Linear careers differ from portfolio careers just like a tree trunk differs from a coppice

Linear careers are like single tree trunks. 
Portfolio careers branch out like a coppice.
CorporateNature Metaphor Series, No 122

1. Some careers are straight tree trunks:

Many career paths are stable and predictable. If you pursue a career in medicine, you know the steps you need to take: study for years and invest consistent effort in one direction to obtain a specialisation. 

2. Other careers are crooked trees:
The tree trunk of a linear career is not always straight, just as trees don't always grow perfectly straight. In fact, German philosopher Immanuel Kant said that "out of the crooked timber of humanity, no straight thing was ever made." If you change direction, e.g. move from finance to teaching, the sharp turn would result in a crooked tree in the forest of life. Also, there may be smaller career hiccups (e.g. gaps and sabbaticals) that create knots in the wood grain. Yet, the resulting trunk after 30 or 40 years is still a single massive block of wood.

3. Portfolio careers are shaped like a coppice:
Some people have portfolio careers: a diversified set of activities, such as consultancy, entrepreneurship, sitting on corporate boards, volunteering for charities. This model resembles a coppice. Coppicing is done by cutting down a tree to the ground, so that multiple shoots come out from the stump and grow into a bunch of (thinner) trees. Coppicing stimulates growth and increases the yield of harvested timber. By foregoing a linear career, you get a more interesting and diversified portfolio career which may result in a bigger timber harvest, i.e. higher income compared with a single salary job.

4. A "tree trunk" or a "coppice" career is mostly down to choice
Most trees can be coppiced: typically hazel, ash, willow, elm, beech, oak, chestnut. However, a small number of trees are not amenable to coppicing, for example birch. So it is of paramount importance for the "birches" among us to know that they should not pursue portfolio careers.

Coppice tree
(image source: Wikipedia)

Language learning resembles vine training. Planting in solid ground helps

Learning a language "vocabulary first" is like training a vine on a metal frame.
Learning a language "grammar first" is like building a vertical garden.
CorporateNature Metaphor Series, No 121

Learning a language is a lengthy and demanding process. It requires hours of reading boring grammar rules and doing tedious exercises. However, this is by no means the most efficient way to reach conversational fluency in a foreign language. 

1. CASE IN HISTORY: MEZZOFANTI
Cardinal Giuseppe Mezzofanti was a hyperpolyglot known to speak more than 30 languages fluently. Reportedly, he was able to pick up a new language within weeks. How did he do it?

Entrepreneur Tim Ferriss explains the method Mezzofanti used: Whenever he would start learning a new language, Mezzofanti would ask a native speaker to recite the Lord’s Prayer. By doing this, he was able to deconstruct the target language and reveal its basic grammatical structures. This proved to be a more than sufficient framework upon which he could then develop further his knowledge of the new language.

2. VOCABULARY LEARNING IS LIKE VINE TRAINING

The Mezzofanti approach gives the learner a lot of vocabulary and merely a basic set of grammatical rules around which to start organising the vocabulary. This process is similar to growing a vine (the language) in the ground and training it on a metal frame (the basic set of grammatical rules). When the vine shoots are just above the ground, they hardly need the frame at all. Over time, as the vine grows, it needs to be tied to the frame so that it keeps growing straight (adhering to the grammatical framework).

3. GRAMMAR-CENTRED LEARNING IS LIKE BUILDING A VERTICAL GARDEN

In contrast, learning a language by first instilling a complete grammatical framework is a much more labour-intensive process that focuses on the wrong priority. Grammatical rules are of no use without  words and expressions. Speaking the language should come first, not be left as a mere afterthought. The unnatural (forced) "grammar first" learning process resembles building a vertical garden, with plants growing not in the ground but on the vertical framework itself. "Grammar first" learning takes longer and requires a lot more effort, just like setting up a vertical garden wall and populating it with plants is harder to start and maintain than planting a vine in the ground. 

4. PRIORITIES AND RESULTS

After all, wine comes from the grapes, not from the metal frame to which the vine is attached.

Vine training
(image source: Wikipedia)

Extroverts are like surface runoff. Introverts are like rivers fed by groundwater.

Extroverts instantly pour out their inner self in one go: like streams of rainwater after rain. Introverts communicate slowly and intently: like spring water welling up from deep underground.

CorporateNature Metaphor Series, No 120

Two key categories in personality tests are “introvert” and “extrovert”. Although it is true that we tend toward a certain pattern of behaviour which can be labelled as “introverted” or “extroverted”, no person is completely one or the other - it is a spectrum. Swiss psychoanalyst Carl Jung gave the following definition: “Each person seems to be energised more by either the external world (extraversion) or the internal world (introversion).” 

1. Extroverts are like surface runoff after heavy rainfall.

When there is an excess of stormwater or meltwater (external influence), it forms a stream. This flow is strong at first but quickly dries up after the external influence is no longer present. In the same way, extroverts get energised by social interaction but are prone to mood dips during periods of “drought” in their social life. Famously, when asked a question extroverts first speak and then think: everything comes out at once, just like surface runoff.

2. Introverts are like rivers fed by groundwater.

A river valley rich in groundwater provides a steady inflow to the river over extended periods of time. While the river is still affected by external factors (water levels rise and drop seasonally), the regular groundwater flow ensures that the river will not dry up. Similarly, introverts source their energy from their internal world. While introverts may occasionally get overwhelmed by prolonged social interactions, all the tools they need to recharge are within themselves. And when asked a question, introverts first think and only then speak, like the slow discharge of groundwater into a river system.

Surface runoff
(image source: Wikipedia)

Walking on lake ice is like navigating corporate culture: slippery and occasionally sinking

Clear ice is stronger than white non-transparent ice on a frozen lake; Transparent companies are safer to work for or work with than murky ones.

CorporateNature Metaphor Series, No 119

When walking on a frozen lake, you should step on the stronger clear ice and avoid the weaker white ice. Choosing the company to work for or work with has analogous parallels. 

1) CLEAR ICE: 

Companies with transparent employment practices are like clear ice.

Clear ice is formed when still water freezes directly. There are few air bubbles, which results in solid ice, so even though he surface is slippery, it is firm under your feet. Similarly, companies with transparent employment practices have fewer undefined “air pockets” in the corporate structure and provide a well-charted course for career development. The same metaphor also holds for dealing with or investing in companies. A “clear ice” company has transparent financing and is less likely to suddenly spring a hole and sink. 

2) WHITE ICE: 

Companies with “murky” nepotistic employment practices are like white ice.

White ice contains air bubbles and impurities which compromise the integrity of its structure and make it more fragile and unreliable to support your weight on your journey across the lake. In a similar way, a company with nepotistic employment practices ("air pockets") offers an uncertain future: you would not have a clear roadmap since career advancement is not entirely determined by performance. And when dealing with a "white ice" company as a supplier or a customer, you constantly have to be on the lookout for concealed financial information or quality-cutting practices.

Whether you are seeking employment or a corporate partnership, consider the risks of taking a step off the clear ice and onto the white ice on the frozen surface of the "corporate lake".

Frozen lake in Canada
(image source: Wikipedia)

Services in the economy and living organisms in nature come in three degrees of mobility

The economy is based on three groups of services with different degrees of mobility, just like in nature there is diversity in fixed plants and mobile animals.

CorporateNature Metaphor Series, No 118


1. FIXED-LOCATION SERVICES

Physical services delivered on location resemble a tree.

A tree has its roots firmly in the ground and depends entirely on the local environment for sustenance. The tree cannot move if the soil is not fertile or the amount of rainfall or sunlight is insufficient and gradually withers away. In a similar way, a corner shop, a local cafe or a hair salon are geographically fixed and depend on a constant flow of customers. A long period of “drought” would make the business go bust.

2. LOCATION-CONNECTING SERVICES 
Shipping and delivery services resemble a camel.

A caravan of camels delivers goods across the desert and the goods have to survive the journey undamaged. Similarly, an Amazon Prime van makes a journey to deliver goods that remain unchanged in the process of transportation. Often there may be obstacles along the way: unclear caravan trails in the desert for the camel or heavy traffic for the delivery van, but as long as both are on the move, they keep serving their mission of connecting.

3. VIRTUAL SERVICES
Online services resemble a condor in the sky.

The condor soars in the clouds at extraordinary heights of more than 5,000 metres and covers vast distances in a single flight. In a similar way, virtual services like online banking are offered "in the cloud" and reach customers thousands of miles away. While both depend on a physical location for their nesting site or operations hub, both are also extremely mobile. Migrating birds can cross continents when the conditions require it, just like data can be moved between data centres across countries if national regulations change. 

Common Ash tree
(source: Wikipedia)

Bactrian Camel
(source: Wikipedia)

Andean Condor
(source: Wikipedia)

You can't fold paper more than 7 times, nor cut costs at a company beyond confines

Paper-folding and cost-cutting are impossible after a few iterations

CorporateNature Metaphor Series, No 117

1. THE LIMITS TO FOLDING PAPER

“You can’t fold a piece of paper more than 7 times” is an internet meme you've probably heard before. The explanation is straightforward: with every fold, the piece of paper halves in length and doubles in thickness. So with a standard A4 sheet of paper, after the 7th fold you end up with a paper blob 1.3 cm thick. The exponential growth in thickness is the real constraint and soon the blob of paper offers too much resistance, which requires superhuman strength to fold any further. The Guinness World Record for the most folds done on a single piece of paper is 12, but this was achieved using a strip of thin tissue paper that was 1.2 km long. 

2. FOLDING PAPER MAY EXPLODE

What if you applied enormous force to eke out more rounds of folding? Well, it has been tried. This viral YouTube video shows what happens when an A3 piece of paper is folded 7 times. On the final fold, the immense pressure makes the piece of paper “explode”  as the cellulose fibres in paper get untangled and released from the structure that holds them together.

3. THE LIMITS TO COST-CUTTING

Folding a sheet of paper multiple times is analogous to cost-cutting in business. When a recession hits and company revenues collapse, management is forced to streamline operations and cut costs. Some companies have a lot of flab so costs can be cut by a lot (like folding a long sheet of paper that has a lot of excess material to fold). But lean and efficient companies have little flab and cost-cutting soon reaches the bone (which is like folding a small sheet of paper that cannot be folded any further).

4. DEATH SPIRAL IN COST-CUTTING
How many employees can a company lay off before product or service quality deteriorates to unacceptable levels and before employee morale reaches rock bottom? And how many unprofitable customers or product lines can a company discontinue? 

In accounting, the latter type of cutting is known as the "death spiral": the more customers or product lines a company gets rid of, the more fixed costs will weigh on the profitability of the remaining customers or products, tempting further cuts until there is nothing left to cut and the company has to literally fold, if you'll pardon the pun. Economic history contains multiple cases of companies imploding by entering a death spiral.

5. TAKEAWAYS

Paper folding can teach us a metaphorical lesson about cost-cutting. How much is too much?

A) Folding a sheet of paper more than 7 times makes the paper explode. 

B) Cost-cutting that goes too deep could make the company implode.

A4 sheet of paper
(image source: Wikipedia)