Career Through An Investment Lens
One piece of advice I frequently give my younger peers is to think of their career in investment terms; the qualifications and degrees you accrue are the baseline capital from which your portfolio grows. Ultimately therefore, where you end up is largely determined by the strategic choices you make:
I came to this realisation a couple of years ago when I was at the crossroads in my very own career. Passionate about public health and somewhat dissatisfied with the projected trajectory of my career back then, I had to decide between taking a leap of faith and going to the United States to study at Yale, or continuing the safe and well trodden path of medical training in the United Kingdom.
For a couple of weeks I pondered this deeply. I 'future-projected' if you will, and envisioned various scenarios of my life in 10, 15 and 20 years time, depending on the choice I made.
That's when it hit me: your resume is ultimately a record of your marketable-skills, or 'career-capital'. Renewable career-cheques in short. Once obtained these can be cashed in or 'banked' in various directions, to take you to a given destination. Along the way, you pick up more career-cheques and cash-in as you see fit.
Whether others perceive you as foolish matters not however, if your investments are carried out in a rational, thorough and objective manner that will take you to the final destination.
Career-cheques differ from their fiscal counterparts on account of their renewable nature. No one can ever take my medical degree away, and I can cash it in to become an attending in any speciality, or to effectively market my skillset in a different industry, if I so desire.
Each career-cheque can be caterogised into bronze, silver and gold according to market-value and depending on the direction you wish to take. For me therefore, an MPH from Yale was a gold career-cheque, and far more valuable for the direction I wished to pursue than continuing along the path I was on.
Be strategic. Be rational. And be fiercely determined to reach your destination.
Decide where you want to be in 20 years time, do your research and speak to those in that industry, and then determine the career cheques that are most valuable in taking you there. For high achievers used to having praised lavished on them, this can be particularly difficult because the ego gets in the way as do the opinions of others. Whether others perceive you as foolish matters not however, if your investments are carried out in a rational, thorough and objective manner that will take you to the final destination. Collecting bronze career cheques so that others will think highly of you is an absolute waste of time.
Be strategic. Be rational. And be fiercely determined to reach your destination.
Godspeed!
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