Is it ever too late for your own advice?
I’ve got an interesting question for you today; but first I need you to do a bit of imagining.
Try to remember, for a moment, what you were like when you were first starting your climb up the leadership ladder.
Can you picture the younger you? What were your career expectations? What were your fears?
Close your eyes for just a moment and try to be that person again for a moment.
So how was that?
Were you able to remember your younger self?
Did some of those expectations come back to you?
Did you feel some of that fear you used to feel?
So the coach’s question of the day:
If you could go back in time and give your younger self some career advice, what would it be?
Go ahead, close your eyes again and imagine what you would say to yourself.
I practice what I preach, and I’ve done this exercise myself:
- I would remind myself to imagine that everyone around me is wanting to contribute their best – even on days where it doesn’t seem that way.
- I would encourage myself to look more for jobs with people I admire, and less for jobs with impressive responsibilities.
- I would worry less about ‘getting ahead’ by other people’s measures and more about contributing something to the world that I’ll really be proud of.
So what would you tell your younger self?
Now that you have some idea of what sage advice you would give, have you implemented it in your career?
If not, what’s holding you back?
And if you have fully taken your own advice, congratulations and bravo!
But, I’m not letting you off the hook just yet.
Last time we talked about using a coach approach in your workplace.
Taking a coach approach with those around you will build an even more impressive team.
How can you take a coach approach, and ask some key questions, to help a younger or more junior person in your office figure out what their own advice would be to themselves?
If you’re so inclined, and want to offer your thoughts for others to see, please provide a comment or two at the bottom of the page.
