When I’m working with career coaching clients on their career direction, one of the analogies I like to use with them is to think of their career path as a pie. Which pieces of the pie need to be bigger than others? What’s your main gig? What is the main thing you want to be doing all day every day; the thing that would be most rewarding and fulfilling for you? That’s your biggest piece of the pie. Then there will be other things you obviously need to do at work, projects, administrative items etc. You can include those as some of the smaller pieces.
When I was talkking to my career coaching client Ben recently, I mentioned this to him to help him figure out what else he would enjoy doing at work besides problem solving through logistics. No, we can’t enjoy every single element of our work. There will always be things we dislike or prefer not to do, but if you can have most of your pie filled with what you want, you’ll be that much more satisfied. I’ll use myself as an example. I enjoy marketing, but I had a job in the past that was primarily marketing and I hated it. I want marketing to be a smaller piece of my pie, and connecting with people (like I do through coaching) to be the biggest piece. So fortunately, by owning my own business, I get to do both. When push comes to shove though, coaching needs to be my primary task.
So remember, just because you enjoy something, doesn’t mean that should be your career path. It’s a much more complicated equation. So think about what you want to be your main gig and then build the rest of the picture around that.
Hallie Crawford
Ideal Career Coach
P.S. Find out if you are on the right track by taking our Free Ideal Career Quiz today.
