Below are the two things that you must avoid as a young professional and for the rest of your career. If you fall into either category don’t beat yourself up over it, but you must take action and do something about it immediately, otherwise it will just continue and hold you back from achieving the goals you set for yourself.
Let’s take a look at the two nasty things you must avoid:
Being Unhappy
Many young professionals try to justify their unhappiness with work by saying “It’s just work, nobody likes what they do.” That is an awful excuse and quite frankly, it isn’t true at all. There are plenty of successful young professionals that absolutely love what they do and have struck a great balance between their personal and professional lives. Just because the people around you may be miserable about what they do from 9-5 doesn’t mean it is acceptable to allow them to drag you down and tell you its “normal” to hate your career.
Unhappiness at work very often will lead to unhappiness within your personal life as well. How many times have you seen or heard someone come home unhappy from work and consequently treat their friends and family differently? “It’s alright, he just has a lot of tough days at work” is not an acceptable excuse. Of course you will have bad days, but if you are consistently carrying over a poor attitude from work into other aspects of your life, you need to make a major change immediately. Find an opportunity that will make you happy. Enjoying what you do is far more important than a few extra bucks or a fancier title on your business card. Unhappiness at the office can also lead to depression and/or substance abuse problems.
The bottom line is that you will be spending 40-60 hours a week doing something you call your career, so make sure you enjoy it. People prefer to talk to someone at a social gathering who displays enthusiasm while discussing their career. Be the person whose face lights up when he’s asked what he does for a living. Be the one who everyone else is jealous of because they never took the time to seek out the best opportunities for themselves, and you did.
Being Unsuccessful
The other major pitfall that you will avoid by following the three step process is becoming unsuccessful. By being diligent and following this process, you will put yourself in a position to become successful. Some people are able to enjoy success from the beginning of their professional lives, while others put themselves in a position to learn, improve their skills and eventually become successful. Either way, those who put in the initial effort to find a great opportunity will ultimately achieve their visions of success.
The biggest fear that I have from a professional standpoint is waking up one day and realizing that I wasn’t successful because I never gave myself an opportunity to succeed. If you don’t put in the proper effort and work hard to find a great opportunity, you will never find one. Great opportunities very rarely will drop out of the sky, so increase your odds and seek your best opportunity.
By properly preparing yourself, you’ll be ready to recognize and maximize on opportunities when they come your way. One of the main reasons why young professionals do not experience initial career success is simply because they did not identify and seek out their best opportunities.