170: Discovering Your Career Anchors: A Conversation with Peter Schein

Happier At Work®

Are you at a career crossroads and wondering how to make the right choice?

In this enlightening podcast episode, Aoife O'Brien dives into the world of career anchors and choices with Peter Schein, co-author of "Career Anchors: The Changing Nature of Careers." Peter explains how career anchors help individuals understand their unique values and preferences, guiding them towards fulfilling and successful career paths. From technical functional roles to autonomy, creativity, general management, and more, the conversation explores the different career anchors and how they influence our decisions. Discover the power of self-awareness in career planning and decision-making, and gain insights into finding a balance between personal and professional goals.

The main points throughout this podcast include:

- Understanding the concept of career anchors and their role in making career decisions.

- Exploring the eight different career anchors, including technical functional, autonomy, challenge, entrepreneurship, general management, service, stability, and lifestyle.

- Recognising the importance of aligning your career choices with your personal values and aspirations.

- How the pandemic has reshaped the way we perceive and approach our careers.

- The significance of self-awareness in navigating career transitions and building a fulfilling professional journey.

“The next one, it was actually one of the newer anchors called to challenge and risk is how we label it, but it's basically, you don't ever want to be too comfortable doing something that's simple. You always have to be finding something that is boil the ocean hard or you, you're sort of a risk junkie.

A friend many, many years ago was a capital market, financial instrument trader and was given the opportunity to, become a manager in that same, department. No, it was the challenge of your life on the line with every trade you make. That is what motivated him. He didn't wanna manage other people doing that.

In 2023, the world embraced that idea, but when this research started at the Sloan Business School at MIT, Ed and other people working on it knew that those people were all going to say, I want to be the boss, I want to be the general manager. I'm at business school because I want to be a CEO. But I think we've moved past that. And they discovered in the research that if nine out of 10 of their panellists said that, by the time they got 20 years later, less than half of them were actually still saying they wanted to be the CEO.”

Listen back: https://happieratwork.ie/happier-at-work-68-embracing-the-gentle-art-of-humble-inquiry-with-edgar-and-peter-schein/

Connect with Peter Schein:

Website: https://ocli.org/

Do you have any feedback or thoughts on this discussion? If so, please connect with Aoife via the links below and let her know. Aoife would love to hear from you!

Connect with Happier at Work host Aoife O’Brien:

Website: https://happieratwork.ie

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/aoifemobrien/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/HappierAtWorkHQ

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/happieratwork.ie/

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YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCm0FKS19I5qSlFFmkx1YGqA