Douglas: Welcome to the Unleash Your Potential Blog, what question can I answer for you today?
SuccessStrategist: How can I find a career that aligns with my values?
Douglas: This is an excellent question! Alignment of our actions (in this case, the work we do) and our values is critical to career satisfaction and reducing the likelihood of burnout. Let’s dig in.
There are two main steps to answering your question. At first glance, it might seem that the answers lie in analyzing different careers and to a point that would be correct. But before you jump into that step, there is a more fundamental question to be answered, what are your values?
Before finding an ideal career you have to do some self-work. You need to understand who you are, and what will fill you and what will not. Notice that I said AN ideal career and not THE ideal career. The word choice was deliberate. It may be that for different seasons of your life, the answer to this question might change. It seems that the days of being in one career for 30 years and then retiring are less and less common. On a personal note, at last count, I am somewhere between my 2nd and 3rd career. Don’t be on the lookout for the perfect fit (as I have said before perfection is not realistic) but for the best fit for where you are right now.
There are a lot of questions to help you figure out what your values are. If I were to list them all this blog would be very long indeed. Fortunately, there are many ways on the internet and other methods to find tons of questions to ask. Here are some to get you started:
Do you prefer a solitary work environment or are you fed by having people around?
Does the amount of money earn or can potentially earn make a difference? What is your ideal salary? It is okay to acknowledge that money is an object. We all have a certain lifestyle we want to be able to maintain.
Do you want a career that is the same work every day or something that provides a changing environment?
What corporate values matter to you?
Answering these and many other personal beliefs will help you to better understand what career and company will best align with your values.
I think it is worth noting that the job you have might not check all the boxes. However, unless you are independently wealthy, you have to work to provide for living expenses so you may have to do something not ideal while you find ideal. If that is the case, also consider how what you are doing now does and does not fulfill you. This provides you with valuable information for the search. I spent time in the restaurant industry at a couple of points in my life and I learned a lot about what I did and did not want in a career.
Once you have done some internal work to answer the values questions, then you need to go find a career that best matches your list. It is unlikely that you will fit into a career that checks off all the things you want and avoids all the things you don’t, but you can find a job where the balance is on the things you want and the things you don’t want are manageable.
When you are looking at careers, make sure to talk to people who are in that career. What you see on paper is only part of the equation. People working on the job are an invaluable resource. It is one of the reasons that I try to get my teacher preparation students out into the classroom as early as their first/second year. It is important to see the reality of the career before you devote a lot of time to pursuing it. It is important to know what you are getting into!
Aligning your career and your values is some of the most important work you can do. If you get it right, it makes that place you go to from “9-5” much more fulfilling, and then you can go home and rest and relax. Career satisfaction can aid in personal satisfaction. Our happiness in one impacts our happiness in the other (which can be its own blog entry).
I hope my answer sheds some light on your question. If you want to dig into this concept further, I encourage you to reach out and set up a conversation. In the meantime, check back tomorrow for the next question in the Unleash Your Potential Series!
Be Well!
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