Obviously most distance runners are on the low-Testosterone interoverted side, which seems like more of an engineering type than a business/corporate type. I would think that someone more outgoing and aggressive would do well in business. Also, the huge hours that managers put it wouldn't be conducice to running tranining. Of course these are all generalizeation. Discuss.
I was in the business world and couldn't deal with many corporate "things". I was a manager, I had a single mother working 30 hours per week and she got insurance for herself and her kids. My boss told me to cut her to 29 hours so she would lose insurance and the multi- billion dollar multi-national corporation would save a few thousand dollars a year. I refused to do it and eventually quit.
Not all runners are big pussies that have to sit behind a computer all day.
I've been working in the "corporate" world for two years now at a Fortune 100 company and it's no big deal...you can be very successful without being some tough guy that's a dick to everyone.....
mcordi wrote:
I was in the business world and couldn't deal with many corporate "things". I was a manager, I had a single mother working 30 hours per week and she got insurance for herself and her kids. My boss told me to cut her to 29 hours so she would lose insurance and the multi- billion dollar multi-national corporation would save a few thousand dollars a year. I refused to do it and eventually quit.
What company was that? It won't hurt to tell will it? Are a lot of places like this? Are the hours always long when you get to the top of these corporations? What happens if you just say screw it and leave at 5 or 6 no matter what.
I am one of many runners in our Fortune 500 corporation. I put in 50-55 hours per week doing R&D stuff and could probably move up into the managerial ranks if I was willing to handle more hours, stress and travel. But I like my work-life balance and the fact that I can put 50-60 miles per week without impacting other aspects of my life. There are usually not many people there when I leave at 5 or 5:30, but I get to work at 7:30 and have no trouble finishing 95% of my job at work.
You're generally right about distance runners and the corporate world. There are few obsessive runners who make it to the top, if only because their work is designed around their training, not the other way. This is especially at their peak competitive years, which is unfortunately the same time you have to suffer the high-cost-low benefit corporate crap in order to move up.
Now, I've known quite a few business types who become quite competent runners because of their hi-achieving natures. Generally they're regarded as pretenders to the running scene, in spite of sometimes being pretty good.
Key is to hook up with other runners.
Rise high enough to make our own work day: I run to work, so am in super early, all my work is project based so no one really cares about my hours. I travel a reasonable amount (and always run, to sightsee, in the visited city).
My running is good for watercooler talk (and I am always good for the Corporate Challenge!).
I find my running to have been a bonus: I run with corporate types at lunch--great networking, and a number of headhunters I know are runners, so they get all enthusiastic about other runners and can put you in touch with like-minded hiring managers, that sort of thing.
That said, yes, engineering/software has a higher percentage of runners than does my line of work...
In the corporate world, I've always found that they're off and running. BA-HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!
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90% of the guys and gals I ran with in my college's running club were engineering and science majors. It was a big club and I only remember one business major. Same thing with the triathlon club.