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Career Posts

Career

Anyone with a brain will tell you there's no one-size-fits-all approach when it comes to growing your professional career.

That being said, here are 5 principles that have served me well during my 10+ years at KPMG, EY, and Google:

  1. The best mentors are those just 1 step ahead of us. They understand your struggles but have also found solutions.
  2. In the long-run, capability always wins. Sucking up, backstabbing, and other under-handed tricks may work in the short term, but if you focus on being the best at what you do, you will come out on top in the long-run.
  3. Over-communication is under-rated. I've been in trouble for forgetting to share updates with stakeholders, but no-one has ever told me I'm over-sharing. Always err on the side of over-communication.
  4. The Work-Life Balance is a myth (if you're ambitious). No senior leader will ever admit this in public since it would be career suicide but just know you will need to make massive trade-offs in life if you want a quick climb up the corporate ladder.
  5. Execution beats strategy every time. If you had a crystal ball that could tell you the exact industry-disrupting new idea to build, but your end product is slow and buggy compared to the competition, you will still lose the game.
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I highly recommend you check out my Succeed in the First Years of Your Career playlist on Youtube if you're working a corporate job!

A few of my favorite quotes

At every job you should either learn or earn. Either is fine. Both is best. But if it's neither, quit - Garry Tan, President & CEO, Y Combinator
Is networking the same as sucking up? Nope.

It's about showing that you've invested in their work before you ask them to invest in yours - Jenny Wood, Director, Google
The concept of work-life balance while being a high-performer is bullshit; successful individuals got to where they are by being out of balance for a very long time - Daniel Priestley, Entrepreneur, Best-Selling Author
If something is easy for you to do? It’s just as easy for your competition too.

That's why easy doesn't usually stand out - Austin Belcak, Founder & CEO, Cultivated Culture

A few of my favorite workplace templates