Figuring out your career as an adult
I have been working full time for 4 years now. 2 of those years were on a graduate scheme, and the rest I have been left to my own devices. When you are on a scheme, they have a path for you to follow over the scheme or a series of options for you to choose from. But when you are off the scheme, you are left in the deep end to figure out where to take your career. So, how do you figure that out as an adult?
How it looks to try and figure things out in anything, but definitely the career part is the hardest part for me.
No one knows what will work for you, because they aren’t you
Getting advice from people is handy and great but using their words to make your decision isn’t ideal. None of those people know you. If you’re like me you will have a different personality at work, so the people at work will not be suggesting information that will actually help you, but what will help the version of you they know.
These people don’t know you, like you know you. If your gut still says no after 6 months (12 months max) of settling in, then go, don’t let anyone talk you out of it. I spent 3 years thinking I didn’t enjoy my job. Turns out I knew I was getting comfortable, and I fear being comfortable because it means I wouldn’t leave and get to experience things because of the comfort. That was my first job and to think I could be comfortable to stay there till retirement, when I was there from the age of 22 was really scary. That’s over 40 years in the same team, working on the same things – that’s crazy to me.
Your manager saying ‘You have amazing potential’ is just as much a reason to boost your confidence, as it is a reason to encourage you to fall into the pyramid scheme of staying in the job and taking on more responsibility. The workplace is full of inspiration propaganda, because a workplace only survives, if there are people there to work. So, they need to keep you there, by whatever means. So, a manager celebrating your achievements within the team, but not listening to your interests and your career ambitions, is still a poor manager. So, no need to stay with them if the job is no longer serving its purpose, whether that is specific experience, specific connections to build or a specific tactical job move (promotion or pay rise).
What is a ‘dream job’?
A fictional idea? An oversimplified version of the truth? A pyramid scheme? Honestly, I don’t know but from my experience, a dream job is NOT REAL. I don’t have a dream job. No aspiration to go to a designated place in my industry. Why do I have to focus on some end goal, when I can just enjoy the journey?
No matter how much I do express this, no one seems to really listen to me. I understand that companies want us to be ambitious and have drive, but I have ambitions to experience as much as I can in my career, in a reasonable order. What’s so bad about that?
I am very happy for those individuals who have found a passion they want to stick with, or an end goal they strive to achieve. I don’t have nor want that. I may only be in my 20s but I have experienced that feeling of achieving a goal and then I’m like ‘hmm what’s next?’ I don’t want to feel that in my career. I want to see where the road takes me. Paint a colourful path, have fun with it, and then when I’m ready (and hopefully my finances will be too) I reach a point where I say ‘ Wow, employment was a drag, but I have had a decent amount of fun here. Let me retire and see what I can do with the rest of my life, not in employment.’ – Isn’t that beautiful?
“Darling, I do not dream of labour”
It’s all a game
The company is not an inanimate object, it’s a living breathing entity, and greedily wants all the advantage and benefit. Yes, moving through your career is handy when you have a network of reliable people in good places. But having the skill of communicating in corporate and playing the game well, is how you get through.
People like to have their egos stroked. It’s really annoying, but as much we want to fight against it, the system is built on it. And those big egos tend to run the game. So, if you want to get the result you want, you got to play and play it good. This is corporate bs (bull s). You’re able to use language that comes across eloquent, well thought through AND appeals to those egos. They just want to hear that you are a reasonably naïve, but easily trainable individual, who seemingly has fallen for the trap of the corporate world, and that they can break with more experience. Give them that, and hopefully they give you the promotion, the flexible arrangements, the deal whatever it is, and then do whatever you want after that.
I don’t make it very clear about the importance of work-life balance to me, until the ink has dried on the contract. They love the idea of us breaking ourselves to try and get ahead, so let me make it out like that. And then I clock off at the end of my contracted hours. My lunch break is taken in full. My work phone is off out of hours. And don’t think that the whatsapp group chat isn’t on mute 24/7, because my colleagues are not my friends. And if they were my friends, I would choose to hang out with them and see their faces, not text on the group chat every night.
Lastly, it’s not THAT serious
Even though your career will take up the majority of your adult life, it’s not the end of the world if you change your mind or make a decision you regret. You are never trapped. Every place will always feel new and uncomfortable. It’s not that serious. Also, if you were no longer on the earth the company would keep going. So, taking a break and taking your time with your career, away from other opinions is not a bad thing, it’s actually necessary since they aren’t you.
I work with someone who’s life is their job, and everything is always marked as ‘important’. Yet when I read it or hear them talk, my brain is like ‘What was the important part?’ – I am constantly sat there waiting to hear the true jaw-dropping news, but there isn’t anything. It’s so anticlimactic, the person becomes irritating the second they email me or open their mouth. It’s like the boy who cried wolf, and I really don’t care if he is telling the truth anymore. I am so desensitised to their words that they have lost meaning. It’s not that serious to me. And quite frankly a lot of things in adulting are not that serious.
It’s really not that serious
‘Duh’
I titled this post as ‘Figuring out your career’, not ‘How to figure it out’, because there isn’t a handbook to follow. I used to think there was something wrong with me, because I wasn’t as driven as the people who wanted to climb the corporate ladder. But I have realised, climbing the ladder isn’t a priority to me, which means my career is spent exploring what I can do with it. Figuring it out IS the end goal for me. I hope to look back when I’m retired at how colourful and varied and vast my carrier was. Right now, in the last 4 years I have experienced 4 different jobs, and I am currently planning my move to the next one (because my current one is way to serious, and I don’t think it’s that deep, but it has been a good experience here). But yeah, those guys ahead of us, make it seem like we need to have it figured out, but we don’t and that’s the beauty of figuring it out.
TL;DR
- No one knows what will work for you, because they aren’t you
- no need to stay with them if the job is no longer serving its purpose, whether that is specific experience, specific connections to build or a specific tactical job move (promotion or pay rise)
- I have ambitions to experience as much as I can in my career, not reach 1 specific goal
- You are never trapped
- It’s not that serious - No matter how much they make it a big deal, it’s really not. The world will keep spinning and that company will keep going, without you.
