Albert Einstein never presented himself as an expert on career success, in spite of the fact that he had a very successful career. However, I thought it would be fun to explore some of his sayings as if they were career success tips. So here goes the first batch of tips:
- Perfection of means and confusion of ends seems to characterize our age: Don’t spend too much time polishing the steps you need to take to achieve good career management. Get clarity on where you want the steps to take you.
- The ideals which have lighted my way, and time after time have given me new courage to face life cheerfully, have been Kindness, Beauty, and Truth. The trite subjects of human efforts, possessions, outward success, luxury have always seemed to me contemptible: Understand the difference in importance between solid ideals with lasting value and the short-term gratification that human measures of career success might bring.
- The important thing is not to stop questioning: Accepting information at face value–especially when you don’t know the reliability of the source–can sabotage your career success. Question it!
- Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results: If something you’ve tried to implement in your job search or career management plan isn’t working, try doing it differently or doing something else.
- Not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted: This kind of goes along with #2 above. For example, money (salary, etc.) isn’t unimportant–it’s how you pay your bills. However, a great salary for a job with a relentlessly high stress level could make you unbearably miserable–or worse.
- The significant problems we have cannot be solved at the same level of thinking with which we created them: If your job search (or your current job) isn’t going well, look beyond and above the actions you’ve been taking. Maybe there’s something you’re not doing–or not doing enough of–that would improve the results you’re seeing.
- If A is success in life, then A equals x plus y plus z. Work is x; y is play; and z is keeping your mouth shut: Success in your career (as in your life) can depend a lot on how you balance what you put into your work and your play–and how well you know when to stay quiet and not say something that will land you in hot water!
More Career Success Tips from Einstein Coming Soon
It will take me at least one more blog post to cover the quotations I selected, so you should see more career success tips from Einstein in just a couple of days–maybe in time for Thanksgiving! In case you don’t, I’ll just wish you a happy Thanksgiving now–however you choose to celebrate it.
