Edition: February 28, 2022
Curated by the Knowledge Team of ICS Career GPS
Excerpts from article by Amy Blaschka, published on Forbes.com
If you want something you’ve never had, you have to do something you’ve never done. And for a lot of people, that means taking a ‘career risk’. Yet far too often, people resist taking action because they’re scared.
Fear is a powerful yet insidious emotion. And during a global pandemic, its effects are magnified. It often masquerades as a cloak of protection, keeping us from doing things that may harm us. But sometimes, the real damage comes from the inaction that fear enables, especially regarding your career.
There is no growth in the status quo. Sooner or later, that caution and those fears that prevent you from getting hurt stagnate you, wreaking havoc on your progress.
To get what you want, you need to move past your fear. Here are five reasons why you should take that professional risk:
1. It’ll help you smash your limiting beliefs
- Self-doubt plagues nearly everyone at some point, especially when we genuinely care about the outcome.
- We stress about doing those things that we place high importance on and value, such as a promotion, winning a new client, or starting our own business.
- So much so that we might never even attempt them because we mistakenly believe limiting beliefs like “I’ll make a fool of myself” or “I could never be successful.”
- But taking action is the antidote to that.
- Once you take that professional risk toward what you want, you’ll begin to banish those limiting beliefs. So often, what we’ve imagined in our heads is far worse than any real-life outcome.
2. It’ll open you up to new people, opportunities, and possibilities
- Change shakes things up and breathes new life into old methods and routines.
- New people cross our paths, and with them, new opportunities.
- We’re forced to get out of ruts we may not know we’ve been in, to view things differently with a fresh perspective.
- It’s about envisioning what’s possible, not just what is.
3. You’ll gain valuable experience
- Challenging yourself to leave your comfort zone helps you stretch your wings and gain new skills, experience, and confidence.
- That might look like mustering up your courage to strike out on your own, volunteering to lead an educational webinar, or offering to put together (or deliver) that new business pitch for your boss.
- Still unsure about taking a chance? Ask yourself if what you’re doing today is getting you closer to where you want to be tomorrow.
- As hockey great Wayne Gretzky said, “You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.”
4. You’ll regret if you don’t
- People regret not being daring enough in their careers, whether that was staying in a lackluster job rather than starting a business or playing it safe professionally.
- “Boldness regrets” happen when we decide not to take a chance because the change we’re contemplating seems too big, disruptive, challenging, or hard.
5. Action begets more action
- When you decide to make the leap, you’re taking the first step toward growth. And the funny thing about action is that it begets more action.
- Once you start, you build momentum and are more inclined to keep it going.
- Action is empowering and contagious; inaction breeds stagnation.
If you’re still on the fence about whether or not to take that professional risk, heed the words of Zig Ziglar: “There are three Cs in life: choice, chance, change. You must make a choice to take a chance, or your life will never change.”
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Have you checked out the previous blog yet?
Education & Career Trends: 13 Science-Backed Tips to Stay Focused
(Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in the article mentioned above are those of the author(s). They do not purport to reflect the opinions or views of ICS Career GPS or its staff.)
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