The Resilient Career

Maximizing Happiness

For my entire career I’ve made conscious choices to move to the next organization, and likely the next job within a company. Or an unexpected opportunity has presented itself and I have chosen to jump at it. In all cases, it has been at a time and place of my own choosing.

From this frame of reference I have told job seekers to “start by knowing yourself”. I’ve told them to know their values, how they like to work, the kind of place they want to work — and then to go find somewhere to work that meets those needs. Overall, I don’t think this is bad advice. You SHOULD have self-awareness or you will risk choosing roles for the wrong reason. But now, I must apologize to those job seekers — this is a start, but it’s not all there is to surviving and thriving in the workforce.

Some of you may recognize the Japanese philosophy of ikigai, which is sort of what I’ve been getting at with the “what you love” and “what you’re good at” pieces:

I really love this idea of matching up what you love, what you’re good at, what the world needs, and what you can get paid for. Great idea. But there is a challenge with this: you can’t control what the world needs, and you definitely can’t control what you get paid for.