I Love My Job: Vic Pergola Helping People Reinvent Themselves
By Deborah Burke
Vic Pergola meets most of his clients when they areat a personally painful point in their careers or personal relationships. Crisis can be a potentially transformative time – a turning point in people's lives – one which Vic considers rich soil for reinventing oneself. “When individuals lose a job or cannot find one, when they retire, when a relationship fails, it is an opportunity to make fundamental changes in their lives,” he says. “I listen to their stories about their journeys and offer them tools to find pragmatic solutions to their problems.” In some cases this means teaching people how to make money, something he admits to struggling with himself as a young man.
Vic, now 58, left home when he was 13 to enter a Catholic seminary where he received classical training in languages and scripture. He left the seminary prior to ordination only to find that his education had failed him. “I was unable to determine how to use my education and training to make money,” he says. “It took me decades to figure it out.”
Following a variety of jobs that included teaching religious education and working in a factory – a time Vic characterizes as extremely painful – he was invited to become a career counselor at a Cleveland-based company. “I adapted to this work very quickly,” he recalls. “I didn't find the complexity and depth of people’s life journeys and their problems overwhelming. I could sit and listen with interest to their stories for hours and then offer them pragmatic solutions.”
Fourteen years, and 1,300 individual and corporate clients later, Vic has opened his own consulting company where he provides mentoring and life coaching. When a former client noted that Vic's work seemed to be about helping people with decisions in their lives, Vic named his company DecisionPoint. The company's purpose is to provide guidance through career and life decisions for individuals age 17 to 70 as well as help corporate and non-profit clients with business strategy, human resources issues and executive capacity.
Individuals in the 17 to 25-year age group are confused and in pain, Vic says, because their education has failed to help them move successfully from school into a job. “Like me at that age, they don't know how to become economic,” he says. Complicating their transition is a tendency to be a bit spoiled, yet he revels in helping them find pathways to wholeness.
The 28 to 40 age group is the smallest demographic group in America, according to Vic. As such, constituents are under enormous pressure to accomplish and achieve due to retiring baby boomers, a decrease in the workforce population and the continual merging and stream-lining of work and organizations. These individuals also want to create balance in their lives, achieve financial security and have an impact on society.
The baby boomers seek Vic out after being laid off or arriving on the brink of retirement. “This is a group that has to reinvent itself,” he says. “It takes courage to train oneself to do something else after spending an entire career in a steel mill.” The task is hampered by Ohio's position as the second-lowest state in job generation.
Actually, Vic advocates reinventing ourselves throughout life. “We should be going on quests,” he says. To do so requires courage, boldness and effort. He wants us to take an intellectual and spiritual scalpel to what we have been taught. “We have to learn not to be controlled by the myths and dogmas with which we grew up,” he says.
In other words, we have to be willing to face ourselves, which is the path to spiritual, pragmatic and economic sustenance. To assist people in this process, Vic helps clients to understand their personality by administering a proven personality test. He then asks them to engage themselves more deeply by reflecting in verbal and written exercises on every part of their lives – work, love, happiness – or the relational, economic and fulfillment components which are critical to becoming whole. “People need hugs and money and mortgages and fun,” he laughs. “It is all important.”
Some people do not want to make the effort. Those who do are apt to groan and struggle through the writing assignments. “That's a good sign,” he says, “because once people start writing, they usually cannot stop. It all pours out. Then they find out why they are suffering. Courage and discipline pay off in an 'aha!' moment.”
Following these inner discoveries, Vic offers a practical and realistic evaluation of the current situation and helps clients target their strengths. He provides hands-on tools for tackling the challenges at hand. He also provides psychological, theological and spiritual – which is broadly ecumenical – support throughout this in-depth process.
Take for example a 40-year-old female executive named Jane (a pseudonym has been used). Jane approached DecisionPoint when she became disenchanted with extensive traveling for her job, concerned about developing hostility in the work place and aware of an inner nudge to explore “what next?” in her career. Jane also had elderly parents who required more and more of her attention, so she desired to be geographically closer to them.
Following mentoring and coaching meetings with Vic, Jane decided to resign from her current position with the goal of achieving dignity, honor and a substantial severance package. Vic helped her secure all three and she made a peaceful exit. Jane moved to Northeast Ohio to be closer to her elderly parents. She began extensive work with Vic on her temperament profile and completed the writing assignments. Vic helped her secure 50 interviews in four months as she identified different sectors of the economy, specific jobs and volunteer opportunities that might be part of the “next step.” Jane reinvented herself by shifting into entirely new work in an entirely new sector of the economy with a corporation that offered growth and opportunity. Vic is currently helping Jane make a smooth transition.
In addition to personal coaching and mentoring, Vic works with corporations and non-profit businesses primarily on human-resource issues that prevent the company from thriving. He usually begins with personality testing to help individuals and small-management teams understand their own perspectives and those of their colleagues. He focuses on leadership styles, communication and team work. His experiences have led him to the conclusion that American business needs the female virtues and strengths now more than ever. “The feminine listens and is empathetic,” he says.
“I love what I do,” Vic sighs contentedly. “My work enables me to have a real impact in the lives of people as I help them with major decisions. I remain fascinated, astonished even, at the breadth and scope of differing personalities and lived experiences. I so much enjoy the complexity of weaving together the psychological, spiritual and pragmatic into a successful pattern of living. It is difficult and lonely work sometimes, but when that 'aha!' moment comes to people, it is extraordinary to see the difference it makes. I love watching people reinvent their lives and become happier.”
Vic Pergola and his wife Maureen live in Lakewood. They have three sons. Vic can be reached by e-mail at VPergola@mydecisionpoint.com, or for information on his company, visit www.mydecisionpoint.com or call (216) 469-6764.
