that you know how to do. So it's the quote that I would always mention to you, I think from True Detective that first season when it's Woody Harrelson and Matthew McConaughey chatting about being cops. I think it's Woody Harrelson says, "You got to be careful what you get good at." That was always like the quote over the door for me of my legal career was like, "Yeah, dude, you went down this road. And now this is what you know how to do when the US economy. So bully for you, you know, you can be a corporate litigator. And that's it."
Scott Anthony Barlow 16:43
The Howling of Pigeons, for sure.
Adam Bloom 16:45
That's right, the howling of pigeons. Yes. So I started my own legal practice as a way to say like, well, if no one will give me the opportunity to do what I want to do, then I will create it. So I started a practice where I did some corporate litigation, but I also did entertainment law, and I did start up law, was working with new startups and helping them raise money and onboard employees and, you know, form corporations, form LLCs. And, you know, that was okay, it was better. And I really liked the feeling of independence and being in control of my own destiny. And I enjoyed running my own business, but the legal practice was still legal practice. Now, the interesting thing was at the same time, a few years earlier, actually, when I was in New York, I'd started doing stand up, just as a creative outlet in my spare time. I'd always been interested in it and I just thought I'd give it a try. And, you know, it was the recession and I'd lost the job at Jones Day. And I was like, whatever. I'm at a point now where, you know, I'm willing to take some chances. Let's throw it around a little bit. So I started...
Scott Anthony Barlow 17:40
Let's do this.
Adam Bloom 17:41
Yeah, exactly. Like, literally, what is there to lose. I started doing open mics, and I loved it. I really enjoyed it. It was fun when I got laughs. It was fun when I did not get laughs. It was fun when there was three people in the audience. It was fun when there were 100 people in the audience. I just enjoyed it. And I met someone, in the course of doing that, who was also like, he had a career, he was doing open mics. And he and I were both interested in screenwriting, which was the other thing that I'd taken up. And so I moved to LA and he moved to LA. And we ended up starting a production company together that I ran alongside my legal practice for about five years. And we settled into a niche of making what we called horror content about technology. So we had videos that went viral on YouTube, we got an investment from Snap Inc, through their yellow startup accelerator program, which was a very sort of selective, prestigious program. We had some success there. And it was a lot of fun. And I learned a lot about digital content and filmmaking and running a startup and, you know, really having the experience of not just advising as an attorney, somebody else who's saying, "Look, I think I have an investor, can you help?" But being the guy who has to go out and find the investor, you know, negotiate that deal, get the documents closed, get the money in the door, and then figure out how to grow the company, which was all really fascinating. But you know, as I say, I ran that business for five years. And after five years, we'd had some success, but we hadn't really taken off in the way that I had hoped. So I decided it was time to move on and find what was next. So in terms of low points in my legal career, and trying to leave my legal career, I look at it as there were three sincere attempts that I made to get out of practicing law. It was like I was one of the dinosaurs in Jurassic Park, just trying to find the weak point in the fence. I think the first one was, let's see, in 2014, I left the small firm that I had joined when I moved to LA and before starting my own practice, I thought, you know, "maybe I could get out of law entirely." And I consulted a career coach who, you know, I had one session with and I told her I was interested in screenwriting and she flew into a very red faced rant about how the entertainment business was nasty and people are each other and stab each other in the back. And so whatever I do, I should make sure not to get into that business. And then she sent me on my way. And I was like, "Okay, thanks. I'll put that in a hopper and see what I can do about that."
Adam Bloom 17:41
Yeah, exactly. Super helpful. Thank you. Yeah. So that was that and, you know, but I looked at, could I get into advertising? Could I get into real estate? Could I get into, you know, just casting about for anything like, Please, could I just stop doing this lawyer nonsense and do anything else. And one of the things I ran into was, you know, I was in my mid 30s, and I've been practicing law for a few years. And so people would say, "Well, you're too senior to be junior because you're a lawyer, and you're, you know, older, but you don't have any experience in our industry. So you're too junior to be senior." So I was kind of betwixt in between, in a way where they were like, "we just kind of don't have a place for you, I'm sorry." And so I ended up settling on starting my own practice. So that was attempt number one, abortive attempt number one to get out passing law. Number two was when my startup production company, when we got the investment from snap, they really like put their arm around us and said, "We're very excited about your company, we love the content that you guys make, we're going to help you raise more money, like we're going to put you on a rocket ship and send you to the moon." So I was, like, "Great. Train is leaving the station. Finally, here we go." And what happened was, while we were in that program, the global market for digital media venture backed digital media just collapsed around us, it was almost like, you know, it was perfect. It was like the tribulations of job. As soon as we got the investment, there were a number of very high profile bankruptcies and closures that happened in digital media, there was a company called defy media that had raised 10s of millions of dollars, 70 million, I think from venture capitalists, and just one Friday, they just sent an email to all the employees and said, "The company is over. Please do not come in on Monday, we're done." And so people looked at that and said, "Okay, well, if they can't make it, then probably this idea of like putting 10s of millions of dollars into a content company that just makes content and expecting to get it back somehow, on the back end, it just doesn't work." And that was like there had been a five, six, maybe seven year trend of people making those kinds of investments. And it came to a precipitous halt, right at the moment that my partner and I were going out and saying, "Well, yeah, they didn't make it. But you should really take a look at what we make." And they were like, "Yeah, thanks. No."
Scott Anthony Barlow 20:10
I don't think I knew about that.
Scott Anthony Barlow 22:25
Track record of timing,
Adam Bloom 22:27
Timing. Yes. It has not escaped my attention. I think you and I have talked about it. But, you know, it felt... I mean, I didn't try to dwell on it too much, because it's a little self pitying. But, you know, I graduated law school into the great recession. And then I tried to raise money for a digital media startup, while the digital media market was going into a crater. You know, it was just like, well, what are you going to do? So... But yeah, when...
Scott Anthony Barlow 22:55
I think it's good, though. I think it's good. Because, honestly, I'm not sure that you would have made the type of transitions and this latest transition in the same way, had you not been through that.
Adam Bloom 23:08
That's right. And, you know, that's always the story of your life is like, you know, whatever happens to you for good or for ill, you have to learn from it and you have to integrate in a way and, you know, my mom always likes to say "things happen for a reason." And my thought is, "Yeah, but you have to find the reason." you know, what I mean? Like, you have to make that reason happen. You know, for example, when I got laid off from Jones Day, one of the things and when I sat down and was like, "Okay, how do I, you know, turn this into an opportunity was, well, without the pressure of feeling like I have a major, you know, Corporation looking over my shoulder, I can do whatever I want now. I'm gonna go do stand up." And that was a tremendous experience and something that I loved and, you know, an experience that I'll never forget, that I've gotten away from, but I actually hope to get back to. But, you know, it's things like that, where you have to be able to kind of alchemize those setbacks into new opportunities. And say, the fact that this did not work out has to create a new opportunity somewhere. But the timing issue is especially interesting, because I was really bound and determined that I wanted to be on time for something. And so to feel, you know, as I said, I had first approached the crypto space in 2017, 2018, and so to feel like that wave coming up underneath me in 2020 and 2021 I was like, I get it, you know, like I could be on time for this. I'm a little bit late, at least relative to, you know, people who created these technologies in the like, starting in 2010. But I said I think I'm still early enough that I could get in on this because by and large, most people, even most of my friends, like, I have a brother who's a software engineer and he barely understands anything about crypto, he's just not very interested in the space. He knows a little but he doesn't know what the way that I do. And when I would talk to him about it, he would kind of shrugged me off and be like, "I don't know." So I was like, wow, well, if, you know, if it's still taking this long to sink in, then I could be on time for this. There's an opportunity here to get in, maybe not on the ground floor but like on the first or the second floor, which is close enough, we'll take it. I just felt very keenly that as I studied the technology and learned about what under pinned all of it were, it's really... people look at it, and they're like, so which coin should I buy? How do I make money on this this week? And it's like, now you got to zoom out, pull back and understand, like, the point of this technology is not this coin or that coin, the point is that they are remaking from the ground up the architecture of the internet in a way that is going to make the entire internet world more open, more democratic, and more accessible and take a quantum leap, hopefully, towards the original vision of the internet, which was to create a digital space where any person could realize their potential to do whatever it is that you can come up with to do on the internet; to access information, to access business, to access education, to connect with other people, to learn ideas, to share ideas. I mean, if you want to live in Manhattan, you have to buy an apartment in Manhattan, right? You got to physically go. But short of that, there are so many things you can do on the internet that create opportunities for people that simply did not exist. And you can open a business in Oklahoma out of your garage and have customers all over the world. And it's not even a big deal.
Scott Anthony Barlow 26:18
Or Moses Lake Washington and...
Adam Bloom 26:20
Moses Lake Washington, yes.
Scott Anthony Barlow 26:21
All over the world.
Adam Bloom 26:22
Yeah. And you know, and to connect with them, and to do business with them, and to really take the next step forward in unlocking finance and business away from the sort of large intermediaries, like, the legacy banks who take fees, and you know, and credit card processors who insert themselves in the middle of your business deals and charge fees that they spend on CEO salaries and advertising expense accounts, and why do I have to pay for that? And you know, companies like Google and Facebook who say, "Yeah, we'll give you these products, if you give us all of your personal information. Like everything you've ever done." Well, what if I could get the product without having to give up all of my data? I mean, what if that was a thing? And that is really the promise of blockchain technology and cryptocurrency technology as I see it. And to me, that's fascinating, because I'm old enough to remember when the internet was born. And while I was playing basketball, and talking to my friends in high school on instant messenger, there were people who were literally remaking the world with this technology. And I just sort of let it go by. I wasn't interested in software engineering, I wasn't interested in web design. I didn't get it. I didn't see it. And it all happened sort of while I was focused on other things, because I was 18 or 20. But this time, I was like, I'm not... fool me once, right? Shame on you. Fool me twice, it's time to get on this. That was my attitude approaching the crypto space, was there's a lot of opportunity here and I'm going to find something for myself within this space. This is, I think, going to shape the next 20, 30 years and I want in and so what was interesting was through the process of working with you and working with Mo was really starting to zero in on, number one, this question of, "what do I want?" It's an incredibly vexing question. And I think I often think about the story that you told when we were working on or writing projects together about being an HR person, and having this experience of interviewing people and asking them, "Tell me something that you disliked that you don't want to repeat from your prior job." And they had a laundry list of 50 things that they did not want to happen again, and then saying, "Okay, now tell me something that you affirmatively positively do want from this job that will allow you to achieve your goals of taking this role." And people didn't have an answer. You know, by and large, they knew what they were running from, but they didn't know what they were running to. And I think that for me, there was some of that, it was very easy to wake up in the morning and saying, "I feel unhappy. I feel bored. I feel under compensated, underappreciated and uninterested in my work. I don't want to do this anymore." "Great. What do you want to do instead?" And I was not certain that I knew that answer. And so that is, at least for me, and I think, based on our conversations, you know, and what you've told me about your experience with other clients, I suspect that's the work for a lot of people is figuring out what do you actually want? What is your ideal life? And how does your professional work fit into that? And what does that look like everything from, you know, do you want to work from home? Or do you want to work in an office to what profession, what sector the economy? You know, do you want your own business? Do you want to work for a company? If so, what kind? You know, what size? Nailing down all those things and going through, you know, the puzzle method and then doing the career experiments to say like, "Alright, well, I like writing. Let's try writing. You know, what writing gigs can I get? I like writing. I like creativity. I like producing videos, could I do that for an ad agency?" And you know, I approached that a little bit. I was just sort of throwing it around and seeing what felt good and where people responded to me and where I could find a connection. One of the tools that I took advantage of that, you know, I think you often refer people to was that Gallup StrengthFinder test, which was a very interesting sort of experience. Because, you know, what I took from that was, number one, they said a lot of things that I think I believe to be true where they're like, "You enjoy ideas, you enjoy sort of high level creativity and strategy and writing." And I was like, "Sure, yes." You know, and... but they put... there were a couple of things. They put the word strategist around it, they put the word futurist around it, you know, I was teasing my girlfriend, I was like, "I took this test and they say, I'm a futurist. Lucky you. You know, you're dating a futurist." So I started like, Googling around where I was like, well, that sounds cool. What does a futurist do? It turns out most of the people who are, you know, futurist, like qua futurist where that is their whole title, they basically write books about what they think is going to happen in the next 30 years. Which is okay, but didn't 100% feel like exactly what I wanted to do. But it did get me focused on the fact that I do have an interest in technology, and that I do have an interest in trying to predict trends and see where things are going. And so again, when crypto bubbled up, it kind of checked that box where I was like, "I can see this, this is a high tech futuristic kind of thing that is happening right now that I could conceivably get in on." And so it did help focus me on that opportunity. And also the fact that they had called me out and said like, "You're a strategist." So just when I was looking around, like even searching on LinkedIn, or searching on Google and saying, who's hiring for what, I started throwing the word strategist into my searches, and it opened up, before I've been saying copywriter. I'm writer, I'm a copywriter, what do you need for copywriting? And so I was seeing a list of opportunities for those kinds of roles. But then when I threw strategist into it, I started seeing other roles, and that was very interesting. And the other thing I'll say, that came out of the StrengthsFinder test that I was not expecting was they have a whole section on your weaknesses. And one of the weaknesses that they highlighted for me was, "You don't place a particular emphasis on forming personal relationships or forming relationships at work." And I was like, "how dare you?" You know, but then I thought about it. And I was like, "Look, I've been a lawyer for 12 years, I haven't liked being a lawyer. Most of the people who I met at work were other lawyers. So naturally, I was not terribly excited about going out for drinks with them after work and talking about all the boring crap that we had worked on all day." So yeah, I had I realized neglected that part of just my personal development, my professional development. And I started placing a lot of emphasis, a lot of emphasis on just talking to people, just doing the thing of reaching out to people on LinkedIn, reaching out to people however I could, "Hey, what you're doing seems interesting. Can we chat for 15 minutes?" You know, people who wrote for video game companies. People who, you know, I found a job listing for a position that was called Content Strategist. And I read that and it was like, facepalm, you know, I couldn't believe it. I was like, "Yes, that's an exact description of what I should be doing. I can't believe I didn't think of that." So I applied for that job and ended up not getting it. But I reached out to the guy who ran the company, and he and I ended up chatting. And, you know, there were a lot of things like that. There was just a lot of like, connecting, activating the network, who do I know? Who do they know? What can I talk to them about? Just anything to try and build connections, and it would spark ideas. You know, eventually, what I came to was I wanted to start a company that I pitched for a few months called backer, which was a marketplace to crowdfund movies using NFT's, which is a lot of businessy cryptocurrency jargon, and I won't give the whole pitch. But basically, it was like a version of Kickstarter where you paid with cryptocurrency. And what you got was an NFT, which is a unique sort of digital receipt, a token that proves your ownership of really anything. And in this case, it was going to be a unique piece of artwork that represented an ownership share of a movie. And so I worked on that pitch for a few months and connected with a lot of new people and got a lot of interest in it. But two things became clear, number one, was that it was going to take me a while to get funded. I thought I could do it quick because crypto was very hot. But in May the crypto market collapsed and, you know, sort of had been growing very quickly and took a breath, you could say charitably. So at that point, it was like the energy, the frenetic energy that had been in that space left. And so I was like, "Okay, well, I still believe in this, but it's going to be a longer road. It's going to take more time. There's not the overabundance of hype and enthusiasm that there was before the crash."
Scott Anthony Barlow 34:26
Adam, tell me about what you get to do now.
Adam Bloom 34:29
Yeah, sure. So what I eventually came to was, I'd been trying to do backer for a few months, and it was coming along, but it was moving slower than I wanted. And I said, "I really want to find something that can start getting me and come now." And so I started looking for opportunities, like, I was just going to LinkedIn and running searches that said "blockchain strategist" and I surfaced a job listing with Coinbase that was hiring content strategists. And so I very simply just submitted my resume and two days later got an email from an HR person at the company and went through a recruitment process and got an offer and accepted and joined the company. And so what I'm doing now is I'm creating both writing content, potentially doing content and other media as well, that we're considering and sort of developing an overall strategy for the content for Coinbase, which is a cryptocurrency exchange, if people don't know, it's a place where you can buy and sell cryptocurrencies. That recently had an IPO. So they're the first crypto exchange to go public, definitely in the US, and I believe in the world. And so beyond the exchange platform, that was their sort of first big product, they're expanding into a lot of new things. And so there's a lot of messaging and content work to do around, number one, continuing to bring people into the crypto space in terms of just allowing them to understand, what is a cryptocurrency? What is a blockchain? How do you invest in this? Why would you want to? How does this all work? And what does it mean? And why should you care about it? But then number two, to start thinking, sort of in a forward looking way about, what are the things that the company is going to do next? And how do we communicate with people about those? And so there are a lot of different opportunities in terms of consumer facing content that we can create, that I'm helping sort of strategize and create. And so it's everything from, you know, help pages to other kinds of media that we're looking at, to put out, to just kind of explain to people what this technology is and how it works. I mean, I gave you the basic high level pitch about, you know, what they call web 3.0, that it's a whole new internet.
Scott Anthony Barlow 36:38
How does this tick the boxes or many more of those boxes for you in terms of what you wanted? Because we got to talk all the way through, like way back when you were lawyering it up during the early stages of your career, and that was not ticking very many boxes, in so many different ways. And then for each progression, and even though you felt like you missed out on different sets of timing, there were so many learnings from that, that allowed you to be able to realize pieces of what you didn't need. So how does this next evolution of that tick many more of those boxes?
Adam Bloom 37:13
Yeah, I think that, number one, I wanted to be engaged with subject matter that I felt like was interesting and exciting and fascinating and forward looking. I had never been able to do that as an attorney, it always sort of devolved into the same kind of arguments about nothing. You know, I used to say it was like the monopoly man versus Mr. Burns, and who really cares who wins, you know. This rich guy, or that rich guy. Frankly, the great innovation of corporate litigation is the best alternative to physical violence. You know, in the Middle Ages, it was like, if two rich people got in a fight, they just went and got all their serfs, and said, "Put down here your crappy plows and stop raking your dirt. I need you to go fight a war for me." Well, so what we do instead of that now was we have lawsuits. And that's great. But I don't know if it's where I need to spend my life. It feels like I'm contributing to something that is meaningful, and interesting, and fascinating, and innovative. And frankly, I mean, my jaw is just constantly on the floor, hearing some of these kids who are like half my age who were talking about quadratic voting, and talking about, you know, consensus mechanisms, and are just going at 100 miles an hour spinning up ideas for how to organize businesses, how to democratize the flow of money around the world, how to open up opportunities for artists to connect with their audiences without having to go through the sausage grinder of intermediaries, like, studios and record labels. It's fascinating, and the possibilities are literally infinite. You know, I'm just astounded by the amount of sheer intellect that is in this space. And frankly, you know, I used to joke that, like that poem, how, you know, I saw the best minds of my generation wasted something, something, I always used to think I saw the best minds of my generation making exercise app, like, "what are you all doing?" you know, it is just what they call web 2.0, this sort of App Store and Facebook and Google, it was like, at a certain point, this stuff has ceased to feel revolutionary, it has ceased to feel like it's moving us forward. And it has just become a cash grab for big corporations. And so it is very exciting to feel like there are real ideas here. I mean, ideas that I admit humbly are beyond me to come up with. I'm just excited to engage with them and to be a part of what is going on in this space. Because I really think it at least has the potential to reshape so much of the economy and especially the internet in the next 20, 30 years. So it's creative. I like the people I'm working with. And for the first time, I feel like I have people who are saying to me, you know, when I was a lawyer, it was like, you know, "You're doing a good job at this and this, but we really need to tone it down. It's too many jokes, it's too much talking, you're talking too much." I mean, I've had a litany like a murderer's row of partners at law firms tell me, "When we're in a meeting with a client, you got to stop talking so much. You know, I'm the partner." So it's like, "I get it, but I know this stuff better than you and what you're telling them is wrong." So you know, it's nice to finally be in a place where I feel like, and this is one of the things that I think you and I talked a lot about, just sort of as a career goal is where you feel like you can bring your entire self to it. You know, like, when I was doing creative stuff as a lawyer, I felt like I had to hide it. That god forbid, anyone at my firm should know that I do stand up. You know now, it's like, I have a podcast, and they're happy about it at Coinbase. They're like, "Great, you know, don't share any confidential information. And, you know, don't get us in a fight with anybody. But other than that, go have fun."
Scott Anthony Barlow 40:50
So let me ask you about that really quick here. Because I think that that is important. You and I got into some really deep discussions through some of the projects that we're working on about how, even though you might get to what you want, even though it can be wonderful, you can still feel a variety of different things. And I know that you experienced variety of different feelings, even though you were getting some of what you want, as you were experimenting in different areas, too, along the way, even before this opportunity. And I'm curious, so first question is, what does that feel like now that you can bring so much more yourself to work that you couldn't before? And then two, what has been wonderful about that, or hard about that?
Adam Bloom 41:31
Yeah, I'd say what has been wonderful about it is it really felt like going into my legal career. I felt it at the time, I felt it during the 12 years that I was trapped in it. And I feel it looking back is that I just missed my turn, you know what I mean? I just missed an exit, like, I should not have been in there. And I just couldn't get out of it. And so to be working now for a technology company and doing work that is creative, and collaborative, and really forward looking feels like what I should have been doing in the first place. I learned a lot as a lawyer, I met a lot of people, I had a lot of wonderful experiences. It's not like it was, you know, I wouldn't say it was a waste of time. But I would say it was not the best use of, you know, my efforts, like it just did not feel like what I needed to be doing with myself. And so it feels like yeah, "This is it. This is definitely, finally, the track that I should have been on in the first place." What's hard about it ism honestly, there is part of me that is like, gee, it's like I'm the dog coming out of the shelter that is waiting to get kicked. Where I'm like, "You guys really liked me, you know, like, you really are okay with me, it's really..." I just keep waiting for like the bad thing to happen. You know what I mean? Like, for a few days before I started at Coinbase, I had trouble sleeping, because I was like, you know, there's something going to happen here, you know, something is going to go wrong here, like, and just waiting to find out that similar to every law firm I ever worked for that it was all smiles and handshakes and backslaps. And then as soon as you got in the door, it was some sort of waking nightmare. And I was sort of waiting for that to happen. And it didn't. And so it took me a few days to accept, like, yeah, this could actually be a good place, this could actually be somewhere where I want to get up and go every day, you know, at least metaphorically, because we work remotely but still. And so I think there was a little bit of an adjustment that I'm probably still settling into of, number one, like you don't have to pretend to be... because lawyers, I think, in large part, get off on behaving like lawyers, you wear the suit, you stand up straight, you speak a certain way, you act a certain way, you know, you comb your hair a certain way, everybody's there because they want to be a lawyer, and even the ones who aren't there are faking it, because god forbid, they get caught out, you know, like being a weirdo. You know, it's different to be in a place where I don't have to do any of that. And then to understand like, okay, so this is a different dynamic, how do I fit into it in a way that feels honest, and so to speak true to who I am, but at the same time is like accommodating to my teammates? I mean, how do you do this in a way that is appropriate for this industry and for this company? Because it's, you know, it's a different rhythm. And it's a different environment than a law firm or, you know, a legal practice or anything like that. So there's an adjustment there. And I just tried to be very mindful of like, the etiquette and what's appropriate, and where I'm allowed to make a joke and where I really shouldn't. So yeah, that's the ongoing adjustment, but it's not, you know, catastrophic. It's just something that I need to be mindful of that like, yeah, "you can be yourself but you know, you need to get stuff done. And you need to make sure that you're making everybody else feel comfortable around you that you're not stepping on toes" so to speak. So...
Scott Anthony Barlow 44:36
When we started working with you just under a year ago, I guess looking back on that, a lot has happened for you. You've done a really really nice job of making a lot happen for yourself. So first of all, just wanted to say that because that... I know I've told you that before but is so true, and I just feel very compelled to say that, make sure that you know that again. And then my question, even with all that, I know this was far... this transition was the furthest thing from easy for you. It was not that easy at all. So I'm curious about what were some of the hardest parts for this most recent transition for you?
Adam Bloom 45:15
Yeah. So there are two that I would highlight: number one was, well, before we started recording, we were chatting a little bit. You mentioned I'd had a job with a startup here in LA that they hired me to write content about, sort of, certain legal subject matter. And they offered me a full time job. And it was the first job that I had been offered to do anything other than be a lawyer since I worked on the presidential campaign in 2004. So like, 16 years, 17 years, you know, I got the offer. And it was funny, because my girlfriend and I had taken a weekend and just gotten a hotel room in LA, so that we had a sort of little staycation and we knew the offer was coming. So like, there was a bathtub in the room. So we had a bubble bath, and we had a bottle of champagne. And I got the offer. And I looked at the offer. And she looked at me and I was like, "This is not good." I was like, "This doesn't work." So like that was... it was a very sort of funny scene. But yeah, as you know, I mean, as you and I discussed a lot at the time, I talked to them about it and was like, "Listen, this isn't quite what I was hoping for, can we talk about this?" And ultimately, we were not able to come to an agreement, and I turned it down. And so at the time, it felt like, wow, I was obviously had some regret around that, and was that the right decision? And you know, was that a mistake? And what am I going to do now? But I think you and I talked about it. And you said very often that you find that with people who change careers successfully, somewhere along the line, they'll get a job, but turn it down because they realize it's good, but it's not ideal. And so to be honest, upon reflection, I felt sort of empowered that, like, somebody could offer me a job, not as a lawyer. And rather than have this desperate, frenzied attitude that you always had as a lawyer, especially during the recession of, "you need a job, there's a law firm offering you a job, just take the job, they'll give you money, you know, like don't interrogate it, don't go asking them for this or that. Just say yes, and move on. Sit at the desk, do the work, take the money, go home, try not to get fired." So to be able to actually come to a situation and say like, "Yeah, this is good, but it's not great. I really appreciate it, guys. But I don't think this is for me. Thanks, anyway." that in and of itself was kind of empowering. And obviously, you know, a few months later, I ended up with this offer from Coinbase, that as I've told you is just a much better fit all the way around, I didn't have to do anything related to law, which was a huge relief. I got to work on something that was much more interesting. And it was just, you know, it's a better established company. And I think all the way around was just a better fit for me. So the turning down the job offer was the first challenge I would highlight. The second one was I spent a few months trying to, as I mentioned, raise money for this startup. It was taking longer than I thought, I was living off of my savings. And I looked at my bank account, and I did a little back of the envelope math and realized that I was going to be out of money pretty soon. And so I had to start looking for something that would make money right away. And I had been applying for some part time copywriting gigs, but just wasn't landing anything, which can happen, copywriting is like that. So I actually started emailing recruiters and former legal clients and saying, you know, "I'm back open for business. If you need legal help, I'm lawyering again. I can help you." And I had some people give me a couple of assignments. So I was right back on the precipice of going back to practicing law just by pure economic necessity. And I was like, "Here we go again, man, third try and just can't get the escape velocity to get out of the atmosphere of practicing law." like I was right on the edge of the cliff, and I submitted this resume to Coinbase, at the same time that I was emailing and talking to legal recruiters and legal clients, just to try and get some work just to make some money because I needed income. And right as I thought, you know, I failed again, this will be the third time that I've tried to escape from my legal career, and it's not going to work out, again, I got the job from Coinbase, it was just that close. But that was yeah, really scary moment where I thought, "oh my god," you know, because that was always the fear was that, you know, I had gotten myself into this hole, and I was never going to be able to get out. And you know, my father had been an attorney. And I'd watched him his whole life, just sort of with the attitude that law was not quite a fit for him, but he had no choice and he was stuck in it. And he was never happy about it. And I was bound and determined that that was not going to happen to me, but it was starting to get very scary. You know, like, "my god, am I going to be able to get out of this?" And then I did. You know, and the thing that I would highlight is, I didn't know that I was going to get that job. I didn't have a personal connection at Coinbase. I was just, you know, for all the bad timing that I've had that we've talked about, yhat was just astonishingly good timing. Coinbase was on a hiring sprint, the whole economy was coming out of the pandemic, there had been this massive reshuffling of people switching jobs, lose jobs, leaving jobs. So everyone or many people were hiring for a lot of things. And in the blockchain, crypto industry, there was a huge need for people who understood both crypto and content. And, you know, I had a screening interview with the HR person. And then I had the first interview with Eleanor, my supervisor, and five minutes into the interview, she called me a unicorn. She said, "The fact that you know crypto and you know content..." she said, "You're a unicorn." And I was like, well, that's a good sign. You don't ordinarily call someone a unicorn, and then tell them that you're not gonna make them an offer. You know, right away, it was just came together. And it was, if you... I mean, I've looked back at the form that I filled out for you and for Mo when I started the career change process, and they said, "What do you want to do?" I said, "I want to be a TV writer." That's where this started. And so you know, I was not like, "I want to be a cryptocurrency content strategist", not one of those words was anywhere in my mind as a career option when I started this process, it really was, like, you know, requires a sort of, I would say, radical open mindedness, you just have to accept the fact that you don't necessarily know where this is going to go or how it's going to get there. And you know, like the Animaniacs theme song, you have to expect the unexpected, just lean into it, just let it wash over you. Because it's an adventure. And you know, it has ups and it has downs and setbacks. But if you just keep going, just stick with it and keep going, you will get there. And that was why I got here.
Scott Anthony Barlow 51:27
What I think is so interesting out of... do you remember, and just a little bit other context, we have a really amazing piece of content that Adam helped us write and put together and it took several months, we call it fondly our career changer guide. However, we had half the team up to Moses Lake Washington, and I remember being a phone call with you, because we're working on a section of this guide, right? And I remember you saying, "Look, I'm working on the section and it doesn't make sense." And it turns out that, you know, we ended up calling this section, you know, what happens when you experience setback. And so it's all about overcoming setbacks and adjusting your plan. And I remember having the conversation with you where we're talking about, you know, the strange thing that happens over and over and over and over again, almost like clockwork, is just when people are ready to throw in the towel, that means that they're so close. And strangely enough, even though you wrote about this, like you experienced the exact same thing, where you're like, you know, on the precipice, as you called it, ready to go back to law, and like, this might just not work for me. And then that's where the opportunity was actually on the horizon. And that's what we see something like that in various different ways, every single time. So just want to ask your thoughts on that, because you and I hadn't talked about that exact thing. But it's, even though you're in it, you knew about it, you helped us write about this thing. It still happened.
Adam Bloom 53:00
You know, I think that it reminds me of the the Mark Twain quote, and I'm paraphrasing, but "it's much easier to give advice than it is to take it", the reality is that, you know, to understand that you're going to go through a journey, and it's going to have ups and downs does not release you from the obligation to go through those ups and downs. And it was very interesting for me, especially writing that career change guide, because I thought of it in the framework of a screenplay and just a basic sort of narrative arc, where you do have what they call the "all is lost" moment. Where it's like, I can't go backwards. But I don't see a way to go forwards. And I'm just stuck here. And in movies, this is often where like characters will sort of contemplate just dying, where it's like, "I can't take it anymore, can this just be over?" So you know, that was what I always thought about was just that moment of coming to the point where you absolutely don't see a way to go home, but you don't see a way to reach your destination. And knowing that that can happen, as I say, doesn't release you from the obligation to go through it. You just have to accept like, yeah, that's not going to be a fun moment. But you're going to have to go through it. And I think that especially one thing that I learned running my startup, the production company, was we had so many challenges as all startups do. And I would get frustrated, I would get upset, and I would, you know, lose sleep in whatever I did, but it came down to one question which was "Okay, well, do you want to quit or do you want to keep going?" And that fundamentally is the choice. Now, even when I was calling up former legal clients and legal recruiters and saying, you know, tail between my legs, I need some legal work. I was still doing the work, reaching out to people, submitting resumes, you know, moving my feet, just like keep moving forward. You're a hockey player. So you'll appreciate this. I played a little hockey when I was 14, and I was not built for it. I was, like, as I am now, very tall, very skinny, better suited to basketball but I wanted to play hockey. And I remember we did this exercise that was supposed to be training for what it feels like to get body checked where they lined everybody up next to the boards and then they had you skate past the row of like 20 or 30 kids and everybody just got to check you, you know. And the only piece of advice they gave you was just keep your feet moving. That was it. And they just sent you and they called it the gauntlet and they just sent you down the road and kid after kid just like slammed you into the boards, and, you know, two thirds, three quarters of them were bigger than I was. And I was just getting worked. And I was like falling down off my feet. And they're like, pushing you down. It was, you know, I remember that. I mean, 30 years, 25 years later, that was a rough exercise. But that's like, you know, at some point, that's the advice is like, just keep moving your feet, there is no way to go through this that will allow you to do it without getting hit, you're going to get hit, you just have to keep moving your feet. And it's like the same thing I say, you know, I have a son, Ezra, who's about to turn seven. And you know, when I would chat with other parents when, especially when he was younger, and he was just starting to run around and go on the playground and stuff, and we were talking about like, "Well, what do you do when they fall? What do you do if they're going to hurt themselves?" And I would say, you know, "You can't teach them not to fall. You can only teach them how to fall." And that, you can read as much or as little into that as you want, but that's my adorable metaphor. It's like, look, the bad things are going to happen. But if you can just get up and keep going, you will get where you're going. But you, you know, it's on you. Like, the choice fundamentally every time is, do you want to quit? Or do you want to keep going?" and it's your choice, and you have to own it. If you give up, that's a valid choice. You can give up. It's hard. It's completely valid to say, "This is not for me, I give up. I'm just going to go back." But that's your choice. Otherwise, you have to absorb the fact that like, yeah, there were difficult moments, there were confusing moments and frustrating moments and very scary moments where the bank account is going down, and there's no money coming in. And I'm not figuring out the career change. And I don't even know necessarily what I'm looking for. And I'm not sure I'm gonna make it. But I just decided to keep going. It's just that simple. Yeah, that's what I take from it.
Scott Anthony Barlow 56:49
That is amazing. I so appreciate you taking the time, and coming on and sharing your story. And I've told you this several times over along the way as you and I have gotten to have chats, but I just... this is super fun for me. I've been looking forward to this conversation for the podcast for a long time for your story. And I'm so glad that we get to have it.
Adam Bloom 57:12
Thanks, great work. Well, I have the unfair advantage that you and I have spent many hours talking through this stuff for our writing projects. So I've done like probably seven or eight dry runs, we could release, you know, an album of, you know, eight hours of our conversations about career change.
Scott Anthony Barlow 57:28
Oh my goodness, yeah.
Adam Bloom 57:29
Listen, I'm happy to do it. I'm very grateful for the help. And you know, it's been a pleasure to get to know you and to, you know, to have the opportunity to, sort of, become a part of your business and your life. I love what you guys do. It's made a tremendous difference in my life. And I was happy to contribute what I could to the content that we made together. And yeah, man, I mean, I'm just looking forward to keeping in touch. So I'm happy to do this. I hope it was helpful to people. And I think it's going to be a very exciting next few years for both of us. So I'm looking forward to it.
Scott Anthony Barlow 58:02
Hey, many of the stories that you've heard on the podcast are from listeners that have decided that they wanted to take action and taking the first step of having a conversation with our team to try and figure out how we can help. And if you want to implement what you have heard, and you want to completely change your life and your career, then let's figure out how we can help. So here's what I would suggest, just open your phone right now and open your email app. And I'm going to give you my personal email address, scott@happentoyourcareer.com, just email me and put 'Conversation' in the subject line. And then when you do that, I'll introduce you to the right person on our team. And you can have a conversation with us, we'll try and understand your goals and what you want to accomplish in your career no matter where you're at. And we can figure out the very best way that we can help you and your situation. So open up right now and send me an email with 'Conversation' in the subject line scott@happentoyourcareer.com.
Andy Molinsky 59:15
This point my career I'm a professor, I teach for parts of the year students, undergraduates and graduate students, MBA students. I increasingly, over the past five to seven years, have started to do a lot of consulting and executive education and keynote speaking. I also do a lot of writing, a lot of non academic writing. I do some academic writing, but I do a lot now of non academic writing. In other words, writing for general audiences. I write for Inc.com, Psychology Today, Harvard Business Review, LinkedIn, and then I, you know, I've written a couple of books. I picked my kid at school a lot. So I suppose I have a part time bus driving job.
Scott Anthony Barlow 59:58
In my conversation with Andy, get to learn the five psychological roadblocks that keep you in your comfort zone and stunt your experiential growth. This is super, super cool. And then how to distinguish between which of your goals are worth following through the discomfort because there's always discomfort in some capacity anytime it's associated with things that you want in your life. And then what are the steps to take to get out of your comfort zone to be able to actually achieve those goals? Because as it turns out, none of the rest of it matters unless you can act upon it. So you know that we like to get you outside your comfort zone here, and turns out, well, Andy Molinsky is a great source of how to do that, he wrote a book and I loved his new book, actually, it's called "Reach: A New Strategy to Help You Step Outside Your Comfort Zone, Rise to the Challenge, and Build Confidence". All that and plenty more next week right here on Happen To Your Career. Make sure that you don't miss it. And if you haven't already, click Subscribe on your podcast player so that you can download this podcast in your sleep, and you get it automatically, even the bonus episodes every single week, sometimes multiple times a week. Until next week. Adios. I'm out.
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