Have you ever thought that there is so much similarity between career path and driving a car?
In our career, we all have long term goals which we want to achieve before we retire and we work hard to achieve them. We complete our education and join the job to achieve those long term goals. Similarly when we drive the car, we have a destination to reach. All of us have different destinations to go like different long term goals that we have set in our life. We drive to reach the destination.
The drivers and Cops:
In our career we meet different types of people, some are smart, some are harsh, some very enthusiastic and some not very much concerned about the career. On road we find drivers who follow the driving rules, drive as per the speed limit driving cautiously like the good colleagues we have in our organizations. We also find some rash drivers on the road, who drive recklessly without caring for others, not following the rules and want to reach the destination faster by increasing the speed and crossing others. They are similar to the rough colleagues we have in our organization. Like reckless drivers, they are not liked by most of the people but they go on doing the same. What do you when you see such people in your organization? You either ignore them, try to move away from them in different department or different project, confront them or raise the alarm to the senior management. Just the same way you behave on road when you see a reckless driver. You either change the lanes, or honk (confront them) on them complaining that they are doing wrong and can affect others. Very few people raise the alarm to the senior management which is similar to reporting the reckless driver to the Police. So we realize that Cop is similar to the senior management or your boss who ensures that you are doing your work properly and not causing trouble to others. If the cop catches someone who is driving recklessly he gives him a warning if it is the first time, gives him a ticket or in extreme case cancels/suspends his driving license (forbidding him to drive). The similar action is taken by the manager when he finds an employee who is not following the rules and regulations of the organization. If the manager receives the complain for the first time he may just give a warning to the person and leave him. If this is repeated, he put this as a comment on the appraisal due to which he is affected monetarily (no promotion, no hike, no bonus) similar to cops giving a ticket to the reckless driver. In extreme case depending on the mistake of the employee, the company may suspend / rusticate him similar to the cop suspending / cancelling the driving license of the reckless driver.
Analogies
Milestone for the Destination:
If the long term goal in your career is to reach a level in the organization that is X levels above the start, by analogy you can divide the distance between your source and destination into x milestones. Between each milestone, there can be different speed limits similar to the career path where the person will be required to show certain level of expertise and spend some years before being promoted to the next level.
Many times in our career we feel that we have stagnated and try to change the company to grow faster similar to the way we behave on roads. We change lanes assuming that we cannot go any faster on our current lane but after we change lanes we realize that the first lane has started moving faster and we regret our decision. People have the same feeling when they see the colleagues in the old organization growing faster than they are growing in their current organization. So there is an analogy between changing companies and changing lanes.
Knowledge about Route:
Now let’s talk about the knowledge of the path to destination. When you are driving the car and you are going to the destination for the first time, how do you know the path? You look the path on Net (e.g., MapQuest, Google maps etc.) and remember them, take a printout and refer them on the way after every milestone or have a GPS and follow the directions specified by them. On the similar lines we have the mentors (GPS) in our career who guide us to our final goal and we follow their advice. Going deeper we will find if the GPS is old, it may not know about the new roads or may not take us to our destination by the shortest path. On the similar lines, if the mentor is not knowledgeable and has not been updating his knowledge about the changes taking place in the industry, he may not be able to guide us on the right path.
Many people think of their long term goal and feel that they know how to reach there (from experience of others) and start working on the same. They don’t analyze themselves at every stage of their life because they are confident that they know the path and are on the right track. They represent the people who have looked at the map once and start their journey. The people who have taken the printout of the map and refer them after each milestone are the people who after each level in their career analyze their goal and see if they are on the right path. If they realize that they are on the wrong way, they take action to correct the same and get on the right path. Very few people prefer to stop and ask the way. On the similar grounds, very few people in the corporate world prefer to discuss their goals with anyone else.
The CAR:
All of us want to have a car that has strong engine, good brand name, and nice look. The Engine of the car represents the knowledge and qualification we have acquired before started our career. The more knowledgeable you are, the more confident you can be and can reach the goal faster. Similarly if you have a car with a strong engine, you are confident that you will reach the destination without and disruption. But having a strong engine doesn’t always mean that the car will not break. On the similar lines if a person is intelligent, knowledgeable and has strong educational background doesn’t mean that he will not have hard life in his career. The only difference will be that the probability of occurrence will be less and he will be able to cope up with the situation. Good brand name refers to the reputation of the University that you pass out which helps you to network with other people.
The Roads:
Roads are similar to the organizations in which we work. The big organizations are similar to the freeways and the small organizations are like the Streets. As freeways have more roads, more no of cars and higher speed, similarly in bigger organizations, there are large no of people working in multiple departments. The benefit of working in a big organization is that you can switch departments and have lots of opportunities within the same organization. On the similar lines when driving on a freeway where there are many lanes you can switch back and forth between different lanes depending on the speed you want to drive.
1 Each driver has a destination to reach Everyone has the long term goal.
2 The person should follow the driving rules and the signs on the road Everyone should comply by the rules and regulations of the organization.
3 The person driving recklessly will be punished The employees misbehaving in the organization will be punished
4 It may appear that by changing the lanes or changing roads, you may reach faster but that may not be always true. It may appear that by changing the job profile, changing companies, you may achieve your goals faster but that may not be always true.
5 It is always beneficial to have a GPS who can guide you from time to time It is always beneficial to have a mentor in your career path who can guide you
6 You require to have a driving license to drive You require a Skill set / Qualification to perform the job
