The dangers of allowing your career stifle your talent by Onyi Uchegbulam

By Onyi Uchegbulam, Human Resource consultant (Dis Generation Guest Writer)

 Why do I have to ‘work’? Can ‘work’ be more exciting than it is already? Can it be something I can look forward to? Can I synchronize my career with my activities of interests, talents and abilities? Can I build for myself a career path that excites me and genuinely gets me up every morning?

To answer these questions I began searching everywhere for ‘The Solution.’ Then it dawned on me, all I needed was a Balance! We all need a balance between our activities of interests and career, between our inherent skills and abilities and our educational/professional training.  We must know how to choose the right course of study or how to make a successful career choice.

There are a lot of possibilities and satisfaction derived from an excellent career fit; from matching personality with career choice.

As a Consultant who has been involved in numerous selection assignments, it breaks my heart to see displaced and unharnessed skills and abilities in people. Trust me, I have seen a lot of them, which explains why we have development issues in Nigeria.

What is the place of talents or gifts or inner skills and abilities in our chosen career path? Everything! The reason most people are dissatisfied with their jobs/professions is ultimately because it does not allow them express who they are, it does not allow them engage in activities that incite their brains and personalities.

We are created with passions and desires. These passions come with inherent talents, skills and abilities that help its realization. It could be really hurtful to disregard these inherent abilities and passions or categorize them as hobbies or leisure activities as we mostly do.

Think about this. When are you more productive? When you approach your profession from a burdensome or nagging necessity point of view or when approached from relaxed, leisure and fun-filled point of view?

Do you have to look forward to the end of a workday or vacation period before you can really be ‘alive’ and do the things you naturally love to do?

The secret to an ideal work satisfaction is a balance. A talent/skill/ability discovered (no matter when) should be given the requisite educational/professional training and steered in the right career path. Can you imagine what this will do in our society? The multi-facet development our country will experience? How it will reduce the rate of unemployment and create more jobs and contribute to a well-balanced society?

What to consider when choosing a Career

I once interviewed a young lady for an administrative position. This lady is extremely cheerful, very relaxed, a conversationalist, enjoys planning parties and having fun. You tell me, how can she ably function as a Senior Administrative Officer, a position that requires some level of strictness and accountability in managing resources and people as well, to say the least. If at all employed for this position, she will be unable to adequately function as expected. The pressure to be ‘more this’ or ‘more that’ will arise and the employer will end up trying to make her who she is not (if he has the patience to do so). Hence both parties are unsatisfied! She will resent her job descriptions, the environment, her appearance (which is determined by the environment and job descriptions to a large degree) and finally feel unproductive. This gives way for an individual second-guessing him/herself in terms of the ability to achieve and excel in career and life.

What would be considered the best fit for this lady? I would recommend and Events Company. The environment will be a good soil for her seeds to be harnessed and developed- she will grow and flourish. Now how did we arrive at this conclusion? Through discovering her passions, inherent skills and abilities.

I am suggesting that individuals cannot be trained to be better at a particular function or to handle efficiently a set of activities unless the individual’s passions, desires, talents, skills and abilities align with the function and responsibility from the holistic point of view.

Also, passions and desires can be initiated and developed but there is no better passion to follow than the one that your personality supports. It makes for a more enjoyable life and excellent productivity level.

Think about it!

Guest Writer: Onyi Uchegbulam discovers and manages talents; career counsels and consults in beauty and style management. Her professional career experience is in Human Resources Management. She is a Behavioural Assessor, a skill much needed to make an excellent selection judgement/career fit. You can follow her works on her Blog: http://www.prettyonyi.blogspot.com