Wouldn’t it be nice to have our careers fully planned out, to know what to expect at every turn, and to rest assured that job stability and satisfaction are guaranteed in the future? Well, yes, that would be nice. Perfect, even.
We all know that person who always strives for perfection, whether sitting with their hand raised in the lecture hall, typing away at their cubicle after hours, or ruminating inside their heads, constantly questioning the value of choices. The perfectionist believes they must be in control of their destiny. Every decision is a deliberate means to an end—the end being, well, success. But what is it that constitutes success?
For the perfectionist, success is seeing their plans come to fruition as imagined. For Lisa ⚖️ Lang , current Vice President and General Counsel at Ohio Northern University, success comes from trusting the process, having faith in the power of challenging herself, and remaining open to new opportunities whenever they cross her path. Listen to our conversation with Lisa HERE.
For the perfectionist, adopting this go-with-the-flow mindset may be easier said than done, especially in the context of something as daunting as a job search or career shift. In the recent Hiring Insights Podcast episode, Connecting the Dots: Navigating Career Growth, Building Relationships, and Harnessing Social Media, Lisa Lang offers her take on letting go of the perfectionist point of view and learning to call upon your present values, interests, and desires when moving through your career journey.
1. Everything happens in due time. Each experience has an exponential purpose that contributes to reaching your end goal - even if you don’t necessarily know what your end goal is yet.
On her path to securing the role of Vice President and General Counsel at Ohio Northern University, Lisa made many choices that “didn’t always make sense to me or others,” yet she doubts she would be where she is today had she acted differently. Having received an undergraduate degree in English, Lisa experienced a change of heart that made her consider a career in the legal field. Lisa’s entry into law came from a serendipitous encounter with a U.S. Army recruiter during one of her paralegal night courses. It was then that Lisa decided to become a military paralegal, a position she held for six years.
2. View every circumstance life throws at you as an opportunity for learning and growth. Normalize taking missteps and realize that the practice of law is practice.
Attending night school while working as a full-time civilian paralegal gave Lisa a more foundational understanding of the practice of law, helping her grasp more fully just how and why things were done at her firm. “I’ve learned how to do not just the thing, but all the things that surround the thing, and it makes me understand what I do and why I do it better.”
3. Be wary of adopting tunnel vision.
Lisa finds that people tend to become “so fixated on a specific goal that they lose sight of opportunities that may exist right before their eyes.” Although she notes that “I never set out to do what I’m doing now,” she always felt comfortable knowing her career trajectory could shift in unexpected ways because she knew how to leverage the skills she gained from each new experience. Moreover, even if a project does not automatically align with your long-term career goals, it is worth allowing yourself the space to try new things.
4. It’s not just knowing how to do the work, but knowing who people are, and how they work, and establishing mutual trust.
When Lisa worked at the Kentucky Attorney General’s Office, she was assigned to the Department of Education. Through working with this client, she learned from both perspectives what each organization did, why they did it, how they did it, and what they both wanted as a result. Eventually, the DOE created an in-house role with Lisa in mind. “I didn’t go seek it, I got it because I built relationships with this one client and got to the point where this one client would come to the AG’s office and say, ‘I want Lisa Lang to handle all my cases.’”
5. Do not approach anything you do as a transaction. Be prepared to give freely without expecting anything in return.
Part of being successful is being authentic, building relationships, and expecting nothing in return, because the fact of the matter is, the more you give, the more you get back. Additionally, treat choosing a job as an investment; you spend more time and energy building up expertise in a less impressive role initially so that you can accumulate your experience and achieve a higher position later on.
The path to achieving one’s ideal career is never perfect. Start in your comfort zone, taking small leaps consistently over time, and you might just find yourself covering more height as you go.
Listen to Lisa Lang’s full account on the Top Talent Advocates Hiring Insights Podcast.