What You're Really Meant to Do

The Book in 1 Sentence

A somewhat hocky, but superb book about the challenges we face at work and in our careers.

Brief Review

This book does a fantastic job of presenting ways that you can rethink where you are in your career and the steps you can take to move where you want to go. Beyond all of that, the stories he tells and the questions he ask of those in the stories have already made me think about my mentorship differently.

Why I Read this book

This book was recommended to me by my supervisor as we discussed how to plan long term in your career. The name of the book is legit a question that everyone asks.

Currently I am mid level career and I want to progress and make some honestly large changes to my focus area for work. Trying to figure out what I am supposed to do for the rest of my life still feels daunting even after 15 years in the same industry.

In-Depth Review

This book breaks down a lot of the thought processes that early, mid, or senior career individuals think about. I know that is probably the expectation of the book, but the way they are presented honestly makes you think of them differently or provides you with a story with a new way of thinking about it.

I honestly think that might be what this book does best. Provides a generic overview of the items that bother you about work, but don't know how to correct. For instance, trying to get promoted is probably one of the harder things to do in most organizations at some point. If you are not talking to your supervisor about that, then they cannot read your mind. That sounds obvious right? How often though when we get passed over for promotion do we immediately blame our supervisor or "politics?"

This book is short, very short comparatively, but I honestly think that it is one of their strengths. There isn't any prattle, any over explanations, any undue information provided. While I listened to this book, as I do with most that I can get through in a justifiable amount of time, there are some items that I want to buy the book for so I can work through the exercises for sure.

How my life / behavior / thoughts / ideas have changed as a result of reading the book.

Already I have made some changes to the way I talk to my mentee's and direct reports. Asking the right questions has already made our conversations much more productive and we have really made progress.

I also know that in the next portion of my life, I will need to be more direct about what I want to do and how I want to do it. I have a goal in mind for "retirement" which I want to be sooner than 65 for sure and with that I will have to make some changes that I serendipitously started this year already.

Rating

Easily a 9. One of the best books that I have read in my life. Granted every book will hit you differently depending on where you are in your life. I mentioned above that I am in a place to make changes and this is exactly the book I needed to read. Only reason it isn't a 10 is because it can be a bit hocky, but that might be par for the course.