I recently made the decision to make a change in my career, and was asked in my final week at the job I was departing for my parting words of wisdom. Obviously I learned a lot of things at that job, like how to take reasonable risks in trying new projects or new responsibilities, how important it can be to consider how you deliver the message (even as much as the message itself), and how including a bit of personality in your professional life can go a long way.
But upon reflection, I may have settled on one thing that is an important bit of advice in a wide variety of occupations: Enjoy your job. Certainly not all of us are lucky enough to have a job that we love, and definitely all of us have some days that just do not go the way we would like. But we spend much of our lives at work, perhaps even seeing our co-workers more than our families. For that reason, it is important to do our best to find a job that we enjoy at least most of the time, and find a way to enjoy ourselves while doing it, even if we are stuck doing the most mundane of tasks. We should enjoy being with our co-workers, feel comfortable laughing with them, and make the most of our work environment to make it safe and comfortable (as much as we can control, anyway) not only because we are spending so much of our time there, but an environment where we feel inspired and comfortable will enable us to do our best work.
Part of enjoying your job is learning how to handle stress, and not sweating the small stuff. When I find myself in breakdown mode because of too many deadlines or professional failures/disappointments or frustration, I try to remind myself that five years from now, or ten, or after I move on in my career, or other such future milestone, I will most likely not remember this moment. The moments I will remember, however, are the moments when I laughed so hard I could barely breathe, or what the morning sun felt like from my office window every morning, or silly office pranks we sometimes played on each other. Obviously the stress cannot be ignored because the work needs to be done and I still care about my contribution to the company and my professional reputation. But in the grander scale of my life, those kinds of problems are not worth sacrificing my health by slipping into a nervous breakdown, and I'm not likely to remember those moments or problems in the future anyway.
I will, however, remember the fun and the jokes. I'll remember the silly mistakes that I was able to laugh about. I'll remember the misunderstandings that I was able to resolve. I'll remember the silly things that co-workers say, and how I was able to develop a closeness with them over sharing silly experiences together. When some of my co-workers were laid off, I remembered the feelings I felt, but I don't remember what the company memo said. I remember laughing over beer with them after their last day, but not what they said while they packed up their personal items from their desks. I remember standing on desks to decorate workplaces for birthdays or pranks, but I don't remember the nights I worked late. I will keep some perspective and try not to get caught up in those stressful moments because they do not make a difference in the big picture. And that is my advice to others as they stumble through their careers, as well.
I wish all my former co-workers the best as they continue on in their own careers, and I wish my former company well as it continues on to find new ways to build on its success. Making a big change like this can be scary, but I am excited to try something new in my career and find even more things to learn and new ways to enjoy my career. And other co-workers to play pranks on. :)
