Welcome to this 12th episode of the Happy UN Career Podcast!
I’m so pleased to see that the podcast has been well received by you who are listening to this. Because without you – there really wouldn’t be much point in doing this.
It’s very interesting to see the metrics for the different episodes and I can see already that some episodes are particularly popular. One of them is episode 10, the one I called “Take a Chance” where I interviewed my former colleague from UNDP, Mike Dodd, about how he’d taken chances in his career. So, if you haven’t heard that one yet, I’d encourage you to go back and give it a listen at www.barbarakandersen.com/10 .
Your career belongs to you
And inspired by my talk with Mike, I wanted to talk a bit more in today’s episode about how important it is to acknowledge that your career really and truly is a personal and individual thing. Your career belongs to you.
And now you might say: well, that’s obvious, isn’t it? We’re all individuals with distinct personalities, and competencies and skills. How can a career not be personal and individual?
However, so often when I talk to people (and this goes for both clients and friends and old colleagues) it strikes me that we constantly compare ourselves to others and how they’re doing. What they’re doing. Especially those that are ahead of us in terms of being at a higher level in the hierarchy or are working in areas that are somehow deemed more important or influential.
It’s easy to get a feeling that you should be more like those people, find out what they do and maybe try to do the same thing. Progress in the same way as them. And that feeds the sense that so many of us are struggling with already.
That we’re not quite measuring up.
That we’re not making the choices we ought to make. Or succeeding in the way others expect of us.
So, I have a question for you today:
Do you feel that your career has to live up to other people’s expectations?
What I have noticed is that we attach quite a bit of value to what other people think of us, and our career. How they evaluate how we’re doing in our career. What we’re doing. Or who we report to. Or what our title is. And so on.
I wonder if you recognize this?
We’re influenced by societal norms. But maybe even more by organizational norms. That makes us look at what others do. Thinking, maybe that’s what I should do?
But we’re also influenced by others’ opinions and expectations of us in a very direct way. We’re influenced by what our parents taught us, by what our spouse or partner wants for us, by what our supervisor expects, what our friends suggest, and so on.
This goes from: what next job you should pursue to how to do networking or promote your work – or yourself!
And all these expectations and suggestions come from a good place. All these people care for you and want what they think is best for you. For you to fit in. Be successful. And be safe. Based on their own experiences and how they see the world.
But what works for one person does not necessarily work for the other.
And yet, I find that a lot of advice around career is not particularly centered on supporting that sense of the individuality. Or finding out what inspires and motivates you in your work life.
Read the full show notes at www.barbarakandersen.com/12
Welcome to this 12th episode of the Happy UN Career Podcast!
I’m so pleased to see that the podcast has been well received by you who are listening to this. Because without you – there really wouldn’t be much point in doing this.
It’s very interesting to see the metrics for the different episodes and I can see already that some episodes are particularly popular. One of them is episode 10, the one I called “Take a Chance” where I interviewed my former colleague from UNDP, Mike Dodd, about how he’d taken chances in his career. So, if you haven’t heard that one yet, I’d encourage you to go back and give it a listen at www.barbarakandersen.com/10 .
Your career belongs to you
And inspired by my talk with Mike, I wanted to talk a bit more in today’s episode about how important it is to acknowledge that your career really and truly is a personal and individual thing. Your career belongs to you.
And now you might say: well, that’s obvious, isn’t it? We’re all individuals with distinct personalities, and competencies and skills. How can a career not be personal and individual?
However, so often when I talk to people (and this goes for both clients and friends and old colleagues) it strikes me that we constantly compare ourselves to others and how they’re doing. What they’re doing. Especially those that are ahead of us in terms of being at a higher level in the hierarchy or are working in areas that are somehow deemed more important or influential.
It’s easy to get a feeling that you should be more like those people, find out what they do and maybe try to do the same thing. Progress in the same way as them. And that feeds the sense that so many of us are struggling with already.
That we’re not quite measuring up.
That we’re not making the choices we ought to make. Or succeeding in the way others expect of us.
So, I have a question for you today:
Do you feel that your career has to live up to other people’s expectations?
What I have noticed is that we attach quite a bit of value to what other people think of us, and our career. How they evaluate how we’re doing in our career. What we’re doing. Or who we report to. Or what our title is. And so on.
I wonder if you recognize this?
We’re influenced by societal norms. But maybe even more by organizational norms. That makes us look at what others do. Thinking, maybe that’s what I should do?
But we’re also influenced by others’ opinions and expectations of us in a very direct way. We’re influenced by what our parents taught us, by what our spouse or partner wants for us, by what our supervisor expects, what our friends suggest, and so on.
This goes from: what next job you should pursue to how to do networking or promote your work – or yourself!
And all these expectations and suggestions come from a good place. All these people care for you and want what they think is best for you. For you to fit in. Be successful. And be safe. Based on their own experiences and how they see the world.
But what works for one person does not necessarily work for the other.
And yet, I find that a lot of advice around career is not particularly centered on supporting that sense of the individuality. Or finding out what inspires and motivates you in your work life.
Read the full show notes at www.barbarakandersen.com/12