Are you making choices, that kill your career? There are three different phases in our career, that define our career! And a bit more too. Those phases have also an impact on our health and family relations! The first phase is looking for getting a new job. The second phase is maintaining the contemporary position. And the third one is accepting a promotion. Each of these are not just some intermediate element in your life, but they make you road to future. There are 5 questions which help you to define, if this really is doing good for you. If your answer is ”yes” to one or more of these five questions, it’s time to reconsider if you should answer different type of questions – job interview question for some other organisation.
1. Do you find yourself questioning your values?
We need to feel valued and that our doing has some real meaning. We need to have a connection to the organisations goals and vision. If you feel that the new job, or the job you are doing right now, don’t deliver those to you, you know you will feel bad, dis-engaged and de-motivated very soon. These will have a negative impact on your achievement level. meaning that you are not building your future success, nor your well being. There is, as our brain has some resistance on change, just to accept the situation. To go on automated mode and think ”work is just work” and ”I’ll find a better solution later.”
2. nobody cares about your interest to learn and to develop.
Today every job must be a place where you learn and grow. One needs to have a clear path towards professional betterment and increased responsibility and challenge. It is about your success today and tomorrow, so you simply shouldn’t settle for anything less.
When you are about to go to a new job, interview some people who are in the organisations. What do they say? If in your today’s job you have this feeling, remember that it is you, and you alone, who needs to take action. You have the right to an environment where personal growth, curiosity, and desire for advancement are nurtured.”
3. Accountability is a phrase, not reality.
A leader whose leadership is based affiliate approach never challenges people, never puts demands on people’s behaviours. That leads to mediocrity, is toxic and fundamentally dysfunctional. There are teams in which everyone’s default mindset was ”not my square,”. This leads to blaming and finger pointing being the norm. Chronic under-performers are not addressed, and where toxic outbursts are not admonished. Accountability is one of the root causes for good on earth. Do you want to learn and improve, or spend your days in meaningless talks about whose fault something is? Blaming is not the same as being held accountable!
4. Silence is culture as talking and taking risks are punished, event the talk would be different.
One of the lessons learnt from organisations in trouble is, that there is no real discussion and developing disagreements. Opinions are asked for, but in the ”best” case they are ignored, in many cases they will lead to punishment in some form. This is Toxic, a culture of fear, where no growth is possible. The easy way to learn, if disagreements are truly allowed and appreciated, is asking people how often changes that are implemented are initiated by employees.
5. In toxic culture information is not shared, in poor leadership it is shared once.
If people say, or you feel, that information is not shared, you need to look at it more closely. There are leaders, who don’t understand who to get people to remember and finally really understand some information. And then there are leaders, who believe that when they don’t share information, they will have more power. The latter ones are those you don’t want to work with. Their interest is about three people; my + myself + I. If your leader doesn’t understand the reason and value of good communication, then you need to ask yourself, is it a real risk to you, or can you behave differently and hence build your personal success?”
The more of these questions get ”yes”, the faster you need to walk out of the door. Or never even open the door. Just in 3 months your brain starts to adapt to the situation and you are less likely to take fast actions. That can (often does) lead to the point, where you take action only after the toxic culture has not only limited your career development, but also adverse impact on you health and/or family. Don’t wait for the ship to sink, take you lifeboat today.
Building you future is about looking around. You need to ask yourself, will this environment support my growth? If it does not, then it shouldn’t be your organisation. You might to want to remember, that the core of work life today has two things; emotional intelligence and life long learning. Emotional intelligence is your tool to succeed in leading yourself in the best possible way, hence you can understand others better and lead them better.
If you would like to have support, just get in touch, or look for our digital training solutions. Our digital solutions are easy to use, lessons are under 10 minutes and focus on one thing at a time. Check this out https://learning.johtajuustaito.fi/kauppasivu%20verkkokurssit%20eng
Kari I. Mattila, your partner in making success happen with emotional intelligence
