In graduate school I had to take a class I wasn’t very excited about, career counseling. It was a required class which I trudged through, but I did come across something I found interesting and have used often. Career coaches often use this information when helping people find a best fit job for their clients. What they have found is that just because you are good at something doesn’t necessarily mean you will enjoy it or should pursue it as a career. On the other hand, just because you enjoy something, it doesn’t necessarily mean you are good at it. (Just think about the American Idol tryouts – eeek!) Therefore, you shouldn’t always be seeking a career doing a certain thing just because you enjoy it.
Take a look at the following career chart:
You will notice that in the first block we have an area which represents the activities we enjoy performing which energizes us, we are good at, but we may not get to do often. In the top right block we have things we are good at, energizes us, and we get to do often. Below in the right block, we have our learned behaviors, which are things we do often, we are good at, but we may not enjoy doing. The last block shows our weaknesses, which means we really don’t like doing them and we don’t do them well. We should avoid most activities (jobs) that fall into this category.
The point to categorizing our activities is to understand why we do what we do and how to best choose between which activities we should stick to and what priorities they should hold in our lives. When looking for a career, it would be great if you can find a job that we are good at, energizes us and we have plenty of experience in. I find that most of us end up in the lower right category when it comes to our jobs – we are good at it, but we don’t really enjoy doing it. Since we spend so much of our waking life at work, being in this category makes it difficult to lead a fulfilling and high energy life.
Practically speaking what I have found to be most fulfilling is to keep your vocations on the right side of the block, ideally in the top but in the lower block if that is meeting your needs while you attempt to move into the top block. Then keep your hobbies in the top left block while avoiding the bottom left as much as possible.
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