I do a lot of reading, and if you’ve heard me speak, you know that I don’t do a lot of reading from career books, because I find most of them are woefully out of date. My reading is usually a combination of sales and marketing books, coupled with personal improvement. I’m always thinking in the back of my mind when I read, “How can this information be used to help my clients get their next job even quicker? Can any of these strategies be used in a career search?”
Today, I’d like to share with you what I learned from reading Authentic Happiness by Dr. Martin Seligman. This falls under the ‘personal improvement’ classification, but there are great lessons to be used in determining criteria for your next career.
He talks about the concept of well-being. Let’s for a moment apply his rules of well-being to work. Seligman defines well-being in 5 ways:
Positive emotion. Does your current or potential job elicit positive emotions from you as you think about it?
Engagement. This is when time stops and you are in a flow state. Does this happen at work for you now, or will you be doing the tasks that put you in that flow state in your potential position? If not, it’s just not a right fit. Gallup did a poll a few months ago that uncovered that 70% of fully employed people are not engaged at work.
Relationships. Do you have positive, constructive relationships with the people you currently work with or will potentially work with? If there are any hints of dysfunction, it’s a bad sign.
Meaning and purpose. Does your current or potential position add meaning and purpose to your life, or are you just collecting a paycheck. You won’t be happy if you don’t have meaning or purpose in your career.
Achievement. Does your current or potential job give you the opportunity you need to make significant achievements? Not only will this make you happier, these achievements look great on a resume and can allow to gain a better job in the future.
Seligman also offers some great advice on getting happier. You can generate resilience and beat stress by creating a nighttime routine of listing three things you are grateful for that day before going to bed.
He also recommends concentrating on what skills you have and use those; don’t worry about improving your weaknesses.
You can take his famous skills assessment at www.AuthenticHappiness.org .
Have a very happy, productive week this week!
