Do you feel a sense of achievement?

Do you feel a sense of achievement?

Do you feel a sense of accomplishment?

Are you happy?

If not, then I'd urge you to seriously consider your options.  Don't be a drifter, 'Saturday night at the movies' - no, not that kind of drifter (look it up, I'm showing my age!).  I mean, don't drift through life.  A couple of years ago I finally faced up to the fact that I was going to be 50 in 2020.  Hardly ancient these days I know, but nevertheless this is going to be a major milestone for me.  It got me thinking about lots of things, including work and, as many of you know, I changed jobs in 2018 after almost 14 years in my previous one.  I wasn't unhappy by any stretch of the imagination, it was just that I didn't want to end up 'drifting' for the rest of my working life.  I'd stopped feeling challenged in my work and felt I had more to give.  So, despite being terrified at the prospect of changing my whole working life, I knew it had to be done and I haven't looked back since.

18 months into my job and I've realised what I love so much, it's the fact that despite it being incredibly challenging at times, I always feel a sense of achievement and accomplishment in what I do.  Last week I reckon I worked about 40 hours in my 4 day working week.  Granted, I wouldn't want to do that every week(!), but the fact is that I worked those hours without it barely registering until the end of the week because I genuinely love what I do.  This might come as a surprise to my desk buddy when earlier in the week I shouted out f***, sh*t, bo**ocks when I realised I still had a whole heap of work to do for Thursday (the end of my working week) and it was already 2.10 pm on Wednesday!!

So, I'm going to repeat the questions I first asked you above:

Do you feel a sense of achievement?

Do you feel a sense of accomplishment?

Are you happy?

When you achieve or accomplish something you should feel proud of yourself because you've used your skills, knowledge and determination to reach your end goal.  This has a positive effect not only on you but your colleagues and your company.  You will also feel more engaged, more motivated, more creative and more inspired to try new things.

Are you currently doing your job to a high standard but still feel like something is missing?  Then you're in real danger of drifting because you don't have that 'sense of achievement'.

What can you do?

• If you're feeling brave and really want to shake things up then you need to do some research into the job market and find out what other opportunities are out there.
• Look for opportunities that will stretch you and take you out of your comfort zone.
• Look for opportunities in different industries if you've always worked in the same one.
• Do you have a burning desire to do something else?  Why not re-train.

• If you don't want to do anything quite as drastic then you need to look at what opportunities are available in your current role.
• Take on new challenges to push you out of your comfort zone.
• Can you transfer or be seconded to another department?
• Ask to work on a project that you're keen to be involved with.
• Create your own project to help improve an office system.
• Talk to colleagues about what they do to feel a sense of achievement.

I don't want to go all heavy on you BUT .... you've got one life so use it wisely.

#not-normal-november