Seth Godin wrote about the hedonic buffet and I want to apply it to thinking about jobs and careers. There are so many choices out there and we all now have so many interests. We also have different narratives telling us whether a job is meaningful or not, and whether the career is going to be sustainable for our lifestyle and so on. We may keep seeking and switching, or focus so much on building out our CV, forgetting what it is for.
There’s no single CV that allows you to land any job you want. Industries shift and move; but so would your interests and areas. I suggest you drop the labels. The titles like engineers, lawyers, teachers, accountants are useful when you look at others, when you have to search for roles and sort them on a website. But start thinking of your interests in terms of the problems you’re trying to solve, the kind of creativity you want to deploy, the kind of interactions you want to have.
At a buffet, people think about what food they like to eat, and also what are the expensive dishes which will make the buffet experience worth it. But they eventually sit down and eat. You have to be consuming the meal to make the buffet worth the while, not just infinitely stacking your plate. Likewise with jobs and careers you’re eventually trying to go somewhere, and pursue some kind of interest. You need to be clear about that.
For more ideas how to approach these questions, download my ebook.