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A few years ago, the Dean of the law school I attended took me out to lunch. He was in town because his son was attending a math camp. He told me his son absolutely loved math and the Dean was nurturing his skill. Reflecting on his son’s math skills, he said something like:
“He’s having a little bit of trouble catching on to complex integers and his skills get a little sloppy in longer problems, but he’ll get the hang of it.”
I had a hard time believing what I was hearing. How many parents understand their child’s math skills this well?
The Dean had attended MIT for college and during the lunch I could not help but think that the Dean’s father had raised him in a similar way—with math camps, insight into his math skills, and so forth. At a genetic (or similar) level, I am sure the son had some natural skills in math. Most parents would not have the slightest idea about what a math camp is. I had never heard of math camp until the Dean told me about his son.
Kids who go to schools like MIT and become great engineers, often have parents (like the Dean) who are able to nurture their natural skills—just like you too probably have some natural skills that someone may have tried to nurture along the way.
By the time the Dean’s child is around 18 years old, my guess is that he will understand math so well that probably less than 1 in 1,000 people could even hope to be his equal in math. He will have a highly developed skill and gift and be doing something that he loves. The longer he does math, the more skills he will develop and the more insight he will have into it.
Most of us have things that we are good at and love doing. Everyone does. Most of us have skills that we have developed over a lifetime—everyone is good at something. The biggest mistake we often make is coming to believe that we should be someone different from who we are, with a different set of skills than we in fact have.
When I was 26, I started practicing law. I hated it but I tried my very hardest at it. For some reason, I felt I needed to be an attorney. Despite having an incredibly successful business that I loved doing, I made the decision to go to law school. Once there, I could not believe my misfortune. I was very much unlike the kids who chose to enroll in law school.
When I started working in a law office, looking out the window from ten floors up was upsetting for me. I would see various businesses down on the ground and get excited about how these businesses could be improved. I would go to the bookstore some days during lunch and buy business books. I would even be excited if the manager came up to me in a restaurant to ask me how my meal was so I could talk to him about the business the restaurant was doing.
Clearly, I was doing the wrong sort of job sitting inside a law office.
In my job, I watched some very gifted attorneys who seemed to really love what they were doing. These attorneys were not interested in business, and instead, seemed to just love the sort of work attorneys do. They would become visibly animated and excited about the prospect of going to court, or giving a client legal advice. These people were in the right profession. This is exactly how it should be. You need to do what you enjoy and what comes naturally to you. We owe ourselves this.
Something I have noticed through the course of being an entrepreneur is that numerous people I have hired in the past decide that they want to be just like me. Instead of doing what they were hired to do (because they were gifted at this and had a history of doing this), they decided that it is better to be an entrepreneur.
Perhaps they feel being an entrepreneur is sexier, perhaps they believe that being an entrepreneur is a better way to make a living.
Everyone has their own rationale; however, what I do know is that I have seen numerous people quit whatever company of mine they are working for and set up competing companies. Their thought seems to be that it is better to do what I do than what they are trained to do and understand and love to do.
Sometimes, this is the correct decision for people—but most times, it is not. Being a manager, or an entrepreneur, is a completely different job and it may not be what you are good at.
An analogy to doing something different from what you are skilled at because it looks better might be the difference between being a world-famous professional athlete and being a coach. Professional athletes can earn more than $40 million a year with their salary and endorsements. Moreover, they have incredible and unique athletic gifts that entertain audiences. Nevertheless, these athletes need to report to practice and answer to their coaches.
What if certain professional athletes in their prime decided that they would prefer to be a coach and quit the team at the peak of their success? They might reason, for example, that a coach is “in charge” and that they want to direct the team. Most people would agree that this is insane. A coach has a completely different skill set than the athlete. Moreover, by being a coach, a great athlete would be depriving the world of his or her skills as an athlete. Finally, a coach would be lucky to make even a small percentage of what the best professional athletes do.
Something I have never understood is how people can be happy and successful and then end up sabotaging their success by believing another type of job is better than their own. I have seen people do this more times than I can count. Someone is happy doing a job and is good at their job and then, all of a sudden, decides they need to be something different in order to be happy.
Most people who put themselves on a path that does not match their skills become extremely unhappy. If you are doing something that does not make you happy and does not make use of your natural gifts, then the odds are very good you will be unhappy doing this.
Your career is a spiritual practice. What you do for a living is about taking something invisible and making it visible—and this is something that I believe is “spiritual” in nature. When you are doing something you truly love and that gives you pleasure, you are drawing on something deep within you that excites you.
The problem with many people is that they think of their jobs as work. They believe it is important to be very professional and serious, for example, or that work should not be fun. When you think like this, work becomes unfulfilling and dull. In contrast, when you are doing something you love and that makes use of your natural talents, you are likely to be far more fulfilled.
Everyone has various gifts and skills.
The biggest mistakes happen in our careers when we want to be something that does not match our natural gifts and skills. We believe we need to change and be something different. We grow unhappy with who we are and decide that we need to change. This sort of thing is always occurring and there are an incredible number of people out there who seem to believe they need to be something different than they currently are.
Whatever your skill is, you need to embrace your gift and not try to be something you are not. Rejecting what you are good at leads to unhappiness. For example, if you do a job just to make money, you are likely to be extremely unhappy. You may have “success,” but you will not be fulfilled doing the work. Success without fulfillment is failure. What you get never makes you happy in the long term—who you become makes you happy (or, if you make the wrong decisions about who to become, sad).
From a young age, I have operated and started various businesses. I have always enjoyed doing this and I gravitate toward it. This is just something that I seem to enjoy and I find myself thinking about doing this sort of thing quite a bit.
When I was around 8 years old, my stepfather opened a small nautical gifts shop and I spent a lot of time in the shop watching him and learning about being an entrepreneur. I saw him almost go out of business and I also saw his successes. I learned about the sense of possibility that went along with being an entrepreneur—and about the potential for failure.
When you grow up around something like this, you learn to understand it. You can deal with the emotions of it, and just being around this you end up improving. You see patterns other people do not and you get a sense of things. You find joy in aspects of the job others might not. In my case, this is what I found.
For me, entrepreneurial work was the sort of thing I gravitated to and what I enjoyed.
Several years ago, I was meeting with a famous lawyer about something. He had become incredibly successful as an attorney and I admired him. We were walking around his office in Century City in Los Angeles and I looked around and admired all the work that was going on. I expressed to him that a part of me wished I had stayed an attorney doing the sort of work he did.
“No, that’s the last thing you should be doing,” he said. “You have a different gift than I have. You need to do what comes naturally to you.”
He was absolutely right. The thing about doing the stuff that we are gifted at and good at is that it can make a huge difference in our lives. When you are doing the things you are good at, you will love yourself much more than if you are doing something you are not good at. Moreover, when you love yourself, you will also have more love to give others. When you connect with yourself, it is also far easier to connect with others.
You need to find your true gift and go with it. You should never try to be something you are not just because it seems attractive from afar.
THE LESSON
Never try to be someone who you are not, or something that does not match your natural gifts and skills. Embrace your skills, whatever they are, rather than rejecting what you are good at and setting yourself up for unhappiness. Find your true gift, and run with it.
About Harrison Barnes
Harrison Barnes is the Founder of BCG Attorney Search and a successful legal recruiter himself. Harrison is extremely committed to and passionate about the profession of legal placement. His firm BCG Attorney Search has placed thousands of attorneys. BCG Attorney Search works with attorneys to dramatically improve their careers by leaving no stone unturned in a search and bringing out the very best in them. Harrison has placed the leaders of the nation’s top law firms, and countless associates who have gone on to lead the nation’s top law firms. There are very few firms Harrison has not made placements with. Harrison’s writings about attorney careers and placements attract millions of reads each year. He coaches and consults with law firms about how to dramatically improve their recruiting and retention efforts. His company LawCrossing has been ranked on the Inc. 500 twice. For more information, please visit Harrison Barnes’ bio.
About BCG Attorney Search
BCG Attorney Search matches attorneys and law firms with unparalleled expertise and drive that gets results. Known globally for its success in locating and placing attorneys in law firms of all sizes, BCG Attorney Search has placed thousands of attorneys in law firms in thousands of different law firms around the country. Unlike other legal placement firms, BCG Attorney Search brings massive resources of over 150 employees to its placement efforts locating positions and opportunities that its competitors simply cannot. Every legal recruiter at BCG Attorney Search is a former successful attorney who attended a top law school, worked in top law firms and brought massive drive and commitment to their work. BCG Attorney Search legal recruiters take your legal career seriously and understand attorneys. For more information, please visit www.BCGSearch.com.
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Tagged: apply for a job, business books, career advice, job search, job search guru | a harrison barnes, job search industry, job sitting, law school, legal jobs, legal profession, potential for failure, sense of possibility, spiritual practice, successful business
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Do not be distracted by your insecurities and doubts, or you will never achieve success because you will not allow it to happen. Focus only on the message about your skills and capabilities. Identify your goals and create a gameplan, and fill your mind with positive and hopeful messages that will drive you towards said goal.
In this article Harrison explains how you can ensure success in your career by externalizing your opponents. Your job is like a game; if you work hard, play by the rules of the company and are seen as part of the team you will be viewed as a valuable player for the company. The most significant part of any game is the presence of an opponent. Don’t look for an opponent among your co-workers. Never speak negatively of your team members. Instead, concentrate on the external opponents. External opponents bring you and the team closer as you work towards a common goal. In order for you and your company to succeed it is important to have an external opponent. Harrison advises people to consistently work hard and not participate in the politics. This is a sure way to score big in your career.
In this article Harrison discusses how people who stand for something always do better than those who do not. Companies who stand for something always do better than companies who do not. The most successful companies not only stand for something, but they are completely consistent with their core principles. This is what keeps them going and this is what makes them successful. One of the largest problems that people have in their careers is when they diverge from what they are good at. When you do not stand for something, you divert from your true strength. Everything begins to crumble and slowly fall apart when you are not doing something that you are really good at. The biggest success comes when you stand for something and are good at it.
Companies necessarily seek to employ positive, forward-minded people. A firm’s success depends on their employees, and they seek people who will enhance them rather than merely contribute to the bottom line. People with positive natures, who contribute to a healthy social environment, prove essential to the growth and success of their employers.
In this article Harrison discusses that the meaning you give to things will control the quality of your life. How we feel about ourselves is all due to what we tell ourselves certain things will mean. The meaning you give things is crucial for your career success. You need to choose meanings that make you stronger. You need to ensure you interpret things in a way that serves you and does not hurt you. You need to reach your full potential. Don’t classify yourself as someone who is not fit to succeed at the level at which you’re capable. You need to take charge of your mind to have the career and the life that you deserve.
In this article Harrison discusses the importance of ‘energy’ over technical skills. When people are hiring you they are purchasing your “energy” more than they are purchasing your technical skills. They are interested in your ability to influence the world around you through your energy. When you are marketing yourself and seeking a job, or working in a job, there are essentially two things you are marketing. You are marketing your technical skills, but more importantly you are marketing an intangible sort of energy. The most successful people have mastered the art of projecting positive energy. The better your energy, the more employable you will be and the farther you will go.
You can never become too comfortable if you wish to be successful. Your success will largely depend on your ability to become dissatisfied with your current position. Successful people are never satisfied with the status quo, and constantly push beyond their comfort zone. When do you this and succeed, you set a new standard for normality in your life. Be continually dissatisfied, and always pushing yourself beyond your comfort zone.
Resourcefulness can make you better at everything you do, and separates the truly extraordinary people from the general herd. Do everything within your power to be resourceful in your job search, life, and career to give yourself the best possible chance of achieving your goals, and learn how to employ the resources currently at your disposal for maximum impact.
The most successful people in the world share the common characteristic of sharing, or concentrating on the value that they give back to others rather than on their own growth and profit. Focusing on yourself never leads to long-term success, but leads instead to unhappiness as well as emotional and financial challenges. Your greatest consideration, therefore, should be how you can contribute to others, and how your actions can impact their lives.
The best way to attain your goal is through small, incremental steps on which you can build. Establish a routine, and make sure you are consistently working towards some kind of goal. Start small, and always build upon what you have done before. Most people fail to achieve their goals because they believe everything should happen quickly and at the same time, instead of progressively building upon their past achievements.
Make sure that you are involved in groups that focus on positive things. Your success in life depends on your ability to focus on the outcomes you want, and the focus of the groups with which you associate will in turn shape your own focus. You must endeavor to always choose groups with a positive focus.
Everything you do is a form of preparation for your job interviews, as you are always under some form of scrutiny. The best employees can always spot other good employees, and you cannot “fake it”; merely doing a good job in your work is a form of interview preparation. Always put your all into your work, therefore, even if you do not have long-term plans to remain at your current employment. Switch jobs as infrequently as possible. The time to prepare for a job search is before you even realize that you need to do so.
Your greatest successes will come from some of the smallest actions in terms of meeting people. You will cause a “stacking effect” the more you meet and connect with people; conversely, people cannot connect with you when you are withdrawn and nothing will happen. You must do everything in your power to connect with as many people as possible.
When myriad candidates are applying to limited positions, practicing unusual tactics in your job hunt will prove far more helpful than following the established routine and waiting for positions to come to you. Much like in military strategy, well-planned and unconventional moves can help you conquer your goals without suffering significant losses. You can land an excellent position by focusing on companies’ needs, rather than depending on job and recruiting advertisements.
You can change your life forever by harnessing the power of persistence. Think about the people in your life, and whether they empower you or hinder you in achieving your goals. You must win at all costs, and persist until you succeed.
You need to provide people what they want, otherwise you will not have a job. Although they might not always be the most desirable kinds of jobs, certain jobs always exist because they provide services that people will always require. The only secret to continual employment is to provide a service that people always need; if you do this, and nothing else, you will always find yourself employed. Give people what they want.
Your ability to help people will determine the extent of your success; the more powerful and effective your help, the greater rewards you will receive. One of the rarest and most profound achievements is to follow through on your goals and create a paradigm-shifting idea. The more revolutionary your work, the more people you will affect and the more memorable of a career you will have.
You will greatly benefit your career by helping and promoting your company’s expansion. A common belief is that expansion is fundamentally positive, and a lack of expansion is fundamentally negative. You must be on the side of expansion rather than contraction in every area of your life. All employers seek people who will help them expand, and the more your ability to contribute to this expansion will provide you increased job security and a greater likelihood of being hired.
The ability to fit into your work environment is among the most important parts of obtaining and retaining a job, even more so than your skill level. Fitting in means nothing more than being comfortable in one’s work environment, and making others similarly comfortable. Employers want to hire people who will embrace their approach to business and the world on physical and moral levels, so you must strive to fit in with their worldview.
Focus on what you are doing, not what others around you are doing. There are people to take action towards their goals, and then there people who sit on the sidelines and comment on the first group of people. People who are mostly interested in gossip and watching others usually lack the confidence and determination to take action themselves. The most successful people go account and accomplish things rather than sit back and watch others make things happen.
In this article, Harrison advises you to live the lives you wish to have, do the jobs you want to do, and basically live your dreams to your best possible ability. Life is fleeting and no one knows what tomorrow holds. So Harrison puts forward certain questions – when are you going to start living the life you want and when are you going to take charge of your life. The time to have the career you want is right now, not tomorrow, and not later. You need to take charge of your career and life and no one else is going to do it for you. Your entire life and the quality of it is a product of your decisions. You can have, do, or be anything you want. Do not create alibis for making comprises in life. What separates the best and the happiest people is the ability to stop to making excuses and Harrison wants you to be this person.
Anyone can be up when things are going well, but the real challenge comes when things are not. Do not look at problems, which are inevitable for any person or business, in a negative light; think of them instead as challenges, lessons, or opportunities. There is a silver lining to be found in every problem, and finding that silver lining will enable you to grow.
Understanding what you do for a living is very important for your career. You should understand the generality of your specific profession. You and your career are a product. You need to know where and how to market yourself in the best way possible. You need to be relevant and understand the skills you are offering. Being a relevant product is essential for your success. It’s easy to be relevant when you understand what you are doing and what purpose you serve. Being relevant is more than just getting a job. Being relevant also relates to serving the employers with the skills they need. You need to understand your market and what your customers want. This is the way to stay employed, and it is also the means to continual improvement.
Things will not always go the way that you want them to go, so you must not be discouraged by adversity in your job hunt. When you persist and consistently put forth your best effort, things are much more likely to go in your favor. Also, you must resist others’ efforts to undermine your efforts and potential; focus instead on doing everything in your power to fight on and complete the task at hand.
Having a goal or vision will propel you towards greater career success and happiness. Without a purpose, you will find yourself depressed and ultimately fail to achieve your goals. Do not subscribe to the unrealistic problem that you should never have problems, but instead regard problems as part of your overall growth strategy.
Don’t ever give up, and make the most of the tools at your disposal. Take chances and invest in your best skills, and persist in the face of unfortunate events. Have faith in your considerable work and capabilities, and use them to create value for others.
In this article Harrison discusses what a good hiring manager should look for. Many people who make hiring decisions really do not know what they are doing. In fact, they often make mistakes when hiring. They put too much emphasis on skills and experience. But the single most important aspect of hiring is evaluating the person’s unique outlook on the world. If the person does not have a positive outlook on the world, he/she will bring down the morale of the other workers. The person will harm the company through the negative outlook. The key to success is having the power to stick it out in jobs and finding happiness wherever you are. Hiring people who do good work and are always able to find happiness should be the number one objective of hiring managers.
To reach the goals to which you aspire, you must compare yourself with people superior to you for motivation. Most people prefer to look at life the way they wish it to be, rather than as it truly is. Move out of your comfort zones and face reality. Don’t seek out or compare yourself with the average people around you, as doing so will only mire you in mediocrity rather than push you forward.
You can better market yourself by taking a stand against something. Peoples’ personal beliefs, including the things with which they do not agree, define who they are as people. Standing against something differentiates you from the crowd; when done in the correct manner, without disrespecting others’ opinions, such a stance can help you land your dream job.
Maintaining a routine in both life and work is important to success. Not only do you need to establish a routine, you must make that routine demanding and push yourself to the limit. Budget a certain amount of time each week for networking, applying to jobs, brushing up your interview skills, and following up with employers. Such consistent effort on a daily basis will make a huge difference to your career success.
A recommendation from a powerful person can make a huge difference in your job search; a reference from an influential person makes a tremendous difference to a prospective employer, and thus can be a major advantage for you. When an important person whom the company trusts recommends you, you instantly qualify for positions that may previously have been unattainable. Make the absolute most of your connections with the powerful people in your life, because doing so can instantaneously change your career and life.
You must plant seeds in the minds of others, so that they will be more likely than otherwise to think of you when a future need arises. In planting seeds, you are making people aware of what you have to offer; you must make sure that you are ever present in the minds of your potential employers. Planting seeds is the most effective way to generate top-of-mind awareness, and ensure that the right people remember you at the appropriate time.
Recent immigrants exemplify the benefits of willpower, passion, and excitement in the way that they work so much harder for their goals than the people who have been here for most or all of their lives. Like most Americans, you need to rekindle the spirit of your immigrant ancestors and become hungry for what you want. The entrepreneurial spirit that brought people to America has often faded over time; adopt the fire and work ethic of new immigrants in order to achieve your goals.
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This is a very good article. I used to love myself and was confident about my skills and abilities. The confidence is gone since I lost my job, and the feeling got worse because of my failure to find a job related to my education and experience. I have law degree (from other country), got a paralegal certificate from a NY school- graduated in a dean’s list (last year), and yet, can’t find a job. Instead, I got this $9/hour job in a retail store. Now, I don’t know anymore what to do to gain back my confidence and self-worth.
Your article somehow is a good enlightenment for me. Thank you. What can you advice. Is there some decent paying job out there for over 50 yrs old applicant like me? I tried everything from applying jobs online, to sending application by regular mail, to walk-in… to different companies, from government offices, to law firms, to banks, to hospitals, you name it and I had it…. ALL TO NO AVAIL. I hate being dependent for my husband for support. But it is what is happening to me all the past couple of years. What else should I do to have a decent paying job and related to my educ and experience? Your advice will be highly appreciated.
Thanks for such a beautiful and an inspirational article. I have learnt a lot from this and will surely apply in my life.
Regards
I am truly inspired by your article!!
Sir Harrison Barnes
I truly appreciate your continual mail to me.i FEEL AM CONTINUALLY FINDING ANSWERS TO MY EVERYDAY ENCOUNTERS AN THEIR BY TAKING INFORMED DECISIONS……THANKS ALOT
The more progress you make, the thicker your emotional skin will naturally get, because you’ll start to realize that you’re actually doing something that matters, and the peanut gallery isn’t.
Very inspirational article. thanks
It often requires discipline to stay focused without trying to copy someone else. There seem to be an inherent trait in humans that tip them towards coveting what they don’t have and in my opinion, this is what makes us fans of duplicates instead of originals.
I’m an architect, in my 50s (52), I decided that I’m not to work for others anymore, coz I can’t, I can’t come and leave in a specific time everyday. So, I decided to use my retirement money in business. Frankly, I find it hard to start an architectectural consultancy office, though I think I have something unique to add for architecture, I’ve seen it all the time in the eyes of my supervisors. One is required to pay his own and family living expenses. So I decided to buy a franchise for frozen yogurt or coffee shop brand name.
Maybe you ment, Harrison, that one does his job the way that shows who he is, espacially in fields like arts, movie making, or architecture, but we remain a part of a big, changing situation that we have to consider.
It seems like the Dean is pushing his son into math because the Dean was good at it, but the kid not so much.
This is an excellant article. I am a solo attorney and recently obtained my real estate license. I keep telling myself I have to combine my skills (bankruptcy law) with my passion (real estate). Deep inside, I KNOW this is not what I want to do. Thank you for the article. I am encouraged to pursue Real Estate in the way that will make me happy and let go of tying my self worth to being able to say, I am a lawyer.