From
my own personal reflection of where I am and where I want to be; to the young
professional who indicated her desire for her chosen long-term profession and
is preparing to take a salary cut to get to where she wants; a friend who has
gone through a negative experience in her company but in the process discovered
a gap in organisations that requires her skills and experience, which is
leading her to create her own advisory business; a friend who is about to
embark on a career change so fundamental it both scares and excites her; a
young man about to leave a lucrative career in investment banking and join a
leading strategy advisory consultancy because that will stretch his mind more.
In
all this, I learnt that the real issue we face is not always about the
frustration of the present; it is not on the inability of others to give us
what will make us happy. It is not in the failure of organisations to advance
our careers and interests the way we would have expected. In saying that, I am
not discounting the long-term risks that organisations face by failing to take
care of their people. My reflection is on you and me as individuals who exist
inside organisations and not just because of them.
The
real issue is that we should focus on that which we desire, rather than that which
we do not like. As one leadership professor told me, “If you get rid of what you do not want, it does not follow that what
remains is what you want”. If it does not exist but is desired in society,
how do we make sure that it is apparent and we get an opportunity to do it?
Focus on roles, responsibilities and opportunities that we will both have an
impact and enjoy.
The
most profound lesson for me though is from the friend who is about to embark on
a fundamental career change. She has been working for about twenty years.
Having consulted a career counsellor, a retired university professor, he has
told her she will never have a happy corporate career. And he emphasised that
this was not about competence. That she is likely to thrive on a different
environment which he has given her useful ideas on. At the end of their
dialogue, he gave her this simple but powerful conclusion: “you must know if you are going the route I
advise, you might earn less money than you earn now. But the guarantee is that
you will be happy." She is now on a different journey altogether and
creating a path to real career happiness.
Each
one of us reaches those moments where we need to let go of the frustrations and
apparent stability of the present for a happy yet unpredictable future. It does
not all have to result in sacrifice of income. All of us as individuals
actually did this when we looked for our first job.
It is better to spend
your energy on positively defining your future than on the challenges of the
present. Lest you lose your confidence, creativity and character.
