Daryl C.The mission of our career exploration and guidance company is to help career seekers find happy and successful careers.
When evaluating a potential career path, consider these paradigms:
Purpose: The “why” you work will get you through the challenging parts of your day. Years ago, I was an intern for the US Attorney’s office. My job was to review microfiche in order to find evidence against a corrupt politician. For those too young (and fortunate!) to have never reviewed microfiche, imagine looking at a one movie frame at a time. But I still liked going to work. “I’m helping to catch a Congressman take a bribe” was the “why” and that got me through the day.
Autonomy: One of my career counseling clients, Stacy, had what many would consider a wonderful job situation. She worked at her family’s thriving company. She felt purposeful. Her grandfather had started the company and she derived purposefulness in knowing that she was helping to perpetuate the family legacy. She also was good at her job and had a reasonable amount of mastery (see below). The problem was that both Stacy’s father and sister micromanaged her. Given the relationships, this dynamic was not going to change anytime soon so Stacy grew miserable at her work, despite having both purpose and mastery in her job. She needed autonomy to have real career happiness.
Mastery: Being great a job provides both security and satisfaction. Jiro Dreams of Sushi, the brilliant documentary of the world’s top sushi chef, will provide full testament to the notion that mastery leads to happy and successful careers.
Consider whether you can attain each of these qualities as as you evaluate potential career paths.