1333: 10 Career Lessons From Julia Child by April Dykman of Get Rich Slowly on Career Success & Skill Building

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[00:01:00] This is Optimal Work Daily, episode 1333.

[00:01:04] Ten Career Lessons from Julia Child by April Deichman with GetRichSlowly.org.

[00:01:10] And I'm Dan, your host, and I am here with you every single day reading from these great

[00:01:15] blogs that we find on all sorts of work-related topics.

[00:01:19] So with that, let's get right into our next post now as we optimize your life.

[00:01:27] Ten Career Lessons from Julia Child by April Deichman with GetRichSlowly.org.

[00:01:32] I hope you'll forgive me for writing another culinary-themed post here at Get Rich Slowly.

[00:01:38] I can't help but to talk about something that's been on my mind as I've read the book My Life

[00:01:42] in France by Julia Child.

[00:01:45] My Life in France chronicles Julia Child's life from the year she arrived in France in

[00:01:49] 1948, knowing nothing about the French culture or language, nor the cuisine she would so famously

[00:01:55] present to America in her groundbreaking book Mastering the Art of French Cooking and her

[00:02:00] television show The French Chef.

[00:02:02] What does any of that have to do with career lessons?

[00:02:04] Well, one of the things that stood out about Julia as she progressed from culinary disaster

[00:02:09] to American icon was her business sense.

[00:02:12] When they were still dating, her husband, Paul Child, was kind about her early attempts

[00:02:16] in the kitchen because he wanted to marry her.

[00:02:19] Of course, she didn't specifically set out to achieve all that she did the day she arrived

[00:02:23] in France or even the day she took her first cooking class, but her passion and dogged

[00:02:28] persistence made her a great chef as well as a household name.

[00:02:32] So without further ado, here are the top 10 career lessons you can learn from Julia Child.

[00:02:37] 1.

[00:02:38] Invest in yourself

[00:02:40] Julia didn't speak French when she arrived in France.

[00:02:43] In fact, she says her French seemed to get worse the more she tried to use it and she

[00:02:46] was surprised the French could understand her at all.

[00:02:49] She wrote, quote,

[00:02:51] My inability to communicate was hugely frustrating.

[00:02:54] End quote.

[00:02:56] One night after a party of mostly French speakers, she'd had it.

[00:03:00] She declared she was going to invest in herself by learning to speak the language no matter

[00:03:03] what it took and signed up for a language class that met for six hours each week plus

[00:03:08] homework.

[00:03:09] 2.

[00:03:10] Follow your passion

[00:03:11] Julia's friends, both French and American, thought her following her passion in cooking

[00:03:16] was a little nutty.

[00:03:18] It wasn't a middle-class hobby.

[00:03:19] In fact, far from it.

[00:03:21] They didn't understand how she could enjoy shopping, cooking, and serving food all by

[00:03:25] herself.

[00:03:26] But Julia, encouraged by Paul, ignored them and pursued her passion.

[00:03:30] 3.

[00:03:31] You're never too old to learn something new

[00:03:34] Julia was 36 years old when she started learning a new language.

[00:03:37] She didn't enroll in culinary school until age 37.

[00:03:41] Julia had a constant thirst for knowledge and didn't rest until she'd mastered or learned

[00:03:45] whatever it was that piqued her curiosity.

[00:03:48] 4.

[00:03:49] Cultivate enthusiasm

[00:03:50] Julia's words about food and learning to cook practically jump off the pages.

[00:03:55] While reading it, I couldn't decide if I wanted to keep reading or go cook something.

[00:03:59] Her passion is infectious and it was something she purposefully cultivated while observing

[00:04:03] her cooking professor, Chef Bunyard.

[00:04:06] It was a remarkable lesson, she wrote.

[00:04:09] No dish, not even the humble scrambled egg, was too much trouble for him.

[00:04:13] I was delighted by Bunyard's enthusiasm and thoughtfulness, and I began to internalize

[00:04:18] it.

[00:04:19] 5.

[00:04:20] Accept that doing anything well requires hard work

[00:04:23] Julia wasn't satisfied to take culinary classes or write recipes off the cuff.

[00:04:28] Her kitchen was her laboratory.

[00:04:30] While in culinary school, she'd come home from class and spend hours working out the hows

[00:04:34] and whys of what she'd learned that day.

[00:04:36] When writing recipes, she'd test every ingredient and measurement, experimenting with mayonnaise

[00:04:41] until she was certain no one could possibly have written more on the subject than she

[00:04:45] had.

[00:04:46] She wrote, quote, I had never taken anything so seriously in my life, husband and cat excepted,

[00:04:52] and I could hardly bear to be away from the kitchen.

[00:04:55] End quote.

[00:04:56] 6.

[00:04:57] Nix the self-deprecating scripts

[00:05:00] When a recipe fell flat, Julia didn't excuse it with self-deprecating comments.

[00:05:05] She wrote, quote, I don't believe in twisting yourself into knots of excuses and explanations.

[00:05:11] End quote.

[00:05:13] These types of admissions only draw attention to your shortcomings, or your perceived shortcomings.

[00:05:17] Usually, you're better than you think you are, and if something really goes wrong, Julia

[00:05:22] would advise you to suck it up and learn from your mistakes.

[00:05:25] 7.

[00:05:26] Solicit feedback from your audience

[00:05:28] Julia was big on soliciting feedback.

[00:05:31] Paul was her main go-to, but while developing her recipes, she'd also send them to trusted

[00:05:35] friends and family members in America for testing.

[00:05:38] Did they have the ingredients at their local grocery?

[00:05:40] Were her instructions clear?

[00:05:42] Did they like her vocabulary?

[00:05:44] Julia wanted to bring French cooking to American audiences.

[00:05:47] She knew.

[00:05:48] She made sure her audience would be able to follow her recipes and actually cared about

[00:05:52] French cooking.

[00:05:53] 8.

[00:05:54] Expand your skill set

[00:05:56] Julia was passionate about teaching others to cook, but to do it well, she couldn't just

[00:06:01] be a good cook.

[00:06:02] She had to learn how to be a good teacher.

[00:06:04] She wrote, quote,

[00:06:05] I decided that, though the cooking we'd done was fine, my presentation had not been very

[00:06:10] clear.

[00:06:11] I felt I'd have to teach at least a hundred classes before I really knew what I was doing.

[00:06:15] End quote.

[00:06:17] Learning how to teach was helpful throughout her career, both for writing recipes and as

[00:06:21] the host of her own cooking show.

[00:06:23] 9.

[00:06:24] Subject beliefs to the operational proof

[00:06:28] In France, wrote Julia, cooking is a major art, which brings with it a certain dogmatism.

[00:06:33] But she wasn't satisfied to accept things at face value.

[00:06:36] She preferred to view everything as a theory until she'd tested it for herself.

[00:06:40] She checked her recipe on the page and in the oven, and she'd investigate the old wives'

[00:06:45] tales too.

[00:06:46] As you can imagine, it took a lot of time to perfect even one recipe.

[00:06:50] She wrote, quote,

[00:06:51] I felt we should strive to show our readers how to make everything top-notch and explain,

[00:06:57] if possible, why things work one way but not another.

[00:07:01] End quote.

[00:07:02] And 10.

[00:07:03] Know your worth

[00:07:05] Publishing mastering the art of French cooking wasn't easy.

[00:07:08] Julia's co-authors wanted to stay with an agent who hadn't replied to their communications

[00:07:12] in months.

[00:07:13] But thanks to a little networking, Julia secured a much better publishing company for their

[00:07:17] project.

[00:07:18] She knew its worth long before it was completed, writing, quote,

[00:07:23] Competition in this field is stiff, but we feel this may well be a major work on French

[00:07:27] cooking and could continue to sell for years.

[00:07:30] End quote.

[00:07:32] Julia's career savvy isn't what she's famous for, but it is what made her famous

[00:07:36] and allowed her to accomplish her life goal.

[00:07:38] Bringing French food to American dinner tables and sharing her passion with the world.

[00:07:47] You just listened to the post titled 10 Career Lessons from Julia Child by April Deichman

[00:07:53] with GetRichSlowly.org.

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[00:08:55] And thank you not just to April but also to JD who owns and founded Get Rich Slowly.

[00:09:00] He considers himself just a regular guy who's learned about money through the school of

[00:09:04] hard knocks.

[00:09:05] By 2004, JD had acquired over $35,000 of consumer debt through credit cards, personal loans,

[00:09:12] and a car loan and was living paycheck to paycheck on a salary of $50,000 a year.

[00:09:17] He did not have savings and in October of that year, he hit rock bottom.

[00:09:21] He then drafted a three-year plan to get out of debt and never looked back.

[00:09:25] In less than a year, he had set aside a $5,000 emergency fund and had increased his cash flow

[00:09:30] by $750 a month.

[00:09:33] He put that money into debt reduction and in December of 2007, just three years later

[00:09:37] and right on schedule, he became debt free for the first time in his adult life.

[00:09:42] And now he's an early retiree.

[00:09:44] So come by GetRichSlowly.org for a lot more.

[00:09:48] There are plenty of articles and resources there that are worth checking out, of course.

[00:09:51] And once again, a big thank you to JD for letting us share his work here and across

[00:09:55] our network.

[00:09:57] But that is it for another edition of Optimal Work Daily.

[00:09:59] Hope you enjoyed episode 1333 and that you'll be back again with me tomorrow for our Sunday

[00:10:04] show where your optimal life awaits.