Best Career Advice…in 6 Words or Less
They say good things come in small packages. That may be very true when it comes to business advice, as well. You can pack a lot of meaning in a few carefully selected words. Perhaps more importantly, you can easily remember short, pithy words of wisdom, which makes it easier to apply them on a regular basis.
Pete Johnson, Portals and Applications Chief Architect at Hewlett-Packard, recently posted the following question on LinkedIn:
In January around the time of the inauguration, the Bush daughters wrote the Obama daughters a letter giving them advice on living in the public eye inside the White House. The most widely quoted part of that letter was pretty touching, "Remember who your dad really is."
At about the same time, Newsweek ran a short story about a collection of 6 word memoirs put out by Smith Magazine on the topic of love.
Given that Jenna and Barbara's advice happened to be exactly 6 words long, and that I have an interest in mentoring, I thought it would make for an interesting experiment to see what people might come up with on the topic of career advice.
So, what's the best career you have, using EXACTLY 6 words?
There are currently almost 90 responses, which I invite you to read for yourself, as well as to contribute your own (feel free to share it here as well). I thought of two that have served me well, and I think are particularly important for entrepreneurs:
"You don't have to do everything."
Far too many people are workaholics, getting themselves stressed out, affecting their health, their relationships, their attitude, even their creativity and productivity. An occasional burst is fine, but as a sustained practice it's actually counter-productive: you spend more hours doing poorer quality work.
You can outsource, you can delegate, you can find partners, you can manage your commitments better, you can simply recognize your human limitations. You're not Superman / Wonder Woman.
By no means have I mastered this -- I constantly have to remind myself of this lesson.
"Are you following your own advice?"
A couple of years ago, I took a look at my business situation and realized that I wasn't doing things myself that I was telling my clients to do. Since then, I do a weekly "self-coaching" session every Monday, in which I take a look at my business, try to extract the "me" out of the picture, look at it objectively, and ask myself what my best advice would be to "this person".
It changed my life. Try it.
My personal favorite answer was from John Madigan, CEO of Executive Talent Services:
"Know yourself, apply yourself, promote yourself."
What's the best business or career advice you've ever received, in six words or less?
Related on About.com:
Comments
Thanks for the plug, Scott. There are a ton of creative answers so far, but I’d love to see more of them, everybody is welcome! I’ll post a link here in the comments to my follow up article when it comes.
—Pete
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Pete Johnson
Hewlett-Packard Company
Marketing and Internet Platform Services IT
Portals and Applications Chief Architect
Work email: pete.johnson@hp.com
Personal email: pete.johnson@nerdguru.net
Personal Blog: http://nerdguru.net
“Go into business for Yourself now”
best,
Chris O.
Referral Key
“Your Trusted Referral Network”
You are responsible for your results.
In the email preceding about.com, I had an email that contained this link.
http://www.simpletruths.tv/store/movies.php?movie=TTWD
The short movie contained the 6-word quote above, but was about the difference between 111 degrees and 112. The one degree more changed water to steam — you know the rest. The best quote from the movie was: “To get what you never had, you must do what you’ve never done.”
Excellence in Totus Sulum - “Excellence in all things, everyday.”
By the way, should be “six words or fewer.”
Good article, though.
“Get out of your own way”
Although my eyes gleam at the potential income of starting my own home based business, I am anxious to witness the personal growth I am sure to experience. In all that I have done thus far I have been my own worse enemy by stoppin myself mentally and sometimes physically. I want to experience such personal growth that I stop creating limitations subconsiciously. I just need to move me out of the way so that I can rise to my potential.
“or fewer”
Another grammar rule that was made to be broken (like not using sentence fragments). 5 is less than 6, therefore 5 words is less words than 6 words. Makes perfect sense to me.
You might (or might not) enjoy Three Grammar Rules You Can
(And Should) Break and the ensuing discussion.
Thanks for the article. It is very insightful.
Here is an advice which has helped me a lot.
“Your attitude defines your career altitude”.
Good enough is not good enough
Good ideas all, I especially like the weekly self-coaching session.
“It is ok to say no”
“Activity without a goal is wasted”