KNOW WHAT YOU VALUE TO DETERMINE CAREER DIRECTION After examining your talents and passions (and also here), considering your values is an important piece in determining career direction. Values, in this sense, are not values that we should all strive for like integrity and honesty, but your personal work and lifestyle values that are unique to you. Oftentimes, I see that values are the first thing that gets neglected when considering career decisions, but they really help people eliminate certain career options or certain work environments more effectively than talents and passions do. How do I determine what I value?
In beginning to discuss lessons in personal leadership, I want to first define what I mean by “personal” leadership. Quite simply, this is the ability to lead yourself. It’s difficult if not impossible to have the capacity to lead others if you don’t have the ability to guide yourself in achieving outcomes that are important to you. To do this though, you have to first know what is important to you! Unfortunately many people, don’t sit down an actively consider what their priorities are based on what their purpose is, so therefore they end up letting things that aren’t aligned
A WAY TO AVOID BEING MISERABLE Coupled with understanding your talents, discovering what your passionate about is a critical piece in determining career direction. I find, though, that many people forego incorporating their passion and even their talents into career choices because they don’t think they can make money doing it or they are afraid they will fail. While I’m an advocate for understanding the marketplace and the demand for certain skills before making career choices, I also believe that people putting aside their gifts and passions end up leaving themselves in very undesirable states. Consider this quote in A
DO WE REALLY WANT TO HAVE IT ALL? I’ve been overwhelmed the last few weeks with the emphasis in the media and through random conversations about the focus on women. Women and their choice to stay at home or not to stay at home, to feed Cheetos for breakfast or fix homemade heart shaped pancakes instead, to take a job that demands more travel or not. About women and equality from the extremes of equal pay to the need for basic human rights for women. Women having it all or wanting it all, or “leaning in” for it all, or
The last two weeks have been devoted to finding your passions through your Holland Code and through examining people, things and ideas that you are passionate about. To make the exercises more concrete, back to the example of Graham: His Holland Code ESA (Enterprising, Social, Artistic) is his Holland Code with a strong bent towards the E. I like to call him the ultimate capitalist. Job titles connected to these areas: Enterprising Social Artistic His Top Passions Establishing and Maintaining Interpersonal Relationships Provide Consultation and Advice to Others Selling or Influencing Others Monitoring and Controlling Resources Getting Information Analyzing Data