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About

Meet Chris Lubrano

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From Brooklyn, NY to Chiangmai, Thailand - with 4 careers, 5 industries and 4+ decades of work experience

CAREERS

  1. Software Development

  2. Organization Effectiveness, Learning and Change

  3. Business Strategy Consulting

  4. Career & Transition Coaching

INDUSTRIES

  1. IT

  2. Investment Banking

  3. Insurance

  4. Consulting

  5. Manufacturing

  • LinkedIn
Image by Clark Tibbs

Developmental Years

I was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York.  My mother was a teacher’s aide and my father was a construction worker.  In my family, you were either a construction worker or a dock worker.  My brother and I were in the first generation to go to college.  Through my mom’s determination to teach us everything from how to read to how to reach for what we wanted, and through my father’s sheer physical strength getting up to go to work each day to lay brick after brick, both my brother and I attended Columbia University and got an amazing education. From our parents, we learned how to do what we needed to do with no excuses.  Life wouldn’t always play fair, but inner strength and determination would carry us through.  I have also learned that work is only one part of life and that you must find wonder and enjoyment in what surrounds you daily - especially the little things.  My wife taught me this.

LOVE

I met my wife about 18 years ago.  We both wish we could have met each other 20 years before that. Being a Buddhist, she reminds me that we’ll meet again and again in all our future lives.  We laugh at this, but there is a part of me that knows this will be true.  She is a Psychoanalyst and continually teaches me about human behavior, about what motivates people, and about myself. I cherish every moment we are together.

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My older brother has literally been with me since day one.  We can just look at each other and laugh at the jokes that we are about to tell, we know each other so well.  He’s an award-winning journalist and even his text messages are written perfectly, with just the right amount of information, humour, and structure. It's amazing what he can do with only a few hundred characters.

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My two nieces are a source of pride.  They will grow to become strong women capable of changing the world.  I love them with no limits. 

Getting Off the Floor, Moving Forward

I started practicing Karate when I was a freshman at Columbia University.  I was 18 years old and practiced every day.  I was in the same university club as an instructor and coach 20 years later.  Life circumstances and injury forced me to quit the club.  I had cervical spine surgery and a long period of recovery.  I remember my first walk early in my recovery; it took 10 minutes to go 1 city block.  After many months, I recovered and I still practice Karate to this day, albeit much more slowly and with no flashy techniques.  I learned so much about perseverance, the value of practice and literally how to get off the floor and keep moving forward.  I was never the best, fastest or technically the most proficient, but I never quit.  I met lifelong friends back when I first walked into the dojo and can’t imagine my life without Karate or without all the teachers and coaches I had.

Pure Joy and Inspiration

Boy, I wish we had apps and Youtube videos back when we started our first band. To learn new music, we used an old cassette tape recorder, recorded songs from the radio, and did our best to figure things out.  We guessed a lot; coming close was good enough.  When we were lucky enough to play small clubs, dances or coffee houses, we used rented and borrowed second hand equipment.  It was pure joy.  Now I have apps, my favorite Youtubers, and am learning the lessons I skipped as a young guitar player.  Still pure joy to pick up the guitar.

Teaching In Order to Learn

I was lucky enough to teach at both Columbia University and New York University. I taught computer programming at Teachers College, Columbia University and Leadership, Management and Ethics at New York University.  My students were some of the best teachers I ever had. At Teachers College, I had the chance to help develop a (then) new computer language that enabled even those in the poorest countries without a computer, to learn the concepts of computing and be ready when  computers were more available.  And  I had the opportunity to teach computer programming to other educators who had no prior computing knowledge.
At New York University, we discussed management theories and the difference between being a leader and being a manager.  But it was during the Ethics units where the discussions and debates were impassioned.  Since the classes were multicultural, the study of Ethics – of right and wrong -  wasn’t always clear or straightforward.  We wrestled with dilemmas and did our best to understand what would be the most responsible course of action given a challenging set of circumstances.  I am indebted to my students and hope that I was as good a teacher to them as they were to me.

​Learning to be Prepared – Early Career

During the first 5 years of my career, I was a software developer and thrilled to actually get paid for what I learned in college.  And I learned very important career lessons.  After the first year of my very first job, I was asked to leave because I could not relocate when the company moved its offices hundreds of miles away.  There was no warning, no well-wishes, no empathy.  They told me I had 2 days to clean out my desk and go.  So I did and moved on to better things.  I learned how important it is to be prepared, as best you can, for when career or life circumstances change.

​Finding Meaning and Fulfillment (and also Getting Off the Floor Again) - Mid-Career

These years represented the core of my experience, where I changed careers several times and learned lasting lessons about how organizations work, how people within organizations behave and how to be resilient in the face of significant change. 

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Overly Starched at an Investment Bank

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After my software development experience, I transitioned to the Investment Banking industry to lead entry-level training and organization effectiveness.  Its where I learned about wearing pin-stripped suits, shining my shoes and having way too much starch in my shirt collars.  As the head of entry-level training for newly hired software developers, I reasoned I needed to set an example of how a professional should conduct themselves.  So, I wore my suit jacket every time I left my desk, never loosened my tie, and sat on the edge of my chair to avoid wrinkling the back of my shirt. I never leaned back.   Its good to act professionally, but a few wrinkles shows character.  Despite my overly crisp appearance, I did mange to help 100’s of newly hired employees join the workforce and establish careers. It was gratifying to see these folks become successful and reach their goals.  After about 12 years in this role, I left the company and challenged myself to become a Business Strategy consultant.

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Weary as a Business Strategy Consultant

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My 2 years as a Business Strategy Consultant were tough, demanding and at times, chaotic.  It seemed I was busy 24X7, guiding clients, directing teams of consultants and managing the unrelenting pace of project work.  If it weren’t for the bright, creative, and tenacious teams I had the privilege to lead, I would not have succeeded.  They put the client first and despite sometimes new or changing requirements and a grueling schedule, never sacrificed the quality of their work.

 

Frequently Flying in the Insurance Industry

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Following this experience, and with much sharper consulting skills, I went back to my roots in learning and organization effectiveness and joined the insurance industry.  My first role for about 4 years was once again leading entry-level training and managing a new hire training program.  But I was really enamoured with the title of my next role, likely the most intriguing role name I ever had “International Organization Effectiveness Consultant”.  Due to mergers and corporate re-organizations, my job was to help branch offices around the world adapt to new structures and ways of working.  I amassed about 1 million frequent flyer miles by this time and was so grateful I had the opportunity to experience different cultures and meet people who saw the world differently than I did.  What an education and what a quest!

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Merging in the Manufacturing Industry

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After about 9 years as an international organization effectiveness wanderer, the next transition was to the manufacturing industry. Another ambition I had was to start an organization effectiveness practice where it did not exist.  In the manufacturing company, I was given the opportunity to do this and to lead Organization Effectiveness, Leadership, Talent Management, Culture and Change.  The 9 years I spent in this role was a great summary of my corporate career.  The company merged several times and I was given responsibility for organization design and culture change. In completing this work, I applied all the lessons I learned from all the prior roles I’d had and all the mentors, coaches and colleagues I’d worked with.  I enjoyed this work and felt I’d accomplished what I set out to do within the corporate world.  Now it was time to re-invent myself and my career.

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Always Getting Up and Taking the Next Step

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What I didn’t mention to this point is that I did not make all of these transitions by choice.  In many cases, circumstances around me shifted and caused me to find new opportunities.  One company was acquired and my role was eliminated.  One went bankrupt due to severe mismanagement and all employees were eliminated.  Another downsized to pay steep fines and half the company was let go. 

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While much of this I could not foresee, in each case – just like in Karate – I recovered from the sting, got off the floor and worked hard to figure out what was next.  I learned early in my career to be prepared, to understand your value and your worth, and to put your energy into building your future should the unexpected occur.  With the help of friends, family, and through my experience, I learned that it was best to focus my energy moving forward rather than railing at the past.  What happened, happened, time to move forward and find fulfillment and meaning in the next adventure.

​The Next Adventure – Present Day

I recently completed a 40+ year corporate career and my wife and I relocated to Thailand, her birthplace and our new adventure.  I’m learning a new language, culture and set of social norms.  So many stories. And I am doing what I always wanted to do at this stage of life.  I’m an independent consultant and coach, codifying the lessons I learned so that I can help others. Hopefully, you and I can work together.  You too are empowered to find your next adventure!

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