Book review: Do What You Are

Julie — Thu, 03 Jun 2010 09:00:34 +0000

It’s one thing to decide that your job is a problem and you need another one. Difficult, sure, but you know the process: search job ads, write job applications, twiddle thumbs, lather, rinse, repeat until you get an offer you like. It’s tedious, it always takes too long, and it’s stressful as all get out, but you know what you have to do.

But what if you decide that it’s the career that’s a problem, and you want another one? Where the hell do you start?

With yourself

Your skills change. Your interests shift. Your passions morph. What doesn’t change is your basic temperament. Starting with understanding how you tend to engage the world can help you better narrow down the field of possibilities from “gee, I don’t know, what could I do?” to “hey, this set of things would really suit me — what’s appealing to me?”

Enter Paul Tieger and Barbara Barron, authors of Do What You Are: Discover the Perfect Career for You Through the Secrets of Personality Type.

They argue that knowing your basic temperament can help you focus your attention on careers and jobs that are likely to match you well — making it much more likely that you’ll be satisfied in your work. They walk you through a pretty comprehensive process for finding your Myers-Briggs Type, and then they use those type categories to illustrate career possibilities you might not have considered.

What’s great about this book

There are a number of things I love about this book.

First, I’m an unrepentant personality test dork. I love them all. And this is the best practical walk-through of the Myers-Briggs I’ve come across. It’s detailed without being overwhelming and deep without being wonkish. After reading this book, I think I might actually know my damn type, which has been eluding me for years. (INTJ, if you’re interested.)

Second, they make the point over and over that any type can love and be successful in any career — it’s how that particular job is set up that makes the difference. We think about sales as an extravert-friendly, high-pressure sort of thing, for example, but they profile a seller of fine wines who is introverted and quiet.

Third, they outline a solid ten-step process for finding a next career. For those of us who like direction, it’s incredibly helpful.

It’s not perfect

For each type, they list possible career matches, but the list is both somewhat conventional and limited largely to the for-profit sector. Sure, the lists include education, health care, and counseling, but I kept wanting a broader range of career listings to help spark more brainstorming. Where are the civil service jobs? Where are the non-profit jobs?

But really, that’s a pretty small complaint all told.

Let me sum up

I’m really excited about this book because it gives people a place to start that is more personal and personalized than “list your skills.” People coming out of academia are largely going to have similar skills (public speaking, researching, writing, etc.), but we aren’t all suited to the same types of careers.

In fact, I’m so excited about this book that I’m developing a several-week, small-group telecourse based on it for later this summer to help leaving academics begin imagining what direction they might go next. Stay tuned for that!

Have you read this book? What did you think? Do you have another favorite find-your-new-career book? Share, please!

Book Review: Leaving the Ivory Tower

Julie — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 09:00:47 +0000

Barbara Lovitts left not one, but two doctoral programs. The experience of those leavings led her to this project, which formed the basis of the PhD she did complete.

The standard assumption is that graduate students leave PhD programs because they can’t hack it, whatever “it” is: the research, the self-motivation, the professionalism, the networking, the requirements of the job search. What Lovitts found through extensive surveys and interviews of graduate students, faculty, and administrators, however, is that there are few differences between graduate students who successfully complete the PhD and students who don’t. In the main, the application process does a good job of weeding out those who are inappropriate for graduate study. Those who get in, in other words, are all good enough to finish.

The real determiner of who stays and who goes has everything to do with organizational structures: of disciplines, of institutions, of departments. Those disciplines, institutions, and departments who do a good job of integrating students both socially and academically have a low attrition rate; those who don’t have a high attrition rate.

The bottom line, for Lovitts, is that the structures of graduate education are responsible for graduate student attrition — not the graduate students themselves. And that’s a point I’m glad someone has proven. It’s something most students who leave PhD study need to hear: It’s not you, it’s them.