Nick Murphy, former NFL punter and CEO of MidAmerica Careers, says don't stay in jobs you hate. He emphasizes serving the right audience to build reputation and revenue, warns against perfectionism, and defines happiness as freedom over time and location. He recommends Blue Ocean Strategy and credits your five closest people with shaping who you become.
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All right everyone, welcome back to another episode of the Business Blast podcast. I'm your host Tyler Wagner. Today we have Nick Murphy. He is a former NFL player and a seasoned career expert. The CEO of MidAmerica Careers, and the host of the top 50 careers podcast on iTunes called The Job Lab. His insights have been featured by Fox News Radio, USA Today, The Wall Street Journal, Yahoo.com, Business Insider, Inc.com, and dozens of local and regional outlets. So welcome to the show, man.
Thanks for having me. Good to be here.
Of course. Grateful to have you here. We'll dive right in. The first question I have for you, Nick, is what is the best story from your life that has an underlying valuable message?
I guess the valuable message is in the ears of the listener, but when I was playing in the NFL and bouncing around back and forth, there was so many different times I could have thrown in the towel trying to make a living being a professional punter of all positions, right? There's no backups. There's no other leagues. You can be the 33rd best in the world and not have a job at all. I think just scrapping through that and being committed to making it happen was So, something just, you know, it's about persistence, it's about commitment. Obviously, sometimes breaks go your way, sometimes they don't, but I was able to sign 7 contracts in 4 years and get a handful of regular season games and have some really, really great stories. And more importantly, I think I just learned a ton about myself and what I'm capable of doing, and I've kind of carried that with me throughout the rest of my career.
And what is the most valuable piece of information we should know that's within your expertise or industry?
Don't spend a second longer than you absolutely have to in a job that you hate. We only live once. We spend a lot of our time in our careers at work. And if you're truly, truly unhappy with what you're doing and it's not fulfilling in any way aside from just a paycheck, start right now and go figure out a way to find something that you care about that can also pay your bills. Don't jump ship right now, but don't settle for something less than what you're happy with, especially if it's making you unhappy or unhealthy.
And it could tie in with this next question, but what's your best piece of like overall business advice? So like somebody that's maybe just starting out, like what would you tell them?
Think about who you can serve. You know, when you're serving the right people, when you understand your avatar, your persona, who it is that you're trying to help with your product, your service, your company, good things tend to happen, the money tends to follow. So if you can be committed to serving your audience, serving your customers, your clients every single day, chances are that your reputation will precede you down the road and the money will follow. Might take a little while, but, uh, just, just trust that that's the right thing to do. And if you operate that way, you'll be successful in the end.
And if you could give your younger self one piece of advice, what would that be?
It doesn't have to be perfect, just has to get done. Um, I think just, you know, I've been— I don't want to say like analysis paralysis, but there's times where I'm a perfectionist and I want things to be right, and I want to make sure that things I launch, things that I put out there are flawless, and I don't know that that's fully possible. So, it's something that I honestly still struggle with. It's just working through the process and getting a little bit better at releasing things and pushing things out there that may or may not be exactly perfect, knowing full well that they're going to have a lot of iteration along the way and probably never fully be done.
And in your opinion, what is the key to happiness?
Freedom. Being able to choose how you spend your time, who you spend it with, and kind of where you are. So, it doesn't necessarily require oodles of money, although financial freedom helps. But I think people hear financial freedom and think that you have to be a multimillionaire. And I don't really think that's true. I think if you can keep a roof over your head and keep your family healthy, can afford to travel a little bit and be in a place that you love, I think everything else is just icing on the cake.
And what is the best book that you've read and what was the number one thing you learned from that?
I read a ton of books. I probably read more books since I started my podcast about 6 months ago than I had in the last several years. But Blue Ocean Strategy is a really great one for me if you're a business dork and you're interested in just how companies kind of come in and create industries that didn't exist. I mean, Uber totally displaced cab drivers and taxis in an industry that didn't exist just by thinking about it differently. So Blue Ocean Strategy is a great one if you're into that kind of thing.
And what is your favorite quote and why?
Gosh, I should probably have one like top of mind, and I really, I really can't think of a great one, to be honest with you.
So it could be— it doesn't have to be word for word. Maybe it could be like a mantra, like, or something like that.
Yeah, I think you're the average of the 5 people you spend the most time with is a really good way to think about it. If you're aspiring to get to a certain level, make sure that you're surrounding yourself with people that are already there or on their way up. Don't surround yourself with the people that are going to pull you back and keep you where you are. Perfect, man.
Dude, thank you so much for coming on. The last question that I have for you before we let you go is, where is the best place for people to find and/or connect with you online?
Probably on LinkedIn. You can find me on LinkedIn just under Nick Murphy, or I'm happy to provide the, uh, the link directly if you want to put in the show notes.
Perfect. And I, and I will put it in the show notes for everybody listening. And thanks again for coming on, Nick.
Yeah, thank you.
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