10 Career quotes: What's yours?

Whoever said you can learn a lot from humour was right. (If no-one’s actually said it, I just did.)

So let’s look at 10 of my favourite career quotes:

1. “You are what you do. If you do boring, stupid, monotonous work, chances are you’ll end up boring, stupid, and monotonous” US lawyer Bob Black is being blunt, but he has a point.
2. “Right now, this is a job. If I advance any higher, this would be my career. And if this were my career, I’d have to throw myself in front of a train.” Jim Halpertof ‘The Office: An American Workplace’ epitomises someone whose job is not what they envisioned their career to be. But job satisfaction is just as important as career satisfaction. If your work makes you want to throw yourself in front of a train, then it’s time to make changes — to aspects of your role, or your role altogether.
3. “If you have to support yourself, you had bloody well better find some way that it going to be interesting.” Actress Katherine Hepburn had bills to pay too, but she really did find an interesting way to pay them. Yes, you need it, but don’t just work for the money. Instead, find something you truly love doing and then find a way of getting paid for doing it.
4. “Every day I get up and look through the Forbes list of the richest people in America. If I’m not there, I go to work.” Magician and writer Robert Orben may be driven by riches, but the message is to find something that motivates you to not only work, but to be the best you can be. There’s nothing wrong with healthy competition and ambition — they can turn average organisations into excellent ones.
5. “Work and Play are words used to describe the same thing under different circumstance.” Mark Twain is right. You can do something that you love as a hobby, after work. Or you can do something you love for work, during the daytime when you’re more alert, and get paid for it.
6. “A career is wonderful, but you can’t curl up with it on a cold night.” Marilyn Monroe would no doubt be turning in her grave at Lady GaGa’s counter-quote that “your career will never wake up and tell you that it doesn’t love you anymore”. That may be true, Gaga, but if you treat your career like it’s the only member of your family, it’s more likely that your life partner will eventually fall out of love with you. Of course a career is a huge part of your life, but so is a family. They can’t make the decisions for you, but at least consider them when making major career choices. Sorry Gaga, Marilyn’s career advice wins out here.
7. “The closest to perfection a person ever comes is when he fills out a job application form.” Businessman Stanley J Randall must have come across a few lying job candidates in his time. How did he know they were lying? Because if you lie on your job application or CV, or at interview, you will get found out, especially if you make yourself sound perfect. It’s like cheating in an exam and answering all the questions right — that 100 percent just looks suspicious.
8. “If you don’t like your job you don’t strike. You just go in every day and do it really half-assed.” Homer Simpson is half right. Don’t go on strike if you’re unhappy with your job role. Talk with your employer about how it can be changed to suit you more. If that won’t cut it, consider changing jobs. And do I really need to tell you why Homer is half-wrong? If you do your job half-heartedly because you think it’s the fastest route to change, you’re wholly wrong. Your employer will not empathise. They’ll be reluctant to alter your role and they won’t give you a great reference if you want to change careers.
9. “I’m doing everything I can to sabotage my career. It’s a little thing called ‘fear of success’.” It’s human nature to subconsciously to mess up something good in our lives, as media personality Jon Stewart observes. It’s the ‘do the dumping before you get dumped’ syndrome. Overcome these insecurities by remembering all the effort you’ve put into getting a job you love and using that to remind yourself that you’ve earned this opportunity — you deserve it. If you continue to show the same dedication and effort that you’ve so far invested in pursuing your chosen career, there’s no logical reason why it should ‘dump’ you, so stop thinking it will.
10. “I don’t wish my career on anyone.” Musician John Entwistle’s quote can be taken two ways. First, that you hate your career so much you wouldn’t wish it on anyone. Or that while you love your career, no-one else would want it. It’s important to remember that our personal preferences apply to our careers as well as to everything else in our lives. If you’re looking for a job or choosing a career, don’t go for something just because it’s what you think your peers would be interested in. You are unique as a human being, your career objectives are unique and so should your career choice. Decide on what you want to do and then find a way of doing it.

You may be wondering why I just didn’t come out and say what I had to say instead of using stupid quotes. Well, I’ll leave you with one last quote from David H Comins: “People will accept your idea much more readily if you tell them Benjamin Franklin said it first.”

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