If you're like many professionals in business and finance, you probably feel as if your career is outside the realm of your control. You may believe that professional success and satisfaction is an ever-elusive mirage on the horizon.
The good news
On a personal level, you can manage your career more effectively than you may realize. There is a series of patterns you can follow to get on the right path, make midcourse corrections, or reinvigorate a stalled career. These same patterns can also be taught to students and children to increase the odds that they will realize their goals over time.
At a collective level, it is important to remember that despite the many problems in the world, we live in the most affluent society in the history of the world. In the U.S. and other developed economies, there are national cultures of meritocracy and hard work.
We also have the gift of mobility. Today, individuals are allowed to relocate and pursue opportunities to a degree that would have been unthinkable in decades past for most regions of the world.
The best and brightest
So what are the patterns for successfully managing a career, and where do they come from? Rick Smith and I performed statistical analyses of over 1 million professionals, completed an exhaustive survey of more than 2,000 executives, and conducted over 300 interviews with individuals ranging from recently graduated MBAs to some of the most visible names in business.
We were searching for the differences between the most successful people in business and the rest of the pack. It is in these differences that we determined the causes, not just the explanations, of success.
Three patterns of success
To crack the code, you should commit to the following with patience and perseverance:
Find the right fit
True success comes when you work in a position that plays to your natural strengths, is meaningful to you, and allows you to work with people you genuinely like and respect.
Surveys by the Conference Board and other organizations routinely find that job satisfaction is at a low point, with more than 50 percent of workers reportedly dissatisfied in their jobs.
A more discouraging statistic we found is that only 1 in 10 working professionals believe that they are in positions that play to their greatest strengths in areas that they are passionate about. In contrast, the vast majority of extraordinary executives believe that they are in positions that play to their strengths and passions.
So how do you move toward the right fit? First, make your career decisions with the following questions in mind:
- Do you like and respect the employees?
- Can you imagine having a best friend at work?
- Do you aspire to become like the most senior members of the organization?
- Does the role play to your strengths?
- Are you fundamentally interested in whatever it is that the organization does?
Second, develop and follow role models. Study the people who are living the life you want to live. Find out how they achieved their results, where they came from, and what actions they took over time.
Try to find creative ways to meet your role models and get their advice. Are they speaking at a conference? Can you convince their secretaries to give you a meeting?
Finally, be prepared to make trade-offs in the short term to achieve what you want down the road.
It is inevitable that there will be tensions between working the ideal job, achieving the compensation you desire, and being able to maintain the lifestyle you want in terms of time demands, control over your schedule, commuting, and travel. Try to find the right balance among these three competing forces and adapt over time.
Overcome the "Permission Paradox."
It's the great catch-22 of seeking a career: You can't get the job without the experience, but you can't get the experience without the job.
This is what we call the Permission Paradox, and overcoming it is one of the patterns of extraordinary careers. Think of waiting tables at just the right moment when a movie producer walks in and discovers you, or of being a golf caddy for a business leader who likes your work ethic and offers you a job.
There are more realistic ways. Cultivate mentors who can give you the right introductions. Expand your responsibilities in your current role by volunteering for a stretch work assignment in the most troubled part of your organization. Pursue an advanced degree or industry credential that will give you access to new opportunities.
If you want to make a big change out of your organization into a fundamentally new role, make it a two step process. Try to move within your current organization, where you already have a track record and hopefully strong relationships. This will give you the required experience to move to a new organization in that same new role.
Make those around you successful
We call this Benevolent Leadership. Our research found that 90 percent of extraordinary executives focus as much or more on making those who work with them or for them successful as on their own success.
You'll achieve success — guaranteed —if you follow this practice and make those with whom you work successful.
Why? You attract the best people to work with you, and the best people generate the best results. People you've helped and supported will in turn become motivated to help you be successful. It's been said one way or another for thousands of years: What goes around comes around.
The more you give, the more you get in return. Don't think that you have to be at a certain level in the organization to follow this pattern. Benevolent Leadership works at any level, from intern to chief executive officer.
Go to Work
So what are you waiting for? You can begin thinking and acting differently in your career right now, and get on the path that leads you to your greatest hopes and dreams.
Related link
Previous articles by Jim Citrin can be found at
Yahoo! Finance
Copyright © 2006 Yahoo! Reprinted by permission.