Is your job = to your career?

We asked a lot of questions in season 1 of the EITF project which addressed different stages of people's career. 

In your first job out of school, the thirst for knowledge, enthusiasm and the inherent need to prove yourself feeds your energy. On the EITF project, this is the reason we spoke about the “first” jobs that our experts have had. In more ways than one, the learnings from your first job and first manager usually shape your career going forward. But, there is also a tendency to lose yourself in your first job.
 
The need to build a career beyond that is usually a realization that hits everyone hard at some point, and it’s not easy to do- it’s a lot of extraneous work, and it has to have a lot of motivation behind it. So we figured, we’d ask our experts for advice - “For someone who wants to work on something outside of their everyday jobs, first, should they? And if they should, where would be a good place to start?”

 
To our surprise, the answers from our experts led us to one common element:

“Don’t think about it as work"
 
  • Our experts say that if you want to diversify your career, there are a lot of options. But since this is something that needs to be driven by strong motivation rather than monetary encouragement, they say that it is always better to start with something that intrigues you, or something you already like. Our experts give a lot of examples in season 1 about topics that interested them enough, to work on after work.
  • Our experts ask us to tap into our curiosity, with everything we see around us - “Why not use the concept of this, in another place?” What could be curiosity one day, could turn into a product the next! Our entrepreneurial experts say that this is how they started - they saw a problem at work and tried to solve it outside of work, using concepts they had seen in everyday life.
  • A lot of our experts ask us to supplement our existing knowledge with the latest industry news. Reading up on what’s coming, so you can prepare yourself for the advent of new technologies, is a great way to position yourself for the future.
  • Another route is to make connections. Make connections with industry leaders and experts through social media apps like LinkedIn, so you can pick their brains from time to time.
  • Lastly, it’s not just about keeping up with technology, but also keeping up with the latest interview standards. Make sure that you do at least 2 or 3 interviews a year, whether or not you actually intend to switch jobs, so you are interview ready when the time comes to transition out of that first job.

What do you think we can add to this list?

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