Written by: Ruth

If you’ve hung out with me much, at some point I’ve probably busted out one of my favorite phrases: “It’s called show business, not show friends.” It’s a phrase I use a lot when talking to my friends about their careers. I’ve busted it out at parties, in meetings and, on one memorable occasion, talked someone into quitting his job with it (that worked out OK, thank goodness, and I feel relieved that it did rather than MAD WITH POWER).

But What Does it MEAN?

Another saying of mine (this one I got from my mom) is “It’s called work. If it was fun all the time, they wouldn’t have to pay you to do it.” I love my job – LOVE it – but you wouldn’t see me doing it all day every day if I wasn’t getting paid.

It’s Called Show Business, Not Show Friends (or ICSBNSF as I shall now refer to it for brevity’s sake) means keeping in mind that no matter what other reasons someone has chosen their career – because they find it rewarding or challenging or fascinating or just plain fun – it’s still their career, and they should be expected to make decisions that keep that in mind.

Should I Stay or Should I Go

The decision to leave a job is often a difficult one – especially when it’s a job that you’ve liked, where they’ve encouraged you to grow in your skills and where you like your co-workers. When your employer has invested in your professional development, it’s understandable to want to repay that investment by staying on and working hard. It’s easy to feel a bit guilty at the thought of leaving your team or even the whole company scrambling to replace you.

That kind of loyalty is admirable, but it shouldn’t keep you in a job where you’re unhappy or where you’re no longer growing. It shouldn’t keep you from taking a new opportunity that you’re excited about.

The first time I gave notice at a job, my now-husband told me that I should prepare for the possibility that the company wouldn’t want my two weeks; they might just tell me to pack up my desk then and there. That seemed crazy to me, but it is something some businesses do to protect their assets during employee turnover.

It’s important to remember that no matter how much your company may like you, no matter how much they enjoy working with you or appreciate the work you’ve done for them in the past, if they need to they will absolutely lay you off or fire you. If it makes good business sense for you to no longer be employed there, they will absolutely let you go.

When deciding whether to give notice or not, ask yourself: if the situation were reversed, would they be hesitating to fire me?

On Loyalty

Employee turnover is expensive and disruptive, and many businesses do a lot to foster employee retention. This is especially true in the tech startup world, where the hours are long, the skill sets are in demand, and the time frames can be really tight.

Startups often rely on fun offices with things like foosball tables and kegerators; flexible hours and vacation; and lots of extracurricular activities to encourage employee retention. Smart executives also make sure their team members have plenty of room for career growth in their roles and are continuing to grow and learn new skills, to reduce the need for employees to go elsewhere in order to advance.

At a really small scrappy startupy startup, you’re not just working to get paid. You better not be, because the company is struggling to stay alive. The long hours and uncertain future are worth it because you’re working together for a common goal: you’re building a company from the ground up, and you’re all hugely personally invested in it.

The result of all these shoulder-to-shoulder long hours can be a sense of betrayal when a core employee leaves, especially if it’s during a critical phase. More than one startup founder has burned bridges with former employees with a sense of “how could you abandon the business/me.” Owning a business means that nobody will have the same level of investment in your business that you do.

Even when there is a great deal of personal investment on the part of the other members of the company, people’s circumstances change. Sometimes people need to do what’s best for themselves and their careers. It’s unreasonable to expect that people will stay in a job that isn’t the best thing for them just out of loyalty.

This isn’t to say that people should screw their employers over or look out only for Number 1. Loyalty to an employer, especially a good employer, is a great thing.  If it’s time to move on from a company that’s been good to you, the best way you can show them how much you appreciate them is to do everything you can to make the transition an easy one. This could include giving a longer notice period or staying on to train a replacement, but might be as simple as providing clear, thorough documentation of your projects and making sure to wrap up everything that you can.

Should I Not Become Friends with My Co-Workers?

Of COURSE you should become friends with your co-workers! Some of my best friends are people I met through work. ICSBNSF in no way means you can’t do business and be friends.

What ICSBNSF does mean is that “friend” doesn’t negate “co-worker.” Be aware of how you treat your co-worker friends in the office. You’re not doing them (or their work) any favors by humoring or indulging them in bad ideas, or in withholding important feedback to spare their feelings, as appropriate. This becomes even more necessary when you are managing or being managed by a friend.

ICSBNSF also means keeping an eye on gossip. Sometimes at work we’re made aware of situations that need to be kept under wraps, whether that’s a change in direction or an interpersonal conflict between two co-workers. When our co-workers are also our friends, it’s tempting to want to fill them in on the whole story, especially if the situation is causing us stress or outrage. Too much gossip can create an atmosphere of unnecessary drama, however, which can make work even less pleasant than the original stressful situation – so know when to keep your mouth shut.

Don’t get all “why didn’t you tell me” when a co-worker friend has been discreet about work-related intel. If they’ve kept information from you that you had no reason to know in your role at work, remember that it’s called show business, not show friends, and your friend is just trying to be appropriate.

Above all do not take it personally or cause a scene when a co-worker friend decides to leave work. They’re not abandoning you; they’re pursuing a new opportunity, and as their friend you should be psyched for them. Saying “I’ll miss you, but congratulations!” is appropriate. Wailing, “What am I going to do without you?” isn’t.

Support your co-worker friends in their next career moves and you’ll not only have great friendships, you’ll also have valuable connections down the line.

TL;DR

“It’s called show business, not show friends” means:

• It’s OK to do what’s best for your career. Loyalty to a company that’s done right by you shouldn’t supersede that (you should still do your best to make any transition out of a job as easy as possible, though).
• We shouldn’t expect our employees to care more about our businesses than they do to their own lives and careers.
• You can be friends with your co-workers, but recognize they need to do their jobs and advance their careers – and sometimes that means leaving.
• When in doubt, ask yourself: “If the situation were reversed, would they fire me?” The answer is almost always yes.

Wow, it’s been almost a year since my last post. No, I didn’t fall off the grid, or join a monastery, or abandon SEO so I could take up homebrewing Melomel mead like these guys. Truth be told, after the huge response to my last post it’s taken me a while to even want to write on my personal blog again. The majority of responses were really positive, but wow – the ones that were negative were LOUD. I don’t know about you but there’s only so many times I can be told to go f**k myself before I start feeling a wee bit discouraged.

I’ve also had a lot going on. For one thing, in August we moved to Norman, Oklahoma so my fiance, Justin, could take a job as a professor at the University of Oklahoma. “Move to Oklahoma” was pretty high on my list of Things It Never Really Occurred to Me I Might Do Someday, and yet here we are. We kind of still can’t believe we live here – every so often something will happen that rocks us back on our heels and makes us say “Wow, we live in Oklahoma.” (As Justin puts it, it’s like the movie We Bought a Zoo, only instead of buying a zoo, we moved to Oklahoma).

With the move to Oklahoma have come other big changes. The biggest of which – I’m no longer working at Moz. An in-house SEO who’s not actually in house turned out to be too hard, for both Moz and for me. So now I’m setting up shop with my own SEO and inbound marketing consultancy here in Oklahoma. It’s going to be a crazy adventure, and I’m pretty excited about it!

I’m also going to be doubling down on this blog, starting with the new look and continuing with, you know, posting more than once per year. I’ve been doing a lot of pondering lately, and I have some Things To Say. So stay tuned!

There’s been a lot of talk in the industry lately around sexism at conferences, both in selection of speakers and behavior among attendees. With some sexist/outright creepo behavior, it’s pretty easy to tell where the line is (not that that stops some men from gaily trampling over that line). Most of us would agree that outright propositions or full-on groping are not acceptable behavior at an industry conference.

But you, Type of Dude to Whom This Post is Addressed, would never do something like that. You’re one of the good guys. You have no problem with women being successful, and you’re happy to have women speak at conferences. You’d certainly never just outright grope someone. But there are many more subtle behaviors that contribute to an atmosphere of sexism that you may not even be aware of. It’s hard for you to hear that they might be sexist, because you are a good guy and don’t think of yourself as sexist – but there’s room for improvement! So here are some additional things that you can work on. Continue reading

PubCon is next week!  A 3-day, multi-track panorama of learning and networking in fabulous Las Vegas.  This will be my 4th PubCon, and I’ve learned a thing or two (Don’t forget to eat dinner, bring more business cards than you think you’ll need, make friends with people who don’t drink so you can steal their drink tickets).  One area where I really feel my experience coming in handy this year: packing.

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Most people would agree that a healthy worker is probably more productive than an  unhealthy worker.  So why do we keep going to work when we’re sick?

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Welcome to Emotion in Tech, a new series in which I reflect on the unavoidable connections between our emotional states and the work we do.

There’s a bumper-sticker quote (or as I’m starting to think of them, Pinterest quotes) attributed to Gandhi: “Be the change you want to see in the world.” It’s a nice sentiment, but as personal mottos go it’s both a little smug and a little unrealistic.  Can one person really exert that much control over the whole world simply by changing his or her own actions?

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In the SEO world we use our heads a lot.  Do we think (x) is affecting our ability to drive traffic via search? Let’s test it!  Is Google rewarding (tactic 1) and no longer as impressed with (tactic 2)?  Show me the data!

Don’t get me wrong – I love this.  It frustrates me when people make blanket assertions and don’t back them up with data.  But marketing isn’t a wholly quantitative discipline – there’s always that “X factor” that separates the truly successful from the also-rans. In my world, we tend to call that X factor “trusting our gut”.

I can’t always blog about what my gut tells me is true.  Sometimes, I just don’t have the data.  Sometimes I’m just feeling too philosophical – and SEO blogs tend to love actionable, tactics-driven posts (and rightly so).  Sometimes the things I feel in my gut are just too emotion-driven to have a place anywhere but my own, personal blog.  So voila: my own personal blog.