Why am I doing this? Because a great career is out of reach for most people

The eternal quest to have a great career

“I want to be a leader. I want to be successful. I want to be promoted and have a high salary. I want to create meaning.”

Your ambition and passion that was so high when you started your career is now a mere faint shadow of what it was before.

For many reasons.

Many have adopted a ‘safe’ approach towards career growth: play it safe and hope for the best

Why a great career is elusive for most people

• There is barely any ongoing help for people to have a great career, create meaning and create an impact for your company and your community
• There’s always unpredictable business cycles where the next recession is looming over the horizon; companies are investing less in their people and they are left to fend for themselves
• Corporate structures are not helping to have a successful career: your peers may see you as competition, your boss may use information against you during performance reviews, HR may see you as a flight risk or next person in line to lay off
• Companies talk a good game about helping people with their careers, they may create some training here and there but it mostly can be summarized under one topic “lip service”
• Most professionals are smart, talented and have great skills but have difficulty in directing those capabilities towards great results for their organization and themselves
• Many have adopted a ‘safe’ approach towards career growth: play it safe and hope for the best
• Recent recessions have created a low growth environment and people have given up on career growth

So how can you have a great career in an unpredictable business world?

There is no reference manual, so I am creating one

I came to the realization that there is no reference manual for having a great career.

So I am writing one.

It is based on three principals: career transitions, taking risks and future-proofing your career.

A. Career Transitions

Having made 10 career transitions over the last 20 years, this is an area that I’m super passionate about and can provide practical advice.

Here is a brief review of those transitions (in chronological sequence)

1. Creative Designer: created logos and typography for neighborhood businesses
2. Pharmacist: Yep, and I interned at a hospital pharmacy
3. Desktop Publisher: during my undergrad days, I typed project reports for engineering and MBA students on my 386 computer and printed them …the best part for me was that I learnt a more about engineering and management concepts than the students who had created those reports
4. Marketing: during my MBA days, I worked with a business partner to build consumer goods marketing business that we scaled to over 500 items
5. Computer Sales: sold PCs and printers for small and medium businesses…most importantly, I wrote the software as well and started to realize in the early mid 90s that technology is clearly a gamechanger
6. Unix and C Developer: <transition to higher $ opportunity> wrote shell scripts to parse COBOL code during Y2K days…ah the excitement
7. Web Developer: <tranistion to new platforms> developed Java applications for the new WWW
8. System Integrator: <transitioned to consulting> helped large scale system integration for companies that were looking to integrate mainframe systems with modern (at that time) Java applications
9. Management Consultant: <management consulting> helped Fortune 500 companies with Strategy, Business Process Re-engineering, Organization Design and good old management advice….I got to understand how Corporate America *actually* works across multiple industries: Financial Services, Manufacturing and Logistics, Consumer Goods, Healthcare, Life Sciences / Pharma, and of course High Technology especially Software.
10. Product Manager: <transition> defining strategy and executing on a business model change for monetizing Software and Services for a portfolio that’s measured in $Bs.

B. Taking risks and NOT playing it safe

There’s no such thing today as a safe, permanent job. And our world changing faster than ever before, it is actually much more riskier to play it safe and be mediocre. I’ve always felt that taking risks, big and small, have introduced far greater career growth opportunities rather than clocking in and clocking out as a routine.

C. Future-proof career advice as every company is becoming a Tech company

You can take advantage of my work experience across industries, specifically in Tech. Because every company, large or small, is undergoing digital transformation and is becoming a tech company.

As mentioned before, I’ve had the chance to work with companies across various industries that are leaders in that space: across Financial Services, Manufacturing and Logistics, Consumer Goods, Healthcare, Life Sciences / Pharma, and of course High Technology.

And specifically within Tech, I’ve worked across multiple functions

1. Marketing
2. Sales
3. Product Management
4. Services
5. Finance
6. Business Operations
7. Supply Chain
8. HR
9. IT

Lessons Learned

Over the course of time, these transitions have taught me a lot: failures (too many to count), successes and most importantly, ways of making your organization and yourself successful.

Looking forward to sharing these, getting feedback and always learning.