Jobs, Careers, and the Big Arrow
by Tom Terez
So you've been hearing over the years about personal missions and purpose-driven lives. Your friend Bob has his own mission statement tucked in his wallet, and your friend Sue keeps blabbing about her "profound calling." It has gotten to the point where you're feeling...well, like you're missing something.
Some people need a deeply held mission -- call it a calling, a passion, a vocation -- to feel good about their work. Our friend Bob, who inspects vehicles for exhaust emissions, sees himself as helping to save the environment. Sue, who works as a grade-school teacher, looks far beyond her daily activities. Her "profound calling" is to create a successful future for tomorrow's adults, in order to build a better world.
Other people are very career-focused. They thoughtfully move from job to job, opportunity to opportunity. They put a high priority on building their credentials and moving up the ladder.
Still others focus on the job itself. They go to work, get the job done, go home, and repeat. The main priority is the paycheck.
End of story? Not quite.
A friend of mine has been struggling with the job-career-calling equation. He's 25 years old, and when he left college for the work world, he didn't really consider this whole mission/calling thing. He was focused entirely on getting the best job for the best pay. He did -- and he did great work. Now all sorts of doors are opening up for him. Therein lies his struggle.
"I don't know what to do at this point," he said. "I could stay with my current company in my current position, with other opportunities coming up soon. Or I could go elsewhere -- two other companies have contacted me. I'm also thinking about going back to college for an MBA."
When I asked him to describe his big mission, he stayed technical: "To manage an audit operation."
No, I'm talking bigger than that, I said. Much bigger. What is the big calling that will propel you out of bed in the morning, engage you beyond description, and bring out your best over the long term?
He thought about it for a while, trying to see beyond the job and career. "I'd have to think more about that," he said.
We all could do some thinking on this because it applies to every one of us, regardless of age, industry, or occupation.
When there's no meaningful calling to serve as the ultimate guidance mechanism, we run the risk of slipping and sliding from one seeming opportunity to another. It's fine (and entirely practical) to pursue higher rungs on the career ladder and more money in the paycheck. But over the long term, an exclusive focus on jobs and career can take us to a place that's terribly unfulfilling.
Gravitation comes to mind. A deeply held mission provides a gravitational pull that draws us to certain jobs and career paths. When the pull is strong enough, it's almost impossible to get off track.
My friend called me a few weeks after our visit.
"I've been thinking about what you said, and I'm now calling my mission the 'big arrow,'" he said.
A hobbyist painter, he had drawn a wonderful visual in his mind.
"The big arrow is my overarching mission," he explained. "My career direction is within that, and it needs to aim in the same direction. The jobs are the smallest arrows of all."
He was still contemplating the exact nature of his mission, but he already seemed more decisive about his future decisions regarding jobs, career, and more education.
"Some of those job opportunities we had talked about no longer make sense," he said. "They would have taken me in different directions away from my calling."
Enough about him -- what about you? Are you springing out of bed most days, eager to go to work? Do feel like you're making a difference? Are your job and career moving you in a meaningful direction?
If so, great. If not, it might be time for you to contemplate your own big arrow.
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