Posts Tagged ‘self-actualization’

• Finding what makes you ‘exceptional’ key to success

  Date: 2008.11.16 | Category: Columns | Response: Comments

  It’s actually been more than a month since I wrote this column, which follows rather directly from my previous two. My deliberations on the wonderful matter of how the financial crisis is impacting the job hunt, and the need to find the right fit, led me to what is perhaps the logical next step: When you find a job you think you want, how do you stand out in order to get it? Maybe just being a good fit isn’t enough.

  My thesis is that what makes a person exceptional is, to quote the column, to be “at least a little bit above average in an interesting combination of ways.” It doesn’t necessarily matter what that combination is, as long as you can find the way to make use of it in a way that gives you a leg up.

  The difficult part is, of course, that it isn’t always obvious how you can usefully combine, say, chemistry and economics. Many people go through life without discovering what that is. Sadly, it seems that like with many of the other things I’ve written about this semester, I have thoughts and not answers. I wonder if that makes me a bad columnist?

• Strive for best fit, not “best job”

  Date: 2008.09.08 | Category: Columns | Response: Comments

  The career fair is upon us today, and with over 400 companies represented between the two days it’s very difficult to decide which companies to even speak with, let alone which you want to work for. If we as students are overwhelmed by the number of options, however, I can only imagine how the company representatives feel as they get bombarded with questions, resumes, and puppy dog eyes from hundreds of students pleading for a job or at least an interview.

  The solution for both parties seems simple, and it’s the subject of my column: No matter how outstanding you are, the rest of the applicant pool is just as smart and just as talented. Likewise, from the corporate perspective, the top students you want to hire all have countless options before them. The emphasis cannot just be on how wonderful an applicant is, or how prestigious the position is. Rather, the question has to move to one of fit: Is this the company that is most in line with my goals? Is it the one to which my background holds the most appeal?

  In the real world, however, these sorts of questions are notoriously hard to evaluate. You often don’t get a feel for the culture of a company until after you’ve worked for them for a while, and companies are well aware that the interview process doesn’t tell them nearly everything they would like to know. The solution to that remains elusive. Whoever finds it will, I think, make the world of job-hunting a much better place. And probably make a boatload of money in the process.

• Instincts provide opportunities for personal discovery

  Date: 2008.04.09 | Category: Columns | Response: Comments

  If I had titled my own column with utter disregard for our newspaper’s headline style, I would have called it something along the lines of “Relegating logic and sensibility.” As I note in the column itself, this sort of thinking is uncharacteristic for me. But the best time to make stupid decisions, to try outlandish things and fail, is now. And it’s time I started doing a little bit of that.

• Tech college career inspires above-average mediocrity

  Date: 2008.03.05 | Category: Columns | Response: Comments

  My weekly column from the Technique (back from a two-week hiatus), this time about my motivations for going to Kazakhstan. I kind of liked it, even though I wrote most of it in a semi-exhausted state at the Frankfurt airport.