Denny had taken the job on a lark, needing the money while he looked for a very different job in an entirely different field that he’d always wanted for a career. He kept up his job search, continuing to get email alerts from two job-search sites whenever a new position meeting his parameters popped up. Denny would peruse the new job postings, quickly passing over most of them and applying for one or two only rarely. None of them really seemed right, so much so that Denny began to think that he wasn’t really interested in that other field after all. He was instead liking the work he was doing more and more. Maybe, he finally realized, he was already in his career field. The thought gave him a new appreciation for his “transitional” job.
Difference
Careers differ from jobs. You may not have thought much about the difference, but most of us have at least a vague sense of it. A career is a long-term commitment to work within a specific field. A job is a short-term commitment to do what an employer asks in return for the compensation the role provides. At times, we even distinguish between our employment with a certain entity and the job we have within that employment. Someone will name their employer in conversation, and another person will ask, What’s your job there? And their answer might be, I do payroll and personnel. A job thus implies a specific task or set of tasks carried out within a general employment role. A career implies a commitment to the field, not the employer or task, while a job implies a commitment to both employer and task, not so much to the field. The above employee doing payroll and personnel might thus describe their career as human resources and financial administration.
Commitment
Distinguishing your career from your job or work can help both your job or work and your career. We can exhibit different commitments to jobs and careers, not necessarily more commitment to a career than a job but just different commitments. Recognizing those different kinds of commitments you have to your job and career can help you in both your job and career. The commitment to your career takes the longer view, minimizing concern over immediate returns if you can see the potential for greater long-term returns. We sacrifice more for our career than for our job, such as in pursuing additional education or training, or in accepting volunteer and leadership roles, good for you and those whom your career serves. So don’t hesitate to invest more heavily in your career. By contrast, in our jobs, we focus on short-term returns, again good for you and those whom your job serves, but in a different way, spurring greater effort to address immediate concerns. Yet don’t waste your time investing in a job when it offers only short-term returns and holds no prospect as a career.
Awareness
We are not always aware when our current job is within our career field, on the border of our career, or outside of our career. That inability to distinguish the relationship between our job and career can at times be a good thing. Careers can change. As the story at the beginning of this chapter illustrates, a temporary job outside one’s career field can become a long-term job, leading to a change in one’s career. Sometimes the spear thrower guides the course of the spear toward its target. Other times, though, the point of the spear determines the course independent of the thrower’s intentions. Think of your job as the point of your career spear. You are guiding your career but working your job. The actual course of your career will depend on how the two influences, your thoughts and intentions on one hand and your job on the other hand, come together. So, try to be aware of whether your job is within, on the border of, or outside your career. But don’t try too hard, if you are for the present time unable to entirely discern. Something good may be happening, turning your job into your career.
Temporary
You may, though, clearly sense when your current job is temporary. You may firmly intend your job to be temporary, and your employer may also clearly indicate so. Temporary employment is so common and useful, to both workers and employers, that temp services do land-office business recruiting temporary workers and supplying employers with temps. You may have worked as a temp or worked with temps. Some temps convert to permanent employment, typically for a nice fee paid to the temp service. Good for everyone. The employer and worker get to check one another out before making a commitment, sort of like living together before marriage. But other temps refuse and disdain permanent employment. They prefer the flexibility, variety, lightness, and impermanence of temporary employment. They do their jobs and go home, without a permanent employee’s concerns for the employer’s respect, recognition, profit, or survival. Recognize the advantages of your current temporary employment, or seek temporary employment if you need those advantages. Oddly enough, some workers make a career of temp service.
Transitional
Other employment may not necessarily be temporary but may still be transitional. Transitional employment gets you from one job to another, one career to another, or one place to another. In transitional employment, you are using the role to bridge your way into another role. Internships, apprenticeships, interim positions, and assistant or associate positions can all be transitional employment. Each of those roles imply the worker’s dedication to the field, so much so that the role is preparing them for the next position in line in that field. An apprentice electrician hopes soon to be a master electrician. An assistant inspector is on the way, sooner or later, to being a full-fledged or even chief inspector. An associate professor surely hopes soon to be a full professor with tenure. Transitional roles don’t have to bear a transitional title. You and your employer may both know that your current role is only to get you on staff or keep you on staff until the higher position you both expect you to fill opens. Transitional roles can be huge to your career development. Seek them, carry them out earnestly when filling them, and value them. They show you know where you want or need to go.
Financial
Jobs have obvious financial roles, too, often more so than careers. We tend to associate our career with non-financial interests and rewards. Ask someone why they sought a career as a nurse or physician, and they’ll likely speak of the reward of healing. Ask them what their job as a nurse or physician supplies, and they may smile while replying a solid income. The financial reward of a job may be the single critical short-term interest a job fulfills. Asked what they think of their job, lots of workers will reply with something like it pays the bills. A job doesn’t have to be otherwise rewarding. Feeding oneself and one’s family is enough, both as a necessity and as a reward, at least for a time and under certain conditions. Yet when other jobs at the same pay and with similar benefits are available, or when the worker doesn’t immediately need the money, the financial role the job fulfills is no longer the purpose for which the worker continues it. Recognize and respect the financial role your current job fills.
Developmental
You might wonder why people take jobs or keep jobs outside of their career field, if not for the income the jobs provide. One good reason to keep working, whether your job aligns well with your career or not, is that jobs develop knowledge, skill, and character, while supplying experience. Maybe you don’t badly need the employment income when you are between jobs in your career field. Maybe you could just wait it out until you catch on again with one of those plumb jobs in your career field. Yet taking temporary employment in a job outside your career field while seeking another job within your career field can show and teach you things you never would have otherwise learned. You might get stronger, smarter, wiser, and more skilled in your career field from what you learn from a job outside your field. A job outside your career field can also expand your personal and professional network. It can also introduce your career-field skills to others outside your career field, who might become your customers, clients, or patients once you return to your career field. Don’t underestimate the developmental and networking opportunities of a job outside your career field.
Vital
You should see from the above discussion how vital jobs are or can be in a career’s development. You don’t just generally step fully into a career right out of high school or college. Careers are something you court, nurture, and develop. You may not even think of yourself as having a career until you’ve worked one or more jobs in the field long enough to convince yourself that the field is yours, where you are most at home, most capable, and most rewarded, valued, and fulfilled. Value not just the career but the jobs that make the career, too. You may also recognize, from the above discussion of jobs, how your in-between jobs outside your career field, whether temporary, transitional, or developmental, can aid you in your career field. Don’t give up on the job because it is not in your preferred career field. That job, too, may be doing everything for you and others that it needs to do.
Multiple
When people think of the jobs they’ve held over the course of a career, both inside and outside their career field, they’re probably thinking of their full-time jobs, one at a time and one after another in succession. First I did this, then I did that, before I took that job next. Yet many of us have more than one job at a time. We may have two or more roughly equal part-time jobs with different employers. Or we may have one full-time job with added other side jobs, side hustles, or second gigs. Those extra jobs can be huge to your career and life ambitions, too. Sometimes, side jobs are purely for the extra money, maybe to pay down school loans or pay for baby’s new shoes. Delivering pizzas or giving Uber rides in the evenings or on weekends probably isn’t for much more than money. But individuals with full-time jobs and adequate income take side jobs for other reasons, too. In my case, I’ve provided expert-witness services, done writing and editing, and done mediation and case evaluation, all compensated but not because I was looking for extra income. Those side jobs introduced me to influential others outside my own network, added to my resume and skills, and gave me greater standing for leadership, teaching, and speaking opportunities. Don’t hesitate to accept a side job that satisfies your passion or adds to your resume or portfolio. See a later chapter devoted solely to the subject of second jobs.
Journal
Start a second section in your journal after your initial Careers section. Title the second section My Jobs. In that section, first list and describe the jobs you’ve had over the course of your life, while thinking how your jobs differ from your career. Next, address your current job. First, articulate whether your current job is within your career commitments, on the border of your career, or outside your career. Then describe your job’s short-term returns, how it serves you and your family and household budget. Also describe how vital your job is to your employer and your employer’s workers, suppliers, customers, clients, or patients. Then speculate on what would happen with all those interests if you suddenly left your job for a job more in line with your desired career. Also articulate whether your current job is temporary or transitional, and whether it is offering you developmental opportunities. The point of the Jobs section of your journal is to help you see how the subtle or stark differences between your job and career inform your day-to-day actions. What adjustments should you make in those actions to do better in both your job and career?
Key Points
A job implies shorter-term and a career longer-term interests.
A job’s focus may be compensation, while careers offer other rewards.
Jobs in your career field inform your career path and build your career.
Temporary jobs outside your career field can build your career skills.
Transitional jobs can get you into and advancing in your career field.
Having second jobs or side jobs can expand networks and build skills.