By John Mullins

I remember once writing about something I called the "career compass". The piece was meant to help people understand that when you look for direction in your career you can find it from within yourself.

Now to be honest, nothing's changed, I still believe the answers lie within, but the thing that struck me after I wrote that piece was how little value people really placed on values.

There seemed to be a very cynical outlook on jobs, and the world of work.

Now I guess there could be thousands of reasons for that, including the one reason I seem to hear a lot these days which says, people are expendable and the more we can squeeze out of them the better.

Well, I have news for any business leader or manager who subscribes to that school of thought. You're not going to last.

You run more risk in draining your human resources than when you invest a little cash in them. And isn't it true that the more we feel that people invest in us, the more we are willing to give back?

Even Stephen Covey knew that all those years ago when he wrote about the emotional bank account. In simple terms, you can't keep withdrawing from people emotionally, without investing something back.

Relationships will simply die if you believe that's the way things work. The problem I think is that in a time when jobs are scarce and there appears to be an overflow of talented people to fill jobs, managers get lazy and even worse careless with the way they handle their resources.

There is a tendency to think that it doesn't matter if someone resigns, because we can easily replace them.

But how true is that really? Not very, is the answer.

It costs a company way more than they think to fire and re-hire. Or when someone resigns and companies arrogantly refuse to find out why, they miss the opportunity to learn what they could do differently to avoid high staff turnover.

But let's get back on track here. The real point of me going off about value in a career is twofold.

Firstly, as I said I don't think individuals spend enough time understanding the value they create in a job.

And secondly, this lack of understanding means we tend to look at jobs as passing moments in time that we occupy outside of our real lives.

We spend so much time convincing ourselves to separate work from our normal lives that we start to live and behave in different ways at work and at home.

This is not sustainable people! You cannot be two different people in one day. You are who you are.

Get to know yourself, and live true to that every day of your life. That way, you realise you bring so much more to a job or a career than just some routine mechanical steps that a monkey could be trained to do.

We need everyone to really understand and find the value in their job or career.

And it starts with admitting whether you are in a job just for the sake of having a job, or whether you feel aligned and committed to the work you do.

Either way, you need to first know what you are all about. Only then can you evaluate what the job requires, and whether you can add value to it.

So let's look at a real life example here. I met a guy who was asked to join a project team to design a customer service programme for a client.

By all accounts he was not known to be any good at sales or marketing and he was not overly excited about the job. Yet, his skills were relevant to the job and so he was hired.

After a while he started to really shine in the job because his natural and deeper personal attributes were being stimulated with what the project required, and suddenly he was adding more to the project than his initial skill set.

This was also noticed by the company and the conclusion was, there was a deep connection between what the company required from people and what his natural values and behaviour was all about. He fitted into the culture perfectly.

For this guy, almost by accident he found great value in his job. He was subsequently rewarded for the effort he put in beyond his basic skills.

Each of us can have this moment. It's the moment you realise that you are bigger than any single job.

Because your job does not define you. You define yourself. One day, the right job will fit you. Keep looking.

Ways to find value in your career

Understand yourself fully. (Your Values and Behaviour Preferences).

Does your job allow you to express these every day?

Do you find you are willing to go beyond what the job requires? If so, is it because you feel compelled, or forced?

Ultimately you are valuable. A job only gives you space to show that. Without you, the job is nothing.

JOHN MULLINS

Visit John’s websites for more, www.daredreamdone.com, or www.johnmullins.co.za
Or contact him on his email address, john@johnmullins.co.za