When being "good at your job" isn't enough
Careers that choose you versus careers that you choose.
I always thought I was bad at math. It didn’t come naturally to me.
Then, when I was sixteen, I got a job as a bank teller. My dad was on the bank’s board, and the owner liked to hire employees’ kids — he believed we’d work harder. (He wasn’t wrong. We all felt like we had something to prove).
“Banking math” was different. As it turns out, I was very good at it. Balancing a cash drawer made perfect sense to me. It was concrete and practical, unlike the calculus class I took. Later, in college, I started working in loan processing. I dug into complex banking regulations and read teh language of dnese financial laws to understand things.
That led to a job at a banking software company after I was done with college. I stayed there for 15 years. I found that I was also really good at data. I taught myself SQL queries. I became the company’s first product manager, writing technical specifications for new features.
I convinced myself that I loved my job, because I was good at it.
But in reality, it was a career that “chose me” rather than one I chose. I flourished because I had a knack for data and complex systems. Working at a software company had a natural career progression through the ranks and paid well.
It took a global pandemic for me to step back and ask myself, “What am I even doing?”
The trap of being good at your job
Being good at something can give us fulfillment. When people praise you for your skills, it feels validating. Promotions, raises, and new responsibilities confirm you’re doing something “right.”
Before long, being really good at your job becomes a core part of your work identity. You stand out among your peers. “The cream rises,” as the saying goes. It’s how people end up in jobs — or even spending their entire careers — in work they never consciously chose. They got good at something early, and momentum kept carrying them forward.
When you’re rewarded for something, it’s easy to mistake recognition for purpose. You start building your self-worth around external validation: performance reviews, titles, and bigger paychecks. Genuine interest falls to the bottom of the priority list.
The thing about being good at your job? It’s hard to disengage. You’ve set the expectation that you’re good, which usually means you also work hard. Or manage other people. Disengagement or quiet quitting might not be an option.
I didn’t really start questioning my job until July of 2020. The COVID-19 pandemic was raging, and I gave myself permission to truly step back. In many ways, I was forced to step back — because I had no childcare and my kids needed me. I started to realize that I didn’t care the work I was doing. Or rather, there were things about the industry that I enjoyed, but the exact work was something I was “good at” rather than something I enjoyed.
Sometimes, we build entire careers out of what we can do, not what we want to do.
When a career no longer feels like it’s “yours”
The timing was fortuitous. I quit my job at the onset of The Great Resignation, and finding another job was easy. Now, I work for myself — which feels like what I was meant to do all along. I always wanted to control my work, and it turns out I’m happier working solo than working as an executive.
But it took a long time for me to recognize that being “good at work” wasn’t enough. Praise wasn’t a substitute for fulfillment. Recognizing the disconnect in your career is Step Number 1.
Maybe you fell into your industry by accident.
Maybe you feel fatigue from your workload and misalignment between what you do and what you feel like you’re meant to do.
Ask yourself:
Am I proud of your work, or just proud that I can do it well?
There’s a difference.
The job market is brutal right now, so it might not be the time to explore something new. My friend Nick Moore, a fellow freelance writer, wrote about working for satisfaction, not passion. And I think that’s an ok place to be. If you can take a step back from being “good at your job” — so you feel like you’re not overworked or over-invested — you can be “satisfied with your job” and leave space for other things in your life.
Nick wrote:
Your workplace is not your family, but work is a part of life. Putting work in the context of your life gives you more variables to think about, more dials to twist, more options to consider. You’re not stuck in the false binary of passion or drudgery.
You must work, yes, but you can figure out ways to find satisfaction in the day-to-day, maximize money and flexibility along the way, and fill the rest of your time with life rather than squeezing your life into work.
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