‘Alex do you have a moment, I need to talk to you?’

Ever so often I get approached by one of my staff wanting to talk to me about their future, what’s my outlook on their next career step and the path of their journey. It’s understandable that you want to know what your next position should be so you can start learning the necessary skills and work on improving on your weaknesses, but nine out of ten times this question is solely generated by impatience and the need to compete with friends, colleagues and former classmates. Being ambitious is a good thing and important to be successful, but it shouldn’t stem from jealousy of your friends and coworkers.

As a consequence of this impatience to get promoted and move on, you’ll feel pressured, rushed and are not able to enjoy the moment. You feel like being on the grid starting yet another race for the next position!

Image courtesy of Ambro at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Don’t worry it’s not just you… everyone needs to constantly battle this impatience (yes, including myself), and I hope that my guide to tranquility and happiness following below will help you as well:

1. Most importantly you need to have a long-term goal and short-term goals leading to it, and ensure to write your goals and steps towards them down on a piece of paper to clear up the confusion in your head and to remind yourself of your journey
2. Having clearly set goals does not mean that you cannot change them… as a matter of fact you will change them many times throughout the course of your career, but it will give you the feeling that things go according to plan and helps calming down your impatience
3. Don’t fall into the trap of trying to chase a title, and rather focus on learning something new every day and on pushing yourself out of your comfort zone
4. Believe me that the title you were chasing after for so long and finally got promoted to, will feel outdated to you within a couple of days only, and you’ll find yourself in exactly the same position of chasing the next title again (almost like a hamster in the wheel)
5. Focus on being able to tell a story that will tell the strengths that you acquired over the years and identify who you are as a leader
6. Rather than knocking at your bosses door every other week to ask for what’s in store for you, tell your boss what your career expectations and goals within the company are, ask if they are realistic and what you need to improve to be considered
7. As simple as it sounds, but focusing most of your energy on doing a good job, having the right can-do attitude and wanting to learn and grow rather than just chasing a title, will get you promoted almost magically by itself (and chances are that you’ll be relaxed and happier along the way)
8. It’s not a race, and if you’re not able to enjoy the journey, what is it all good for?

Question: What’s your take on impatience, and your recipe of battling it?