My graduation address is about the difference between two prepositions: AT and FOR. Now before you yawn and start scrolling your cell phones for news items, give me a chance here.
Understanding the difference between these two prepositions has implications, not only for your future career, but also, more importantly, a well-lived life.
People ask, “where do you work?” Or “who do you work for?” As if they are the same question, but they are not. Generally, we answer both of these questions with the same response, which may or may not be true. I have thought deeply about this only recently, and the ability to recognize this difference clearly after so many years has been a wonderful experience.
Prior generations often began careers working AT the entry level AT a company or institution and continued to work there in one capacity or another until retirement. I think now, we are all pretty use to the fact that in a rapidly changing work world, that just doesn’t happen much these days. We may work AT lots of different places, changing and growing skill sets significantly over time. Will we consistently be working FOR the same thing throughout our careers? That depends. There is no right or wrong answer, but there are different answers. Knowing what the answer is for you can make a big difference in how you spend your work life and how you feel about it all at the end. Right now, that end feels forever away, but it isn’t. The way you spend your days now, often becomes the way you spend your life. The present is the future.
I believe we are all connected by stories so I’m going to tell you a couple. The first story is about my husband. When we first met, he was just starting to take his Wharton education out for a spin and begin his trek up the corporate ladder of ad world. These were the days of perks, privileges, and two martini lunches. He was really good at what he did. We both knew where he was working AT, bad grammar aside. However, all these years later, he has trouble figuring out who he was working FOR. He worries that all he was working FOR was more power, control and money. Since he is also a pretty careful and responsible guy, he also worries that he never took enough risks to make it to a pinnacle of success that feels like enough. I tell him that he was working FOR our family, to give us a very good life. We had a nice house, the country club, plenty of nice vacations, evenings out and the occasional spurge on a luxury item. He doesn’t completely buy it. These days, he spends many of his retirement hours volunteering for children in foster care and substitute teaching in special needs classrooms, both things that give him an opportunity to answer the question, “who are you working FOR?” In a way that pleases him more.
Story number two is my story. Fresh out of four years of college, I landed a job in publishing. It was very entry level. The subject matter was not of interest to me personally, but it was a start. I had fun being a grown-up out in the work world, but i knew pretty soon, this was not long term for me.
Through new acquaintances and coincidences, I decided to go to graduate school at the University of Virginia and learn to teach children who are deaf. With my interests in the development of the English language, my background in theatre, and my love for both being a student and engaging others in learning, this turned out to be a perfect fit. I walked into my first classroom of children in the mid-1970s. My career took different turns. I worked in different states, designed different programs, adjusted my skills to learn how to work in a time when children could actually access sound with the aid of cochlear implants. I learned early intervention and parent coaching, saying good-bye to children who were on age level with typically hearing peers when, in the past, I would have just been seeing these children in my classroom for the first time -- so far behind. I continued the pattern of engaging with children who are deaf or hard of hearing for 45 years until March 13, 2020 when the COVID pandemic shut the doors of the school where I had spent 22 years as a faculty member and co-director. Every day had been different and pretty much every day had been filled with intellectual challenges and joyous discoveries. Who could ask for more?
This story has a mixed ending. I had already planned to step down from my leadership position at the end of June. I was to continue on part-time, seeing children and working on special projects at my workplace. That came to an end on August 11, 2020. That was the day I really began to think deeply about the difference between where I worked AT and who I worked FOR.
For a time, I felt really lost. I felt I had spent a lifetime doing work I loved to have that work taken from me because I didn’t know where I was AT. I essentially had no AT. My son provided me with these words of wisdom: “Mom, your legacy is not about where you worked. Your legacy is in the lives of the children and families that you changed forever.” Bingo. This was indeed my lifelong FOR. Fortunately, I had already started the process of creating a place to be, with the thought that those FOR whom I had always worked would be front and center. This is how I would spend my “off hours.” Just connecting, not collecting. No worries about budgets and oversight. That is how wehearhere.org was born. At less than one year in, I continue to work with families and their children who are deaf or hard of hearing, supporting them on their paths to a listening and spoken language future. To date, I have connected with families and professionals in ten states and three foreign countries.
So that is my answer. No matter where I worked AT, I have always worked FOR the same thing. It feels good. Not because it was the right answer, but because it was the right answer for me. Your answer doesn’t need to be the same as mine at all. I believe that to live our best lives, we just need to understand the questions. To borrow from the poet, Rainer Maria Wilke, we must breathe ourselves into the questions every day, and, over time, breathe ourselves into the answers that bring us to a place where we can look back and appreciate our lives as lives well-lived. Wherever we worked AT and whomever we worked FOR.
My heartfelt good wishes to each of you as you head into your futures.
Understanding the difference between these two prepositions has implications, not only for your future career, but also, more importantly, a well-lived life.
People ask, “where do you work?” Or “who do you work for?” As if they are the same question, but they are not. Generally, we answer both of these questions with the same response, which may or may not be true. I have thought deeply about this only recently, and the ability to recognize this difference clearly after so many years has been a wonderful experience.
Prior generations often began careers working AT the entry level AT a company or institution and continued to work there in one capacity or another until retirement. I think now, we are all pretty use to the fact that in a rapidly changing work world, that just doesn’t happen much these days. We may work AT lots of different places, changing and growing skill sets significantly over time. Will we consistently be working FOR the same thing throughout our careers? That depends. There is no right or wrong answer, but there are different answers. Knowing what the answer is for you can make a big difference in how you spend your work life and how you feel about it all at the end. Right now, that end feels forever away, but it isn’t. The way you spend your days now, often becomes the way you spend your life. The present is the future.
I believe we are all connected by stories so I’m going to tell you a couple. The first story is about my husband. When we first met, he was just starting to take his Wharton education out for a spin and begin his trek up the corporate ladder of ad world. These were the days of perks, privileges, and two martini lunches. He was really good at what he did. We both knew where he was working AT, bad grammar aside. However, all these years later, he has trouble figuring out who he was working FOR. He worries that all he was working FOR was more power, control and money. Since he is also a pretty careful and responsible guy, he also worries that he never took enough risks to make it to a pinnacle of success that feels like enough. I tell him that he was working FOR our family, to give us a very good life. We had a nice house, the country club, plenty of nice vacations, evenings out and the occasional spurge on a luxury item. He doesn’t completely buy it. These days, he spends many of his retirement hours volunteering for children in foster care and substitute teaching in special needs classrooms, both things that give him an opportunity to answer the question, “who are you working FOR?” In a way that pleases him more.
Story number two is my story. Fresh out of four years of college, I landed a job in publishing. It was very entry level. The subject matter was not of interest to me personally, but it was a start. I had fun being a grown-up out in the work world, but i knew pretty soon, this was not long term for me.
Through new acquaintances and coincidences, I decided to go to graduate school at the University of Virginia and learn to teach children who are deaf. With my interests in the development of the English language, my background in theatre, and my love for both being a student and engaging others in learning, this turned out to be a perfect fit. I walked into my first classroom of children in the mid-1970s. My career took different turns. I worked in different states, designed different programs, adjusted my skills to learn how to work in a time when children could actually access sound with the aid of cochlear implants. I learned early intervention and parent coaching, saying good-bye to children who were on age level with typically hearing peers when, in the past, I would have just been seeing these children in my classroom for the first time -- so far behind. I continued the pattern of engaging with children who are deaf or hard of hearing for 45 years until March 13, 2020 when the COVID pandemic shut the doors of the school where I had spent 22 years as a faculty member and co-director. Every day had been different and pretty much every day had been filled with intellectual challenges and joyous discoveries. Who could ask for more?
This story has a mixed ending. I had already planned to step down from my leadership position at the end of June. I was to continue on part-time, seeing children and working on special projects at my workplace. That came to an end on August 11, 2020. That was the day I really began to think deeply about the difference between where I worked AT and who I worked FOR.
For a time, I felt really lost. I felt I had spent a lifetime doing work I loved to have that work taken from me because I didn’t know where I was AT. I essentially had no AT. My son provided me with these words of wisdom: “Mom, your legacy is not about where you worked. Your legacy is in the lives of the children and families that you changed forever.” Bingo. This was indeed my lifelong FOR. Fortunately, I had already started the process of creating a place to be, with the thought that those FOR whom I had always worked would be front and center. This is how I would spend my “off hours.” Just connecting, not collecting. No worries about budgets and oversight. That is how wehearhere.org was born. At less than one year in, I continue to work with families and their children who are deaf or hard of hearing, supporting them on their paths to a listening and spoken language future. To date, I have connected with families and professionals in ten states and three foreign countries.
So that is my answer. No matter where I worked AT, I have always worked FOR the same thing. It feels good. Not because it was the right answer, but because it was the right answer for me. Your answer doesn’t need to be the same as mine at all. I believe that to live our best lives, we just need to understand the questions. To borrow from the poet, Rainer Maria Wilke, we must breathe ourselves into the questions every day, and, over time, breathe ourselves into the answers that bring us to a place where we can look back and appreciate our lives as lives well-lived. Wherever we worked AT and whomever we worked FOR.
My heartfelt good wishes to each of you as you head into your futures.