Updated April 17, 2023
Successful Career Making Decisions
Decisions are the cornerstones of success or failure. People say that you can’t achieve success in a day. But let’s look at it in a different way. The thing is, you can’t achieve failure either in a day or two. When you keep on repeating the same mistakes in making decisions day in and day out, then instead of having a great future, all you have is a job that you don’t like, wearing what you don’t want to wear, drive what you don’t want to drive and live in the way you don’t want to live. So, how to change all that? Simple! You need to make career-making decisions every day, ultimately giving you momentum and boosting your career to a new level. Remember, career-making decisions are everything. It’s the beginning of refueling your future, even if you’ve made fatal mistakes in your past.
In this article, we will wipe off the glass of the past and will help you create a new career. We will offer you a few choices, or you can say pointers for making the right career-making decisions so that in the next 3-5 years, you reach a pinnacle of career success.
Without much ado, let’s begin.
Personal Development Career Making Decisions
Most people will skip this advice. That’s okay. That’s the reason most people don’t reach their mountaintop their whole life. They struggle and manage to reach the next rung in their career decisions. But make sure that’s not you. Like any other living organism, you need growth to expand. If you don’t make decisions to develop yourself, you will simply decay. Whatever skills you’ve learned in the past will dry up, and you will end up in the gutter. Yes, no one wants to live in the gutter. But in spite of that, very few do make career-making decisions to develop themselves.
Personal development is easy. It’s not rocket science. You only need to pick one or two things and learn about them. Once you learn the things, you must apply them whether they work. If they work, you learn a thing, and If they don’t, you will get an experience and can begin again. You should keep on making the decision that no matter what, you will learn something new every day and apply it in your career. This insignificant thing will get piled up, and when you look back after 3 years, you will see that you’ve learned much more than you expected. So, even if you have the temptation to skip personal development altogether, please don’t. It can separate you from the 99% of the crowd and make you a hero in your own right.
Outperform the previous day
Most professionals make decisions to outperform their peers but not themselves. From day one, it’s a mistake because no one can conquer another. The organization is built with people who work for a common purpose as a team, not against each other. Thus from the beginning, if you have a competitive mindset, use it for yourself. Don’t involve others in your competition. You can obviously learn and take experience from other professionals but never compete. Each of us is different and unique. We’re all made of talents, abilities, qualities, and weirdness. So, when you go to compete, your proposal is something like – “I have a red handkerchief, and it’s better than his green one.” It’s silly! Isn’t it?
Instead, learn to outperform yourself. Set targets for yourself each day. Don’t be hard on yourself. But try to hit it. And then increase the target by minuscule the next day and hit that too. This way, you will be able to get a sense of accountability for yourself as well as improve your game as you go along. The career-making decisions to outperform yourself are always smart, and the paradox is this approach will ultimately outperform everyone in your professional group.
Set your priorities right for career-making decisions
We, as professionals, put too much emphasis on the tiny tasks than the ones that really count. In a study, it was found that the best managers are the ones who can make decisions every day to select the frogs from the cookies. If you, as a manager, can make decisions about which ones are the most impactful and most important from a huge list of to-dos, then you win.
There’s a simple method you can use to master this thing. Most people deal with a long list of to-dos. Why not make another to-do list? The first one consists of one thousand things. Let’s call it the ‘long list.’ And from that ‘long list’, let’s make a ‘short list’. A ‘short list’ will only contain the most impactful things that will generate maximum revenue. Once you have a ‘short list’, start working on anyone. Make sure the ‘short list’ should not exceed 3-5.
If you make everyday decisions to set your priorities right and work on them, you already know how to work on high-value tasks without being told by your supervisor.
Learn to be firm but polite
There’s a timeline for being nice. If we start with “being nice” at the first point of the timeline, you will find “exploited” at its extreme! No, it’s not because people are bad or organizations are creepy. It’s because you’re too nice. So, if you want to make your mark in the corporate world, you must let go of this ‘being nice syndrome’ and take up your armor of firmness. If you’re new in the professional world, making decisions to be firm may take a while. You can take your time and prepare yourself. If you want, you can read a lot about firmness, and there are many books you can pick up that can teach you to be assertive.
Now, why it’s important?
No matter what you do, you need to be firm. A nice person may not be a good professional. For example, take negotiation. If you’re not assertive, you will not be able to reach the point you aim at. If we talk about taking interviews, how would you take interviews if you are not assertive in your dealings (remember, you’re the face of the company)?
So, learn this from the beginning. And make sure you decide to be firm by will. Remember, every small thing matters. But don’t overdo it. Be firm but polite.
Work on your vision
When you begin your career-making decisions, you may not have much idea about what to be in your future. It’s completely alright. There are many professionals who have started with something and have become something else after 10 years. Be open and flexible, but you will slack and lose momentum if you’re not working on your vision from day one.
Simply take a crisp paper and write down a theme for your life. Find out what you like most. What smells attract you? What kind of people do you love to be around? Do you like any particular types of books? Find out and try. See for yourself what genre of career attracts you (even if you’re currently not pursuing that career, it is okay). Once you have even a vague idea, just write it down. Then as you go along, shape your vision. Refine it with new information. The thing is, you shouldn’t be standing still. Every day you need to make career-making decisions that, no matter what, you will work on your vision. It may be vague for now.
For example, you wanted to be top of a company. You don’t know what position you want to reach. Or even you don’t know whether you want to start a company on your own or not. That’s okay. Ask yourself – What would a top company person spend the day like? Would s/he read a lot? Would s/he make decisions every day to be better than yesterday? Once you get an answer, work on it. Take one step at a time. And one day, you will see that you’re closer, and the past does seem to get connected.
Do deep work
You read it right, do deep work, not hard work. Doing hard work is a myth. Deep work is a much better way to put it. Now, what is deep work? Deep work means when you do work, you only do work. It’s that simple.
If we take statistics, we would see that every day, each full-time worker in corporations does an average of 2 hours of deep work. It’s astonishing to see how much time is being wasted every day on gossip, checking emails, connecting with people who will not impact the revenue, and extended lunch breaks. You can take a different approach when 99% of the crowd does this. You can make decisions to do deep work at least 4-5 hours a day.
The best way to do deep work is to be clear about the priorities every day. Once you’re clear about what to do during the day, pick one of the highest-value tasks. Then clear away all distractions from your desk. In many companies, employees are not allowed to put their headphones on. Ask your supervisor whether you can do it or not. If you’re allowed, use headphones and start working. Do the work in a 30-10 schedule. Do 30 minutes of deep work and take 10 minutes of break. Chitchat is not bad, but it should not hamper what you’re here to do.
If you make decisions to practice deep work every day, you will bring results that no one would. No, you don’t need to compete. You just need to focus on the most valuable tasks and finish them before deadlines. And you’re done.
Go out of your comfort decisions every day
What can you do today that makes you more valuable than yesterday? Yes, that small piece is your growth. And if you don’t make decisions to grow, who can help you?
Every day, make decisions to do something that scares you. It may be a cold calling that you’re so very scared of. Or maybe a client visit you’ve been putting off for some time. Or maybe talk to your boss about certain changes you want to make in the design to build a better prototype.
Everyone’s comfort zone is different. Earlier, we used to equate the comfort zone with the safety zone. But the worst news is that your comfort zone is not safe anymore. If you don’t go out of your comfort zone, you’re not safe; rather, you’re trending toward a riskier zone each day. Do you want to make such stupid career-making decisions? I bet you don’t.
Make a list of things that scare you. Don’t write something like – I’m scared of the height or water. Write something related to professional life. For example – “I’m scared to make the first phone call in the morning” or “I’m never able to talk to a particular colleague of mine”. Pick one from your list and do that first thing in the morning (if possible). That way, you can beat the demon lurking inside your head and not let yourself become your highest self.
Final analysis
The above decisions are easy to do and easy not to do. There’s no force and no immediate gratification. No, you will not get any immediate reward. But if you continue and keep doing it for at least 3-5 years, you will see the results in front of your eyes.
Decisions make or break us. What we do each day separates rock stars from ordinary professionals. Don’t think that the rock stars belong to some rare breed, and you’re not. We all are cut from the same cloth. Some decide to be the best of the best. And some make decisions to give in and be ordinary.
Which one are you?
The pointers we mentioned above are not exhaustive. You can add more, as many as you want. But make decisions to be extraordinary by following a simple method. It works for everybody, every time.
- Start with only one. If you don’t, you will spread your energy too thin and soon give up.
- Start very small. Do it for 3-10 minutes or maybe less.
- Do it every day first thing in the morning for at least 30 days until you get momentum and the task seems automatic.
- Once you do the first task for 30 days, pick the second one and practice both for another 30 days. And then pick third.
- Write about your growth in a blog or a notebook.
- Once you’re on it for a year, teach this method to other professionals (if they’re willing to know).
If you use this simple method, soon enough, you will see the magnificent difference in how you act professionally. Just give it a try and see for yourself how it goes.
Related Articles
This has been a guide to the Career making decisions is everything. You need to make a few decisions every day, which will ultimately give you momentum and boost your career to a new level. These are the following external link related to career decisions.
- Career Success Skills
- Career Advice for College Students
- Financially Intelligent Career Move
- Cold Calling Techniques
