5 ways to take risk in your career

The only things you regret in your career are the risks you didn’t take

The biggest risk is not taking any risk. In a world that’s changing really quickly, the only strategy that is guaranteed to fail is not taking risks.

Mark Zuckerberg

If you are like me, whenever you find someone with a successful career, you check their linkedin profile and examine what their career decisions were.

After closely looking at careers of different individuals, I noticed that people around same age or graduation batch end up with very different career trajectories!

Why do some people discover success while others feel stuck in their careers?

Apart from positive traits such as a hard working nature and intelligence, these people were part of something growing at some point of their career which propelled their growth.

So what do you do when you feel you need to give your career a boost?

Take some RISKS.

DON’t GET STUCK IN LOCAL MAXIMA. KICK YOURSELF OUT OF IT.

Here are a few ways to take appropriate risks

1. Bet your career on a new trend.

Be aware about changing trends in your industry and adapt accordingly. I wrote more about trends in software industry here

When you switch you might not command the same title or compensation. But remember you are optimizing for growth and not for title or money. Soon being part of this early trend would pay off 10 times in every aspect.

eg: I have friends who developed on mobile very early and now run mobile related companies worth millions. I have friends who worked on map reduce way earlier and now have created new open source products used by millions or written books about Big Data technologies.

2. Join a startup.

Startup by its nature has taken some risk and some bets. Identify a startup that aligns with your career aspirations and join them. Checkout Careerswitch.me for passively searching for a company that matches your career aspirations.

When you join them you internalize part of their risk into your career and position yourself to benefit from the high rewards.

3. Join a team that’s doing something new.

Yes find those new products your company is trying to build or launch. Be part of the team even if you think its not going to take off. You can learn a LOT about how to aim-shoot-adapt-aim.

Also you would be the one who knows something new and unique, rather than being 200th backend engineer at the company. Almost always try to pursue newer projects in a company in the early stages of your career.

4. Start your own company.

As ridiculous or cool (to some) it might sound, this remains one of the riskiest choices.

However some people might get extremely passionate about an idea or opportunity and might consider risking it all. If you go this route, make sure you create a group of mentors around you and go all in.

Career boost is directly proportional to career risk. So this has to be one of the option that has the potential to give you extremely high career growth.

Look at young founders who have attained high positions at companies irrespective of their startup’s outcomes.

5. Pivot your career.

Sometimes you are stuck in an industry or a job that doesn't provide much growth. You took some decisions as a teenager, enrolled in some program and now you are stuck in that role for ever right ? Wrong.

Don’t keep hanging on to decisions that you took 10 years back . Understand what sunk cost is and don’t let those influence your decisions.

If you don’t like where you are, change it. You are not a tree.

Re-evaluate how your industry and other industries have changed and how you need to adapt for the future. There is always the fear of unkown, but you would grow and enjoy a lot if you do so.

Lastly, the decision to take career risk doesn’t happen overnight. Often you already know that you need to do something different. That’s a good first step. Here is a simple process to make a decision:

1. Time-box the period in which you definitely make a decision.
2. Research and understand everything about whatever you might like next. Talk to a lot of people who have real related experiences.
3. Once the time expires make a decision and go for it 100%. Dont hedge unless you have to.

Most importantly enjoy the new ride, you are relevant once again!

“In the end, we only regret the chances we didn’t take, relationships we were afraid to have and the decisions we waited too long to make.”

What’s your career bet? What career risks you and people around you took?