Your Sorting Hat: When quantity beats quality, systems beat goals and your hourly rate
Career Tuesday
Careers, Life and Questions (Aug 30, 2022)
Wish you a Happy Career Tuesday!
3 Career Ideas
I.
"Quantity beats quality - when you embark on something new
So your number of hours will matter when starting on a skill, a sport or a study."
II.
"Think about what is changing - in your domain, company and market.
Will this boost or put brakes on your career in 2 years? What should you do?"
III.
"Desperation and deadlines lead to poor options and decisions.
You find better jobs when you are not under pressure to find one."
2 Life Quotes from Books
I.
Scott Adams, creator of Dilbert, writes about why Systems beat Goals in his book - How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big: Kind of the Story of My Life:
"A goal is a specific objective that you either achieve or don't sometime in the future. A system is something you do on a regular basis that increases your odds of happiness in the long run. If you do something every day, it's a system. If you're waiting to achieve it someday in the future, it's a goal. If you achieve your goal, you celebrate and feel terrific, but only until you realize you just lost the thing that gave you purpose and direction. Your options are to feel empty and useless, perhaps enjoying the spoils of your success until they bore you, or set new goals and reenter the cycle of permanent presuccess failure. All I'm suggesting is that thinking of goals and systems as very different concepts has power.
Goal-oriented people exist in a state of continuous pre success failure at best, and permanent failure at worst if things never work out. Systems people succeed every time they apply their systems, in the sense that they did what they intended to do. The goals people are fighting the feeling of discouragement at each turn. The systems people are feeling good every time they apply their system. That's a big difference in terms of maintaining your personal energy in the right direction."
Source: Book: How to Fail by Scott Adams
II.
Tynan, author and adventurer, offers a compelling argument for total ownership and accountability in his bestseller - Superhuman by Habit: A Guide to Becoming the Best Possible Version of Yourself, One Tiny Habit at a Time -
"Assuming that everything is your fault is a shortcut for finding those areas where you have control, and opening the door to exerting that control for positive change."
Source: Book: Superhuman by Habit by Tynan
1 Question
What is the hourly value of your time? Now what tasks from your work/ life should you pay money to automate or outsource?
If you enjoyed that, please share this email with others.
Sign up here to receive this email every week or read longer career articles here.
Until next week,
Devashish Chakravarty
Author of YourSortingHat
Columnist for Careers at The Economic Times
Note: This newsletter is part of Amazon Affiliate program