You’re Not Who You Used to Be

Times have changed. Your place in the business world has changed … forever.

Go back 20 years ago and more. If you were graduating from college, you would interview with a number of companies, most likely large corporations, and then take the best offer. Perhaps it was what you were looking for, but most likely not quite. Then you stayed awhile. Your work became the center of your world. Your coworkers and business associates became close friends.

And who were you? You were a Software Developer for Apple or a Business Development Manager for Microsoft. The business card proved your worth, your position in the world. The company gave you stature and identity. Your name meant little without the title and company.

No more. Positions with companies come and go. Many of us now have companies as clients rather than working for them as employees. Our identities now lie squarely in our own hands. Who you are and where you fit in the world it up to you to define and put out there for all to see.  This is not just a result of social media. This is a shift in our culture and way of interacting with each other both inside and outside  the work environment.

If you want to create the life you want to live, you need to not only create the you you want to be; you need to put yourself out there for all to see.

Creating a career for yourself used to entail determining if you were a round peg, a square peg, or a triangular peg, and then find ing the hole that seemed to fit the best. Now we not only define our own unique shape, but we also create the space where we will fit.

This is the dawning of the Age of the Individual.